I miss my grandpa. It was him who first took me plinking.
The year was 1975 (or early ‘76) and I was 5/6 years old. He ‘invited’ me out to the family farm. I’d never been invited anywhere that I could remember, much less the family farm – I didn’t even know what that was. Best of all, he didn’t invite my older brother, just me. Just me and grandpa going on a wild adventure nearly 2 hours away!
Little did I know his intention was to put me to work in the field picking beans and digging potatoes.
A few months later I went back to the farm with him – this time to plant. I can vividly remember sneaking beside a barn to plant some green beans – without him knowing. He knew what I was doing but didn’t say a word about it the entire way home.
A few months later he took me out to the farm again just to check on things, and sure enough, ‘my bean stalk’ was one of the things. The minute we got there to the old house, that’s the first place he went … Just after …
He got out of the car, opened the trunk, grabbed the rifle and said, “hold this”. I remember this so well because it was the first time I’d ever held a rifle. His .22.
It had a strap on it so he told me to ‘throw it over your arm’ – as if I were Snoopy signing up in the Army and going on a march.
He slammed the trunk and started walking to my beans.
This day was also the first day I ever met his brother Olin (I think is how he spelled his name). I’ll never forget Olin (in a sense) because out there in the potato field, while digging potatoes, Olin caught me a bunny rabbit.
While my grandpa and his brother were working the field I was allowed to go, rifle in hand, and travel the rest of the property up to a point. Woods, trails. To a young kid it went on forever, but really it was probably no more than around 50-60 acres – and as long as I kept my grandpa within sight, I felt safe.
The one rule: a stern warning, “don’t try and fire the gun”.
Well, wouldn’t you know it. I couldn’t take it anymore! I had to! I had to try! I started pretending I was hunting. Hunting this, hunting that. Hunting that cow I saw in a field across the way in a neighbor’s yard.
Ready. Aim….. FIR…….
My grandpa grabbed the gun before I could get even the first shot off! And I thought he was going to spank me into a pulp. But he didn’t.
He said, “ya see that cow over there isn’t too far away for a gun like this. This gun is likely to hurt the cow. And we don’t own that cow. If you’re gonna use a gun, you need to know how. Want me to teach you how?”
Of course I said yes and then and there, he commenced to teaching. Including, and this is important, how to safely load the gun.
The gun wasn’t loaded. I couldn’t have hit the cow no matter how hard I tried. No ammo, safety on. Just a kid exploring a property and getting used to the weight of having a rifle slung over and in his arms.
Great lessons.
The rest of the day on the farm was spent plinking. A can here. A bottle there. A tree limb. A potato. Always under the watchful and protective eye of my grandpa. Teaching each step of the way.
On the drive home, with the bunny in a little makeshift crate in the back seat, I drifted to sleep.
I miss that day.
So why Plinking.Pro and Plinking Academy?
Call it a lost memory, which seems to be too lost on too many right now.
Plinking is fun.
Plinking is educational.
Plinking doesn’t require a whole bunch of money.
Plinking is time well spent.
Plinking is sometimes time well spent with people you love.
And when plinking, nothing in this whole world matters except taking that next shot.
Plinking.pro has all the gear you will ever need to get started.
Plinking Academy will teach you how to plink – from beginner to professional.
It’s up to you to just get started and start making memories of your own.
Join us.
Paul “Plink” King
(BTW, for those who don’t know, after you’ve picked beans and dug potatoes the work isn’t done. When you get home you have to shuck and can those beans and wash all those potatoes.)
PPS. The feature pic is me and my mom around this exact same time in history.
