It’s funny how we mark time in our lives. There are the periodic things– the length of time it takes to go through a tube of toothpaste, the time between a change in eyeglass prescription and so on. There are also the one-off milestones. Your first car means something. So does your first deer, and your first trip to the Moon with a girl.

Reloaders have all sorts of measures like that. There is how fast you go through a pound of powder. There is how many times your brass can be reloaded. How many loads does it take to fill a notebook on the bench? When do you wear out your first press? You see a neck-split case coming out of the corn cob, and it makes you think how long it was since the whole batch arrived shiny and new in the mail. Sometimes a split case will leave you with thoughts like: How many tubes of case lube has that been? or Was that before or after I had to get the stronger glasses?

This weekend marked a bunch of these milestones– both one-off events. I used up some 125 Grain hollowpoints and some powder leftover from an experiment back in ’03 and put both sons to work loading their first joint load. Outside of priming the cases, I took a back seat and mostly did the QC work. They took the lead and did all the important stuff. When it was over, we had 50 rounds of 357 Magnum that Mooseboy and Angus can go shoot on their next trip out.

Later in the day, one of our friends that came over to watch the AFC Playoffs decided to start talking about her funeral arrangements and invited Girlfriend to sing at the service. I’ve been to several of my friends’ funerals, and been a part of a few. This was the first time anyone in our circle of friends had ever thought seriously about the hereafter and actually started rounding up volunteers on their own.

There’s a connection here. I just have not gotten past counting up the number of 1-pound cans of Unique it’s been since I met Julie, and estimating how many 158 grain wadcutters it may be before it’s my turn.

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