Op-Ed: NRA's newest convert: Even a hippie needs a gun

On December 5, the Lubbock (TX) Daily Toreador has published as excellent op-ed by Clara Cobb, who is the newspaper's Features Editor and a self-professed (formerly) "anti-hand-gun" "hippie.

The op-ed begins like this:

About two weeks ago, a male approximately 5 foot 9, 150 pounds broke and entered my house.
(SIDE NOTE: This is funny because it is true.)

That night, or rather, early that morning, it was really, really not funny. I had just locked up the front door and the dog in the front room. My friend Lauren was watching TV in the back room.

Suddenly Jules, my roommate's seven-month-old black lab, began barking like she has mad cow, or bird flu, or mad cow and bird flu. She's growling and snapping like I neveer have heard her bark before.

Then we heard the coughing. Then we heard stomping. Dogs don't cough or stomp.

Lauren and I were freaking out. We grabbed butcher knives and head lamps and quickly turned on all the lights in my house.
(SIDE NOTE: For this to be funny, make sure you are picturing two women in a hallway, clutching pillows across our bodies, butcher knives in hand, wearing head lamps and pajamas.)

Click on the "Read More..." link below for more.

The story continues to describe the two women turning on lights and calling the dog, which sounds as if it being restrained, and then continues:

She's barking again, and I peek in my front room. If anyone's there, they are not in eyeshot of the doorway. Then I see the shadowed reflection of a man in the double glass doors leading to the dining room.

The dining room doors are locked, and the hallway door doesn't lock, but since my house is old, the door sticks when slammed. We slam the hall door and run in my bedroom, slamming the door behind us. We have to buy a little time.
(SIDE NOTE: I am a pretty liberal hippie when it comes to life, a make-love-not-war type of girl. But I know enough about anatomy to know a butcher knife doesn't protect from a bullet. I have been an anti-hand gun person for years, mainly because they serve one purpose: to kill people. However, this has become a matter of self-defense. Damn it, this is Texas, and I'm gettin' a gun.)

The writer said that both doors out of the home were blocked by the intruder, and that because her windows are screwed shut (as a burglary prevention measure!), only having been fortunate enough to have a Leatherman handy in a nightstand gave them an exit - by unscrewing the windows.

Again, from the article:

We jumped out my window and now were in my backyard, where all the gates were locked, but the fence is old, rotting and falling down. We tried to break through the fence at the gate, but ultimately ended up running across a downed section into my neighbor's backyard. We pounded on the door. We have to get a phone, stat.

No response. In my mind, I was thinking about how the man in my house could have pulled a gun on us at any minute, or could have been hurting the dog or worse - he could have been finding the perfect hiding place in my house to wait until we came back and went to sleep.

We jumped the fence. Three doors down, the girls have their front door unlocked. We woke up my neighbor girl, who was sleeping on the couch and used her phone to call 911.

Dispatch tells us to wait outside for the police and return to the scene. Hell no, we weren't returning. Especially after we watched the man leave my house, literally walking out the front door.
(SIDE NOTE: *sigh.*)

Anyway, I begin my gun classes in January. I hear that with a shotgun, I won't miss much, so for the record, I also am buying a raffle ticket from the Texas Tech Polo Club.

The sad reality is that for too many people in this country, it takes a dangerous, life-threatening encounter before they realize that it can happen to them, and that when it does, they can count on no one else but themselves for protection when it does. Fortunately for Ms. Cobb, she has lived through her hard lesson, and is now prepared to do something to prevent it from ever happening again. Not everyone lives through such an ordeal, so why not encourage your friends and family to let Ms. Cobb's experience be their wake-up call, instead of their own home invasion?