Apr. 17, 2002 - 18:44 MDT

THE WONDERING JEW

A Mixture

Big question it is and a perplexing one. Bill Johnson's column in Rocky Mountain News this morning begins with a hairy question. "Would I ever shoot a man ?" He goes on to discuss going to a convenience store with a friend for a coffee-up and while they are pouring and creaming he sees a dude dressed up Ninja Style level what looked like the barrel of a shotgun at the clerk and who hollered, "Give me the money B__ch."

Bill says, "I'm figuring I'm about to be shot. For being a witness." Bill thinks a bit and says,"How I longed for my own birdgun sitting unloaded and cased in my car. Had I been armed, I'd have for certain shot this little man."

I sat and thought a bit before I read on. In his shoes I stood in that convenience store and watched the event in my mind, knowing that often the clerk is murdered and any bystanders are also. What would I do ? Probably what Bill wanted to be able to do.

He and his friend hear the black pipe (Must have knocked against something), "Its plastic !" Bill and his friend are ready to rush him, to take his head off. "He sees us first, double-takes and lets go with yet another epithet. He flees --- cashless --- into the night."

Here in Denver there is pressure to allow citizens to carry concealed weapons. If that law had been already enacted, would Bill Johnson have been armed ? He says in his column, "I think of that day every time I walk into any mini-mart. I think of how I probably should be armed -- you know, in case." Then he puts us both in the same boat by saying, "I think, too, how I truly don't want to live my life that way, forever with one finger on the trigger. To get the baddies before they get me."

He ended his column wondering whether he really would have killed that little man. He further explains that, "They nabbed him less than 10 minutes after he ran out, Bill and his buddy were driven past him to verify he was the one in the store.

He ends the column weighing things in his mind thinking that if he or his buddy had been armed the man would have died with that plastic stick trying to get 75 bucks. Stupid fool." And his last sentence he puts it to me -- "I don't know what to do with any of this." Nor do I -- the eternal dilemma of whether to be gunned down or gun down someone who might kill you while in the apparent act of committing a robbery.

I have a gun, I know where it is and I know where I put the cartridges in another place. In my mind I have never been able to think that I could make a split second decision of whether to shoot or not or if I could sort it out in time, so the gun stays hid. I have read of things such as a person waking up in the middle of the night, hearing a noise, seeing a shadowy shape coming toward the bedroom, pulling a gun from under the pillow, shooting and finding out when he put the lights on he had killed one of his family who had probably been to the bathroom or for a drink of water.

Then, supposing the robber did have a shotgun, killed the clerk and looked for witnesses -- what then ? Circumstances alter cases that's true, but you can't unshoot a gun -- so how could one avoid being killed ?

The above is the entry I planned to make tonight, but Maggie says something pertinent too, her url is:

http://www.maggiemcquade.com

this lady often causes me to think more deeply than ever before. She has this beautiful knack of using the lyrics of a song along with her thoughts. The title is Teach Your Children sung by Crosby Stills and Nash. To me it seems that both blend into the desire to see that no one human is hurt in any way. So you see, it is A Mixture . . . . . . . .

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