Irene Rojas Media • Blog

I spent most of Saturday, October 3, at the Missouri Carry Picnic in Jefferson City, MO.  It wasn’t so much a picnic as a trip to a shooting range, and that was fine with me.  I went there looking for potential story subjects and I think I eventually found one.  The people there were very nice and I was surprised by the number who let me shoot their guns.  Over the course of the day, I got to shoot 9mm and .45 caliber handguns, as well as an AR-15 and… something special.  More on that later.

At the handgun range, I spoke with Stan Payne, who told me about some possible story subjects, mostly gunsmiths and gun makers.  He was the first person to offer me a chance to shoot a gun, a Kahr P9.  I started out a little rough, but after some coaching, I started aiming better.  Another man let me shoot his .45 cal 1911 style gun.  I eventually started talking with Erik and Kori Anderson.  They let me shoot another .45 cal 1911 style gun, but the textured grip dug into my hand painfully.  Then they let me shoot the Springfield XD.  I aimed at a metal plate quite a few yards down the range.  It made a sweet “ping” sound whenever I hit it.  Since I usually have trouble seeing where/if I hit a target, the ping was quite nice and clear.  The Andersons also spoke to me about the Appleseed Project, which I think I will do my EPJ project on.  I won’t get into that here though.

After a while at the handgun range, I headed over to the rifle range.  With apologies to the handguns… the rifles were awesome.

Stoney McCleery let me shoot his AR-15 and I think it was my most accurate shooting experience so far.  It was kind of telepathic.  I wished for a hole in the target spot, and there it was.  The recoil was also quite manageable.  Loved it.  According to Stoney, I shot a “DPMS AR-15 chambered in .223/5.56, 16 inch barrel, collapsible stock, quad-rail handguard, and a Bushnell 12x magnification scope” with “PMC .223 full metal jacket 55 grain ammunition.”

A man downrange began assembling a .50 cal rifle and then the fun really began.  I eventually got to shoot it.

After fixing a small hiccup with the loading mechanism (visible in the picture), I aimed and slowly pulled the trigger.  The recoil wasn’t as bad as I expected, but wow.

You can see the size of the rounds in the foreground.  I originally bought an unused round for some more apartment decoration and finally built up the courage to actually shoot the rifle.  Part of the deal was that after shooting, you got to keep the spent round.  Now I have .50 cal rounds in before and after examples.  I was quite giddy after that experience.

I finished out my time at the picnic by interviewing Greg Sackett about the Appleseed Project.  This event was definitely outside of my comfort zone and I’m really glad I went.  I grew up in northern Virginia, and even though the NRA is in my backyard, guns were foreign to me.  That might also have something to do with the fact that my parents are from Costa Rica, where it is illegal to own guns.  They were made out to be these scary things, and they can be, if handled poorly.  I don’t know why I wanted to learn to shoot, but I simply did.  I guess I felt less pressure when starting when I came here.  The guys at TargetMasters were very helpful and understanding.  Growing up, I never thought I would ever shoot a gun, but now, I’m loving it.  It does carry a sense of power, but I also feels it gives my brain a chance to think differently.  It’s a more physical mentality, similar to what I feel and think when playing tennis.  On the other hand, being in grad school, I’m quite appreciative of anything that gets my brain away from book knowledge for some time.  I’ll also admit that I have preconceived notions of the people involved in the shooting community.  While I doubt I see eye-to-eye with them on certain social issues, I found that they were nothing like the ideas in my mind.  At the very least, my time in Missouri has been a real eye-opener and for that, I’m grateful.  I met some interesting people that day and got some very new and fun experiences out of it.

Here are some more photos from the day.