The circle is complete.

When I went shooting this past weekend, I came across an astounding realization. It had to do with a "circle of life" concept. Let me explain...

When I was young, Pops taught us all to shoot using old Marlin .22 rifles. We had Model 60's. We (my brother, sister, and I) shot all day using a 550-round box, and maybe part of another. We shot .22 pistols, too. I don't think I shot a centerfire anything until I was about 10, then not again until I was about 12. My brother started with centerfires then, at age 10.

Up until then, the lowly .22 had been cheap and fun. But, as boys often do, we wanted "bigger and better." Pops indulged us a bit. We got some M1 Carbines (still have those, though Mrs. Usagi has taken possession of mine!). My brother got a lever-action .30-30. I got a bolt-action .270. We still have those guns.

We turned our backs on the lowly .22's. They didn't kick. They weren't loud. They wouldn't do much for self defense. What was the point in shooting them?

Then I turned my back on shooting.

I never fell out of love for shooting - getting in at least one range session a year from age 19 to my 30's. It was definitely a low point, however, for my personal shooting.

Then I became interested in guns again. The renewal of my personal passion was fueled by my wife, who became deadly serious about being able to protect our children should the need ever arise. She leaned on me as the "expert," and I knew I could not let her down.

So I taught her about the guns. How to shoot them. How to use them. I am teaching her now how to clean them and take care of them. This will be the hard part as cleaning them involves getting "dirty."

And I purchased newer and improved self-defense guns. And we got carry permits. And we learned how to shoot the pistols we now carry. And we learned how to hit targets we shot at. And Mrs. Usagi always wondered why, when I picked up a gun and shot, I hit what I shot at. I kinda did, too.

Then Pops would let us shoot the little Ruger Mark III he purchased a couple of years ago. And that gun was the one Mrs. Usagi and I both used when we took the class to get our carry permits. And still, the memory remained, but I was unaware of it.

Then we went to an Appleseed, and trained. And all the training I'd had - thanks to Pops - was refined. And I obsessed. And I got the results I wanted. Then I realized I am not a good shot - I simply fully understand (and very objectively so) what the limits are to my personal shooting abilities.

And I realized during this training, that I can now out-shoot my main self defense rifle. And I realized that once I get a job, I have the wherewithall to change that, and make the rifle effective to ranges I have not trained on.

And I realized that the majority of the training that I have done, and that Mrs. Usagi has done, have been done using lowly .22's. In fact, my favorite gun to shoot is my Marlin 60 - a .22 of the finest specifications and design. A gun that was first designed and built 15 years before I was born. A gun that helped me out-shoot a man who had a very expensive, very accurate rifle - who was shooting from a bench rest. And I had been shooting from field positions.

And so the circle completes itself as I completely enjoy and prefer shooting with the lowly .22.