A few days back, I met up with some friends at the range. Fun was had by all. His girlfriend was taking the second half of her carry class (the range session), and we decided to hang around until she finished and get some dinner.
We decided to hit an Italian place in the Vandy area. Naienko (my wife) decided to join us, but was at home and had to catch up with us. Of course, she was at home, and it would take her a little longer to get there. We went ahead and grabbed a table, and let the guy at the host station know that we were waiting on a 4th person.
When Naienko showed up, she asked the host if he knew where we were. She started to try to describe us, and the host asked her “did one of them have a gun?” (one of us was open carrying) She started to say “oh, they probably all do,” but managed a “yes” instead.
For those that don’t know the area, the neighborhood around Vanderbilt University is one of, if not the, most liberal areas of a pretty liberal town.
There were no shrieks of terror.
At least one of us was positively identified as carrying.
We ate our dinner in peace.
Sometimes Open Carry can be a successful ambassadorship / normalization.
(The difference between carrying a gun openly and carrying a gun /at/ someone. Which gets all subjective…. and doesn’t even get into the retention/situational-awareness/target issues)