the things worth believing in

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I have mentioned in previous posts that I subscribe to the idea that:

A man’s ordinary life at peace reflects his courage or cowardice just like a mirror…Having the least bit of spare time, he will put his mind to Learning, and not be negligent in his practice of the martial arts…He will protect his health fully and will keep in mind the desire to perform at least once in his life a great meritorious deed.

-Bushidoshoshinshu

It’s my opinion that a person should, on occasion, test themselves. Large, life altering tests are not as necessary as frequent, smaller tests.  These “little tests” can be as simple as; speaking up when you see something wrong, being the person who takes the lead when it’s obvious that everybody else is looking for someone to make the first move, making a public speech, etc.

In this day and age there are also many opportunities to test your “gut” in a relatively safe manner. There are numerous adventure and X-sport opportunities out there to test your mettle; rock climbing gyms, skydiving schools, SCUBA courses, etc. I recently had the opportunity to do a high angle “adventure” course. You may have seen them, cargo net climbs, wire/plank bridges between elevated platforms, zip lines.

Now, I’m not claiming that doing stuff like this is somehow going to guarantee that you will perform well under stress, or make you magically courageous (my daughter and niece went on this course with me btw) but any opportunity to associate that little twinge of fear with fun is an opportunity that you can use to prove to yourself that you CAN override fear and do what needs to be done.

I look at opportunities like this as a chance to “practice” those things that you don’t/cant practice by shooting at targets or even by trading simunitions with another living person. There is no (or very little) pushing past actual fear in a lot of tactical/weapon training, you get to fantasize about what you “would do” in real life, but it’s still just training. There is a reason why most military boot camps run their recruits through “confidence courses” and obstacle courses…and it isn’t to train them to perform common soldier tasks.

What I found interesting in this latest excursion was the ratio of young people to adults. It’s somewhat amusing how many parents will let their kids do the course but will pass on doing it themselves. Granted, youth has long been known to be more adventurous, but where is the line between adventure and the over-cautiousness of adulthood?

Image by james.thompson via Flickr

When I moved into my home well over a decade ago I was still a fairly fresh rookie with a young family. People being as nosey as they are, (and my stopping home for lunch/dinner in a patrol car), people learned fairly quickly that a cop had moved onto the street. As the years went by I began to notice a dynamic that was never explained in the academy. How you balance being a cop with being a homeowner.

One of the first hurdles I remember was trying to figure out which battles were worth fighting and which were not. The neighbor kid with his loud base thumping while I was trying to sleep? That needed to be addressed. When I stepped out the door and yelled (had to) “HEY..THATS WAY TOO LOUD!  TURN IT DOWN!!” the kids snotty buddy decided to reply with “It’s not after 11 PM yet…” alluding to the Town’s noise ordinance hours (which he didn’t know also includes unreasonable noise at any hour). After I replied with something like; “would you really like to test your knowledge of the law?” I recall the neighbor kid murmering “shut-up..he’s a cop”. The radio was turned down.

Funny thing is, I heard some other neighbors clapping from their windows. Apparently they either didn’t have the nerve to say anything or perhaps they thought it was the “cop on the streets” job.

Then there are the irritating things that just are not worth the hasstle. The neighbor down the street who thinks that they can park in either direction in front of their home because they obviously think that they are special and don’t have to obey the parking laws. Or the friends of the guy across the street who decide to park on the “No Parking” side of our street, just because he feels like it. I’m not about to walk over there and lecture them about it. All you will get then is complaints filed with the building inspectors office if you let the grass get too long, or calls to patrol to complain when a visitor parks their car over the sidewalk while in your drive way. None of that has happend to me mind you, but I have seen it happen to other coppers. I haven’t determined if this sort of behavior (petty violations like parking) is simply arrogance or if they actively think “I’ll park however I want, the “neighbor cop” won’t want to stir up bad blood over it”.

Then theres the issue of the other neighbors who don’t like these parking headaches either,but somehow think I should be deling with it vs THEM calling in a complaint.

Don’t get me wrong, all of my neighbors are decent people. If they were assholes, I would “take care of business”. In a way that would almost be easier, but the fact that they are otherwise good neighbors tends to cause me to overlook these minor issues.

BUT is that part of the “Quid Pro Quo”? Is there an conscious aspect to this? While they wouldn’t park in front of a No Parking sign if one of my co-workers was driving down the street, they don’t have any qualms with doing it otherwise because we have a “go along to get along” agreement?

And to add to the issue is the fact that I as the “cop on the street” have to be sure that I adhere to every law and ordinance because sure as shooting the murmers of “he thinks he can do whatever he want because he’s a cop” would start going around.

 It’s stuff like this that I bring up when the “Cops are just people with a job like any other” debate starts up. Like it or not we have different expectations of behavior on AND off duty and people treat us differently even when we are at home.

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After winning several archery contests, the young and rather boastful champion challenged a Zen master who was renowned for his skill as an archer. The young man demonstrated remarkable technical proficiency when he hit a distant bull’s eye on his first try, and then split that arrow with his second shot.

“There,” he said to the old man, “see if you can match that!” Undisturbed, the master did not draw his bow, but rather motioned for the young archer to follow him up the mountain.

Curious about the old fellow’s intentions, the champion followed him high into the mountain until they reached a deep chasm spanned by a rather flimsy and shaky log. Calmly stepping out onto the middle of the unsteady and certainly perilous bridge, the old master picked a far away tree as a target, drew his bow, and fired a clean, direct hit.

“Now it is your turn,” he said as he gracefully stepped back onto the safe ground. Staring with terror into the seemingly bottomless and beckoning abyss, the young man could not force himself to step out onto the log, no less shoot at a target.

“You have much skill with your bow,” the master said, sensing his challenger’s predicament, “but you have little skill with the mind that lets loose the shot.”

This video was made by Memphis police officer Timothy Warren:

On Sunday, July 3rd 2011, Timothy Warren bypassed roll call and rushed to respond to a “shots fired” call at a Memphis hotel, where a gunman shot him in the head in a stairwell.

“He loved his job,” said his best friend, Jerome Gray. “He told me: ‘I’d give my life for my fellow officers.’ And that’s what he did.”

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Check out Nathans Facebook Page.

We were recently having an interesting exchange about the “train your weakness” vs improve your strength concept. We have all heard the old saw about how you should be training in the areas you are weakest in to improve your overall game. I think that after examining ones “mission” that there is absolutely a benefit to working on your training gaps, but I don’t think the answer is all that simple.

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Do you give the horse its might?
Do you clothe its neck with mane?
Do you make it leap like the locust?
Its majestic snorting is terrible.
It paws violently, exults mightily;
it goes out to meet the weapons.
It laughs at fear, and is not dismayed;
it does not turn back from the sword.
Upon it rattle the quiver,
the flashing spear, and the javelin.
With fierceness and rage it swallows the ground;
it cannot stand still at the sound of the trumpet.
When the trumpet sounds, it says “Aha!”
From a distance it smells the battle,
the thunder of the captains, and the shouting.

-Job 39:19

…a day out shooting?

A few things I learned:

-I don’t typically wear a chest rig (except when I go out shooting I guess), the one I have doesn’t especially play well with my holster and mag carrier as you can see from some of the vids. I will most likely be getting a thigh rig for work later this year so I will hopefully solve that problem.

-My steel plate set-up works well enough for single shots, but the swinging/bouncing thing makes double-taps a problem at any sort of advanced speed. I also think I need to re-think my suspension rig. I’m considering rubber tire strips. I’m shooting off too much chain with the .223 and that’s gonna cost $$$ in the long term.

-Time to make some more paper target stands. Multiple steel target shooting and multiple paper targets are two different training animals. There are some drills I really need 3-4 paper target stands for.

I think I’m gonna have to do this my next time out at the range.

So I did try these out at the range. Obviously I’m not up to Falla’s speed, I screwed up a stage or two and I forgot an extra magazine so I couldn’t do the 3 mag reload at the end, but it’s a starting point.