This trip was possibly the most interesting one that I did
for this blog. I went shooting
with a group of people that I met online out at Pelican Point on the west side
of Utah Lake. Here was a group of us who
had never met before, who met up in a Wal-Mart parking lot, yelled crazy names
out to ID each other and headed down the road to a stretch of BLM land to put
some holes in stuff.
The crazy names were usually things like Blackhawk, monkeyman,
DesrtRat or UT33345. (Any misspelling intentional) These were the screen names that we use on
the internet forum that we met on. It is
a forum for preparedness and outdoor activities, and we saw that other areas
had met up in person, so we thought, ‘Why not? Let’s do it.’
Of course, I probably shouldn’t have gone, because I had
a concussion, and shooting a 12 gauge shotgun didn’t do anything to help me
heal. In fact, I think I made it
worse. But I had fun, plinking away with
my little .22 rifle, and getting to shoot others guns as they were willing to
share. The only gun that wasn’t shared
was one gentleman’s .45 pistol, because it was his baby. Ammo for that gun is pricy as well so I don’t
blame him.
One thing that made me quite sad was the trash. Many people who shoot are very aware of the
land and its needs. They will clean up
after themselves, policing their brass and retrieving any used targets. Policing Brass is a term for picking up the
used, ejected metal casings from the bullets you shot. Some people with the right equipment will
reuse the brass by reloading them.
Others will properly dispose of the brass in the trash at home or will
recycle it at the right place.
But
other people don’t care. They will leave
the mess they made behind. Many bring
junk to shoot up and then leave the bullet riddled pieces behind with other
pieces of trash. I saw people who had
been shooting glass bottles, old TV’s, and other junk. One of the men I was with saw some people at
that location shooting trash, and caused a wild fire because of a ricochet. One fool, who didn’t follow basic shooting
rules, started a fire. What else could
happen?
It was
interesting the type of people who were out at the site. I saw groups of buddies, some with nice pricy
guns, and others with some that looked like they shouldn’t be working. Some of the people were city folks with nice
cars and clothes, and others had rusted out pickups and acted like rednecks,
whooping and hollering as they shot a gun as fast as they could. They were couples were the guy was teaching
the girl to shoot, and families teaching children. It was obvious to see those who had real
firearms safety education and those who wanted to just do as they wished.
I also
thought about us. Here we were, a group of
random strangers, who met online, where it is usually known that no one really
does anything, and we met up in real life to have real experiences with real
people. Since that day, more of us have
met up, in coffee shops, or the range again, and are now working to be an official
group based out of Utah for the website.
I will be heading off now and then the grab a burger with the guys from
the site so we can plan a service project to help our community. It all started with a group of people with
common interest in Missouri, who put together a website, and are now changing how
many of us look at life and use the internet.
The
power of words, written on a keyboard somewhere else in the world, shared with
others, is truly amazing. I hope that I
can continually be able to learn and grow from this group of peers, and we can
use the internet to build our community and help each other to appreciate the
outdoors a bit more.
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