No matter what you do, you cannot keep guns from boys. If they don’t have one, they will make one out of sticks and mud and paper. They will say “pew, pew, pew.” They will make explosive sound effects. They will fake die in a battle so epic that a real war will never compare. Few girls have that kind of relationship with a killing machine. Apart from boys, that is.
Now my nephews are satisfied with shooting tiny pellets at inanimate objects. A leaf. A bottle that shatters. A moving plastic bag. I don’t know what they would do with a live target. If a rabbit hops this way, we will have to do a lesson in “eat what you kill.” That means gutting and cleaning an animal. I’m not sure that I am up for that.
You wouldn’t know it to look at him, but the oldest is less than six years away from becoming a state sanctioned killing machine. He may wield weapons of mass destruction. And days of sticks and mud and paper will be forever lost.
