Now Here’s One Mother’s Day Gift That’s Way Off Target

I’m a bad son. I don’t send Mom a present for Mother’s Day. Just a card and a phone call.

OK, I’m a cheap son.

Even if I weren’t, of all the things I wouldn’t give her Sunday is a four-hour instructional course on firearm safety and ammunition awareness, like the one being offered this weekend in Orange County by local members of the National Rifle Assn.

Not that she’s dropped any hints or anything. “You know, honey, if you really appreciated everything I’ve done for you. . . .”

Mom lives alone in an apartment, and of course I worry about her safety, but the thought of arming her as a Mother’s Day present is as far off the radar screen as giving her a Doberman.

It’s Mother’s Day, for Pete’s sake.

Guys like Paul Vallandigham don’t understand my thinking, and I’ll say this: I don’t understand his, either.

Granted, a gun would thwart any bad guy’s intentions with my mother, assuming she knew how to hit a target and wouldn’t be freaked out the rest of her life if she shot a burglar. Yet, the thought of putting a gun in her hand makes me cringe.

So, even if she lived in Orange County, Mother Dear wouldn’t be attending either of the free four-hour courses Vallandigham is helping organize. One begins at 8:30 a.m. Saturday at Evan’s Gunsmithing’s Shooter’s World in Orange and the other at 12:30 p.m. Sunday at Silverado Community Center in Silverado Canyon.

“We thought we’d provide an alternative to the Million Mom March on Mother’s Day last year,” says Vallandigham, a 43-year-old husband and father of two daughters, 11 and 8. “Something with more practical value.”

Speaking of practical value, the Hallmark people haven’t tapped into the “Firearms-On-Mother’s-Day” market.

“There’s no one quite as sweet as you/

So here’s a nickel-plated .22.”

Last year’s march in Washington drew attention to gun violence and the push for tighter controls.

Wrong approach, Vallandigham says. Vallandigham supports gun ownership as a constitutional right and says many problems with gun violence could be reduced if people followed proper storage and safety procedures.

The weekend course will explain a range of storage options.

“For instance?” I ask.

“There are a variety of strategies, depending on what your needs are,” he says. “If I don’t need quick access to a gun, the option I’ve chosen for our family is that I have a full-size gun safe to store my rifle, shotgun and handguns I don’t need to have on hand for quick use. For the couple of handguns that I have ready to go for quick access, I have a quick-access lock box. You punch a combination code with five units, and in a couple seconds, you’re ready to go.”

Vallandigham says the Mother’s Day weekend sessions are primarily for women and teens, but not because they’re way behind men when it comes to gun knowledge.

“Actually, it tends to be the opposite,” he says. “Most guys think they know a lot about guns and don’t. My daughter is a member of the local junior shooting club, and she’s become an excellent shot, more than the older boys who think they know what they’re doing, but don’t.”

The president of the shooting club, Vallandigham says, has told him that women tend to be better shots because they follow instructions better.

I ask Vallandigham if the gun sessions don’t seem a bit “in-your-face” for Mother’s Day.

“I wouldn’t consider this in-your-face,” he says. “I would consider it practical education. Look at police officers. They’re not legally required to protect you. Their gun is to protect themselves. They need the use of a gun in that situation, so it makes sense that a private citizen would need one too.”

I’ve never completely dismissed that logic. I guess I’m just not a “gun person.” I’m the kind that NRA people look at and shake their heads.

I can see you guys out there now, trying to decide what to get Mom or the wife--that day at a spa or the quick-access lock box.

Whatever. My mother is going to spend the rest of her days not knowing how to load a gun properly or to recognize various types of ammunition.

I ask Vallandigham if his wife is attending the sessions. He says no, adding that she’s not as involved in the NRA as he. I ask what he’s giving her for Mother’s Day.

Nothing dramatic, he says.

“She’s asked for a watch and a bracelet.”

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Dana Parsons’ column appears Wednesdays, Fridays and Sundays. Readers may reach Parsons by calling (714) 966-7821; by writing to him at The Times’ Orange County edition, 1375 Sunflower Ave., Costa Mesa, CA 92626; or by e-mail at dana.parsons@latimes.com.