The gun I’m keeping is a Franchi AL-48 20-gauge shotgun. I’ve had it longer than I’ve had a mortgage, a wife, or a driver’s license. My Papaw gave it to me when I was eight years old along with a lesson in adult responsibility. I had previously carried a pellet gun on our hunting trips, and from time to time, he would take it away from me to check the safety. If he ever found the safety off, we went home, no questions asked. Shooting that shotgun for the first time was better than my high school graduation. I’ve shot it for literally as long as I’ve been shooting shotguns, and I hit targets or birds with it before I realize I’ve touched the trigger. That Franchi belonged to my Papaw’s daughter Mary Lloyd, who left this life before I ever knew her. Cancer took her at age fourteen, four years before I was born. Now I have a niece and nephew with shooting and life lessons to learn, and I know that Mary Lloyd’s shotgun has more to teach.
1 response so far ↓
1 Theresa // Oct 22, 2007 at 1:45 pm
Really enjoyed this rememberance of Mary Lloyd and your carrying on a part of her memory with the gun that she once used.
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