Paintball

I hosted a trip to the local paintball range last weekend--my first attempt at paintballing. Four teenagers and the old guy headed out to the site on a beautiful Saturday afternoon. I wore big, baggy sweat pants and a baggy long-sleeved shirt because I suspected that being hit by a paintball would hurt and that the more padding I had the better off I would be. My extra clothing proved unnecessary and extremely hot, but more about that later. What I didn’t wear was a hat compatible with the mandatory face shields, so my balding head took more sun than it has seen in a long time!

There was talk about how they were going to destroy the old man, gang up on me and take me down. One of my favorite sayings is “Confidence is the feeling you have before you fully understand the situation”. I truly don’t know if I made this up or heard it somewhere, but Google can’t attribute it to anyone, so I will claim it for my own. I have found it to be true far too often in my life! I had a great time, as did the kids with me.

It turns out that I still don’t know what it feels like to be hit by a paint ball, after a 1000 rounds, none of them hit me! This leads to my second favorite saying “It is far better to be lucky, than good!” I did manage to inflict quit a bit of pain on them however with a number of hits leaving manly welts to show off during the post war BBQ.

Paintball is not what I want to tell you about, although I had a great time, what I learned is that I would be no good in war. Why, you ask? I did very well at the game; I happily, and without guilt, shot the enemy and I strategized to avoid getting shot in the process. Sounds like a good candidate for war to me. It turns out I am just too cheap! I found myself saying things like “why are you shooting, you don’t even have a target” or “aim before you shoot”. I also spent a great deal of time picking up paintballs that had been shot at me, but missed and fell on the grass. I wondered if, perhaps, this was a deep, dark side of me that liked the irony of killing my enemy with their own bullet, but I think it was just the Scotchman in me saying “look, 8 cent, just lying there to be picked up”.

I envision myself in Vietnam (yes, I know this dates me) walking through the jungle going “look, another unexploded hand grenade” or digging out unexploded bombs for reuse, bent fins and all. Can you imagine how irritating it would be to have someone in your platoon forever yelling at you for wasting bullets ever time you fired blindly into the jungle! Economizing does not seem to show up near the top of the list of traits when describing a good soldier. There are times, like trying to save your life, when you should not have to worry about adding up the dollar value of the bullets you just fired. I suspect that if I found myself in a war, I might just “cheap” myself right into and early grave, so I will stick to paintball, were losing means the game, not my life. Thanks to the boys for trying to take me out, better luck next time!