Even people who may be against guns as I am might still have a fascination for them. I do.  As a Latin man born in Argentina I have been plagued by a quick temper. I have often thought that if I had a gun in my house I would eventually shoot at someone in anger.

My fascination for guns stopped at air guns. In the old Athlone house in Kerrisdale I watched how squirrels would eat my Rosemary’s bulbs before they bloomed. I went to Three Vets and purchased a 357 Magnum replica gun that was air powered. It even had an extra-long barrel that made the gun more accurate. I decided that shooting at a squirrel without my glasses made it sportsmanlike. When I would open the kitchen door  the rascals would run. I always missed. But once I did not. I caught the squirrel in mid air and it fell still alive. I went to it and I quickly remembered how as a little boy I had killed a bird with a slingshot. I had been devastated by it. I had to give the squirrel its coup de grâce and like that bird of my youth I buried the animal with much sorrow. 

When my youngest daughter Hilary found out she told me that if I repeated my offence she was going to call the SPCA.

I never used the gun again but I displayed it in the living room. One night someone came into the house and liberated me of the weapon.

Guns still hold that fascination and I like to use them in some of my photo sessions but only in the hand of a woman. I love the concept (very Chandler) of a lady’s gun in a purse.

The above is my simple excuse to post this lovely photograph of Bronwen with a toy gun on her lap.