Gun Control

If she told me once she told me a thousand times, "Davy, please keep your toys and comic books picked up off the floor!"

"OK Mom" I lied as I stretched back in my bed loading another ping pong ball into my Newell Airfire. I had wanted one of these babies for quite a while and after much begging my parents had finally given me one. As toy guns went it was a real humdinger. It didn't just look like a real gun, it was a real gun because it shot real ammo (ping pong balls). All you had to do was load one and work the pump-action slider to pressurize it and you were ready for the hunt.

1950's Newell Airfire "harmless" sub-machine gun.

Toy guns were plentiful in those days. Everybody had 'em...even girls! I had spent most of that morning knocking down toy soldiers with it from across the room. Their lifeless plastic bodies were strewn everywhere across the floor. At least a hundred of them.

But now I was ready for more. I wanted to go after "big game". You know, a moving target like a "redskin" or an outlaw. Just like my movie heroes took care of every Saturday matinee at the Grove Theater.

Audrey Hepburn in her Capris, circa 1953.

It was then that Mom walked into my room. I sensed as soon as she eyed the mess on floor that she was not in the best of moods. Nevertheless, when she bent over to pick up some of the scattered corpses off the battlefield she presented a target I could not resist. That day, instead of her usual jumper, Mom had decided to sport a stylish new pair of tight fitting "capris". The further over she bent, the tighter the capris stretched until they were as taught across her bohunkus as the head of a Royal Marine's snare drum.

I took careful aim, but from only three feet away there was really no way that I was going to miss. As I pulled the trigger there was a loud "thoop" as the projectile was shoved out the barrel by the air pressure followed almost instantly by a most satisfying "thwak" as the ping pong ball found its mark.

The next few minutes were a bewildering mixture of pandemonium, chaos, loud shouting of words I didn't understand, toy soldiers and comics being flung in all directions, ending only when Mom suddenly snatched the Newell Airfire out of my hands, broke it in half across the knee of her uplifted and stylishly capri-clad leg, opened the window of my room and flung the broken weapon out into the back yard. I never saw it again. I had owned it less than twenty-four hours.

I learned several lessons that day, like keeping my area picked up, tuning in more closely to Mom's moods, and to expect (or at least to not be too surprised by) the unexpected. All in all it was not unlike what my drill sergeants would teach me later in life except for one thing. Never surrender your weapon!

Enjoy the snare drums.