The next attack on gun owners is to censor their reading material. I was in a waiting room one day waiting for my wife. I had brought the latest issue of a well-known “gun” magazine to read. Ten minutes in, a woman sits in a chair two down from me. I looked up, made eye contact, and went back to reading. The next thing I know, the woman gets up and moves farther away. I thought nothing of it at the time. A little while later, one of the receptionists was standing in front of me with a pleading look in her eyes. “Sir,” she said, “there is a woman who says you are reading a gun magazine, and she finds it offensive. Would you mind putting it away?” I look around, and the woman who had been sitting two chairs away from me is giving me the evil eye. I said, “It's too bad she doesn't like my reading material. It's still a free country, and it's not pornography, so yes, I would mind.” I went back to reading, and the receptionist went away. The woman went from couple to couple speaking animatedly and pointing at me. I don't know what she told the other people in the waiting room, but many of them started giving me the evil eye. A few minutes later, the receptionist returned to tell me the other woman had warned everyone I might be an unstable “gun person” and might have a gun, and that the doctor had asked I put away the magazine so as not to upset the other patients, or I could leave. I was legally carrying, so rather than being pig-headed, I put the magazine away, picked up a copy of a cooking magazine and read that. The woman had a smug look on her face. About 10 minutes later, the woman was called. She went out of her way to pass near where I was sitting and loudly called me a “child killer.” After she said that, about a dozen people got up and moved closer to me. No one said a word; they just nodded in my direction and sat down. I appreciated the silent solidarity.
Antaeus Balevre, Bradenton, Fla.
