Advanced Apathy

At the ripe old age of 9, I had police called on me.

It was in Pleasenton California where my cousins used to live. I would go down with the rest of my family and visit them every other year if possible. When I was 9, I went down there and spent some time with my aunt. It was at this point my loving aunt thought to buy me a cap gun.

Now, if you know me, you probably know that I am a reasonably calm person with a few short spurts of incoherence and dismissive thinking. Reverse that, and you have me at 9. I was the most idiotic, stupid child in the world. Keep this in mind.

So, I have the cap gun. Of course I do the first thing every 9 year old does when he gets his first cap gun, go out in the backyard and shoot imaginary ninjas! They were behind the flowerpots, over the fence, around the house, even in the fricken ground if you can believe it. They were everywhere, but I wasn’t worried, I had my cap gun!

It was after what was probably the 90th cap that a neighbor comes over and knocks on my aunt’s door.

*BANG BANG BANG* (him knocking on the door)

“What the **** is that noise? My ******* dog ran through our screen door and broke a vase after hearing those pops!!”

My aunt goes and opens the door. She can’t believe that this guy is going so crazy.

No, seriously, this guy was nuts.

“Who the **** is going to pay for my stuff?! You?!” he’s pointing at me

Now you can understand how this is scaring me. My aunt keeps calm and says it won’t happen again. After many more explicative’s, he leaves with the promise to bring cops the next time it happens.

So, it’s the next day, and I am bored. I can’t believe I did this, but I took the gun and went out again. I shoot more ninjas (or were they pirates?) and had much fun. Not more than 3 minutes later, however, and I heard the dreadful sound again:

*BANG BANG BANG*

My aunt looks at me, and reluctantly opens the door again. His time however, he doesn’t look mad. In fact, he has a smile on his face.

“My dog ran through the door I just installed earlier today. I am calling the cops, and I will sue your ***!” he walks away in the manner I would imagine Wile E. Coyote would if he finally caught the roadrunner. A few minutes later, a cop appears around the corner to assess the situation. At this point I should mention that 3 nice neighbors who know me come stand by my aunt and talk to the cops with her. They (the mean neighbors, the cop, and the good neighbors) talk as a group for about 5 minutes. Then I can hear the cop finally say:

“Ok, where is this guy, I want to talk to him” I come out from inside the house, and the cop stares at me. He looks to the mean neighbors and laughs and drives away. I learn later that up until the point, he had assumed I was a teenager causing trouble. When he saw I was 9, he just left, apparently not wanting to deal with the mean neighbors. After it was all done, I was quite happy! (see pic on the left) Needless to say, I never shot a cap off again. However, I was never able to walk past them without getting an evil glare…

-Trenton Stahl

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