I want a gun!!

I want a gun! Not an Uzi or Luger or anything automatic..but a colt 45 with a mother of pearl handle. I see myself as a modern day Annie Oakley, a pistol in one holster; my Blackberry waiting in the other.

Almost every week I see an ad extolling the virtues for women to sign up for a concealed weapons class. And almost every week I think "hmm maybe I should sign up" and I picture myself on my horse with my gun hidden in a saddlebag waiting for that moment when I defend myself from a rabid bobcat, or fierce pack of coyotes, or a herd of rattlesnakes refusing to move, not allowing my horse to tiptoe around them..

For a brief time I almost had my husband convinced. I told him of all the women I knew in Cochise County who carried guns. Finally one weekend he loaded his 22 and we shot at cans and bottles. I didn't do too bad, if I am ever threatened by a diet Coke can or a Coors Light bottle, there is a good chance I will win the fight .Encouraged by my sharpshooting skill, the next day I took his Beretta and shot up our NO TRESPASSING signs. I scared the horses with the loud blasts and had to wear apple treats to get them to come near me for the next week.

The following weekend I dragged my reluctant better half to three pawn shots in Tucson and perused their weapons. None of them had pearl laden pistols. When I got home I called my brother in Wisconsin remembering he had inherited a lady like pistol-maybe I could convince him it should be mine.

On the phone I reminded my brother I had take riflery class in college. He reminded me I supported the Brady Bill. I reminded him I had joined the NRA when I was 18. He reminded me I was thrown out of an animal rights group for being so militant. I told him I needed the gun to protect myself from rattlesnakes and rabid coyotes. He relented and said he would send me just what I needed.

I thought about our conversation. There was some kind of cognitive dissonance going on with me. My brother was right I was opposed to guns. I had a bumper sticker on my car saying "Support Our Right to Arm Bears". When I was still teaching college I always lectured to my cross cultural communications classes against guns, revealing the research that more murders occur in Washington D.C. yearly than in all European nations combined where guns are banned.

But now I live where Mohave rattlesnakes creep inches away from my Tevas when I walk ito the house, where a gang of coyotes lounging between our front door and our gate, took a chunk out of my brave dog on Thanksgiving day. I ride my horse alone following a sandy wash and am three hours from the nearest point of civilization. I am in the Old West-I need a gun.

I prematurely put "Janie's got a gun" on my Blackberry's ring tone. My old friends freak out when they leave a message, obviously I have been in the Arizona sun too long. Where is their bleeding heart liberal non-gun toting pal? I call my brother again wondering where my weapon of choice is. My brother says the package has been sent. My husband is starting to worry-a scatterbrained wife and bullets will not mix well. I do have a tendency to scream, then run wildly in circles stuttering when I see any kind of snake. My patient spouse is fretting I will shoot one of the cats, or dogs, or hot tub, or him while stumbling around getting my up up my courage to aim at the evil venomous rattling shaking snake .

At last a package arrived with the appropriate return address from Cheeseland. My brother had came through. I ripped into the brown paper wrapping, and withdrew the weapon my brother had sent.

It was a Walmart slingshot.

I sent it back postage due.

Do they have a gun section on Craigslist?