A 22 For Christmas

[Jim DiSpagno]

In 1958, my Dad gave me a Marlin model 100 that a close friend gave him as appreciation for teaching him to hunt 29 years prior. That little single shot accounted for an untold number of squirrels a few dozen cottontails and the occasional raccoon. Forward forty years and the nephew of the gentleman that gave the old man that gun had an eight year old boy so I paid it forward. When my grandson was born in 2018, I asked Tom who was a NYC cop if he still had the gun. He informed me that a relative with a drug habit stole five sporting guns from his home and that little 100 was among them. He offered to replace it but I turned the offer down. Just wouldn't be the same. So in a couple of years, I'll get my grandson a new one and he can restart the tradition.