The story of the witch and the bulls eye....

recurve bow
I did not always like reading.  In fact I hated to read.  I think it had to do with the fact that I was not very good at it and lacked all confidence in my abilities.  It was this way from the days at Peter Pan Preschool and by the time I hit jr. high I had the meanest (I still have bad dreams with her as the evil witch) English teacher who let me know that I was lacking in ability(in front of the class and sometimes classes I was not even in she would mention me). I would like to blame her for my overwhelming fear of reading which stuck with me up through high school and occasionally creeps up if I am caught off guard and asked to read aloud with no notice.  


(The picture is just representation of the witch and sweet, impressionable, 12 year old me.)

My interest in reading changed when I gave it a chance and I had no other form of entertainment. This happened the summer after High School when I moved to England. No T.V., no computer, and no radio (this is before mp3 days). I was there with long periods of time during the day by myself with nothing to do.  I started to read British classics (recommended by my sweet sister-in-law, Heather) and learn to love the written language. This love was rekindled when I started teaching jr. high. Kinda ironic. I wanted to be well read in the books that might interest my students. As I started to burn through adolescent literature, I found a common theme or should I say weapon that came up over and over again, The bow and arrows. I began fascinating about developing a sure shot.  Well tonight was the first night of my practice. Travis and I came across a bow club by chance. We wanted to check out the ice skating rink and wouldn't you know it, in the up stairs was a shooting range. 

Ice skating rink/shooting range

 A very nice guy named Josh invited us to come back and shoot. So tonight we did. For as much thought as I have put into the bow (through reading) I kinda thought I could just pick it up and rock the house. On my second shot the string hit my arm and holy cow it hurt. It left an impressive bruise and a small amount of fear to let go of the string again. As the night went on I did not get much better with my aim but Travis and I did have a lot of laughs.  We will be joining the bow club and returning.  I hope with time I will be as good on the outside as I am in my head.

How I envision myself. Who knows? It could happen.