I have one memory that has affected my life since it occured. It is so intertwined into my mind heart and soul that it impacted my life for life. Memories have that affect on most of us that it can shape who we are and who we become. This memory was turned into a poem that started the process of healing from within. As a child I loved to play with toy guns with family friends we played cops robbers Cowboy indian so on. When I grewup I wanted to be in the service and to someday become a police officer. That all changed one afternoon when my mom pointed a 22 riffle at me and pulled that trigger. To this day I do not wish to own or use a gun of any kind. I also believe in the Right to Bear Arms why because that is one of our contitutional rights and I believe in those rights. Now do we need backgroud checks yes do we need to make sure people with a violent history of abuse not be allowed to own guns yes. That the mentally unstable not be allowed to own weapons yes. The following is my story of that day when Mom chose to impose a memory that changed my life forever. Do I regret not backing down no. This one memory is what made me the person that I am today. “Stand My Ground Wont Back down”. Loves hugs to everyone. Side note when I finished writing this poem I went out to smoke and it was a windy day and when I bent down to put the cig out I found a 22 caliber bullet I still have that bullet.
Until That Day
By Mary C Rowan
Until that day I had so much imagination.
I loved to play cowboys and Indians.
I was a cop or a robber.
I went into stealth mode.
I was on the lookout for danger.
Behind every tree, rock, hillside, there was danger.
I was hiding behind the trees and crouching next to the huge rocks on Gram’s farm
and laying into the hillsides waiting for danger to come over the ridge.
I was hiding in the barn, chicken coop and spring house waiting for my pray.
I loved to walk through the woods and look for sticks.
The big sticks were rifles.
The little sticks were Colt 45s.
Every year for my birthday I got a gun set, six shooters around my waist
and my sheriff’s badge pinned to my shirt.
Then one day I was just being a kid, and I guess to mom I was being bad.
I ran from the house and I was standing in the yard.
The door swings open.
She is wearing black polyester slacks with a hateful angry red shirt.
I hitch up my hand-me-down jeans.
I cross my arms seeking comfort within my gray sweatshirt.
The distance from us is from where I’m standing now to the back of this room.
The mustiness from the morning rain is suspended around me.
A 22 rifle is resting comfortably in her hands,
The same hands that caressed and cradled her rosary this morning.
As the silver plain cross dangles from her neck
She slowly raises it until she has the bead between my eyes.
She dares me to defy her. I am the Taurian woman of strength.
I wrap my arms around the courage that I have within me.
I do not succumb. She glares at me. My eyes plead back. I open my arms wide.
My mind empties with the hollow click of the rifle.
Since that day I have not been afraid to die.
I am left standing like the granite Sunset Cliffs surviving the continuous oceanic erosion of abuse.