My Little sister by nature is a goofy, fun loving extrovert.  Being a coal-up-my-butt-makes-the-world’s-diamond-supply styled Introvert, I only understand her condition on a theoretical level.  But Little gets lonely and sad if left on her own too much.  Exponentially so since the stillbirth.

She spent a season in the dark of her house trying to figure out what (like the big, existential WHAT) had happened. Even from a distance, it’s hard to separate out how wanting to have a life again, to feel normal again, isn’t a betrayal of the person who died.  So when Little said, “I’m so tired of being sad,” I cried, but I smiled too.

As such, Little’s been trying to fill every weekend with some kind of get-out-the-house activity.  Like…. every weekend since 2016 started.  I’m not saying it’s reached obsession levels or anything, but mostly because it’s like watching her pull herself out from an alligator pit with her own bloodied hands, and so FUCK YEAH, wildly obsessed Little is a beautiful thing to behold.   And shit, it’s also terrifying, and it feels like I’m perpetually dancing around the edge of the pit, frantic as a kid who needs to pee, hoping she makes it.

So when I scrolled through my facebook feed and up popped a photo of Little holding a gun approximately half the size of her body, I had to dial her up for the latest.

“OMIGOD, that.” She sighed long and hard.  “So that started when my guy friend, Chuck, invited me and my husband to a ‘weekend’ ‘gun safety’ class his cousin runs ‘just outside Las Vegas.’”

I can hear the air quotes over the phone line, because sisters.

LITTLE:  I say, sure! because it’s something to do, and my friend can get us into this $500 class for $50 because it’s run by his cousin.  Figure I’ll check ‘firing a weapon’ off my bucket list, then hit the Strip.  Sounds good, right?”

ME:  (because I love how doggedly she will do anything to get out of the house.  Unlike me.  I’d be under three blankets.) SURE!

LITTLE: Except the ‘weekend’ is FOUR DAYS, and intro level ‘gun safety’ class is a PARAMILITARY SURVIVAL COURSE and ‘just outside Vegas’ is TWO HOURS OUTSIDE VEGAS, in the high desert, with approximately 200 gun nuts dressed in desert camo, and zero civilization.

ME:  Whoops.

LITTLE:  Yeah, I barfed on day two.  Heatstroke.  Or as my comrades called it, “being a liberal.’

ME: … So you learned how to shoot a gun, though, right?

LITTLE:  You know the best part?  THE BANQUET AFTER.  While we ate, we had a speaker.  She says, “OK, I’m going to tell you a scenario, and I want you all to stand up when you’d make the decision to discharge your weapon, OKAYYYYYYY?”

ME: (Imagines the following in the voice of Sarah Palin.  SORRY.)

LITTLE: She says, “A man walks into the room.”
LITTLE:  She says,  “He has tattoos.”  Swear to God, the first person stands up.
LITTLE: She says,“He appears to be carrying a concealed weapon.”  Like, half the people stand up.  I’m looking at them like WHAT THE ACTUAL FUCK?  YOU ALL ARE CARRYING WEAPONS.  YOU WOULD BE SHOT IN THIS SCENARIO.
LITTLE: Then the speaker says, “He starts fondling his weapon.”
LITTLE:  At this point, I turn to my husband, and we make eyes like, ‘yeah, should we stand up? You wanna stand up yet? Does this guy deserve a cap in the ass yet?’
LITTLE:  The speaker yells, “BOOM.  YOU’RE DEAD!”
LITTLE:  I’m trying really hard not to laugh in the dramatic silence that follows.  Because honestly, I’m a little afraid one of the amped-up standers might take a shot at us if I do.
LITTLE:  As we get back to dinner, she says, “Now, everyone in this room would know you’re justified in taking the shot.  But here are some key words you want to use during the police interview, to make it clearly legal you acted in self-defense.”

ME:  So A+ weekend is what you’re telling me.

LITTLE: Actually, not the worst one this year.  I did learn how to shoot a gun.

ME:  Sweartogod, you should write a book —  52 Weekends Keeping Grief At Bay – and chronicle your adventures.

LITTLE:  All I need is a zingy title.

ME, laughing: “It’s Not Worth It” by Little.
ME, instantly wishing I could take this comment back.

And even though she laughs too, there’s an awkward-turned-grim silence, because of the reason she’s doing all this in the first place, and how nothing will ever make it worth it to have gone through this.  And God, I wish I could end this on a happier note, but this is what life looks like right now: like watching someone crawl out of an alligator pit.