Country Fun

By: Ben Tiernan

Dave and Suzy called my cell phone while Andrew was explaining to me the various stages in the season when they spray grapes with growth regulators. Andrew had spent the morning driving around the vineyards checking on the progress of the work-crews, and assigning their stations for Monday morning. I’d accompanied him in the passenger seat of the truck tending to my hangover and trying to avoid situations where I might have to speak Spanish.

Dave and Suzy with a Glock

Dave and Suzy were lost, which was a very reasonable thing to be since Andrew lives among hundreds of miles of vineyards with no distinguishing characteristics to the untrained eye, and vast, unmarked country roads. I told them to pull over, so that we could come find them witch we did with surprising ease.

As a farmer, we, the city folk, like to exploit Andrew’s access to vast, open, untamed space and tap into the lawless wilderness with decadent abandon.

As evidence, we wanted to shoot guns. Andrew recently bought a .40 caliber Glock to protect himself against home invasion because his home had been invaded one night. He also had a shotgun that he carried around in the back of his work truck to shoot at little birds that eat grapes off the vine.

Access to these wholly foreign, but significant cultural icons was too much to pass up. First, we shot the handgun, which was disturbing for a while as I considered that the tool in my hand was engineered specifically to kill people. Then I realized that, with it, I was just like Jet Lee and I cranked out shells rapid fire with my only remorse that I was not wearing a black suit and I didn’t have a gun for both hands.

Andrew and Dave were both much better shots than I was and Suzy, who was a novice, took to the sport with natural aptitude.


Next, we shot shotguns, or rather we shot skeet. The best way to put it would be to say that Andrew and Dave shot skeet and Suzy and I shot shotguns at skeet, but I could tell that the skeet were never very concerned when Suzy and I were up. The take away from the skeet shooting was that there is nothing on this earth that makes you feel quite as viril as cocking a pump-action, 12-gage shotgun.

Another take away was that when they protected the right to bear arms in the 2nd Amendment, they probably didn't have me in mind. When I'm popping off caps at wine bottles, I begin to wonder if perhaps the NRA lobbys too effectively.