People often say that nothing ever happened in Coronation, Alberta.

This is not true.

What they mean is that most of the things that happened were never reported to the authorities.

I grew up with Brent and Grant Spooner.

They lived on a farm just outside town.

Brent was about fifteen.

Grant was around twelve.

Both possessed the absolute confidence that only teenage boys can achieve.

This confidence was particularly remarkable because it existed entirely independent of knowledge.

One summer their parents went away for a few days and left Brent in charge.

This was considered perfectly reasonable in rural Alberta.

After all, he was fifteen.

Practically a government agency.

Like most boys in town, we all owned .22 rifles.

We had one important safety rule.

Never point a gun at another person.

Remarkably, this rule worked fairly well.

Unfortunately, nobody had yet invented Rule Number Two:

Never point a gun at yourself.

Grant owned an elderly single-shot .22 whose bolt action appeared to have been designed during the Crimean War.

The mechanism was rusty.

Crooked.

Stubborn.

It required negotiation before every use.

One beautiful July afternoon Grant decided to clean it.

The cleaning was successful.

The rifle was now even harder to operate than before.

The bolt would not close.

The bolt would not open.

The rifle had apparently entered retirement.

Brent examined the problem with the calm authority of an experienced gunsmith who had been alive for approximately fifteen years.

Then inspiration struck.

Hit it with a hammer.

History has often taken a dark turn after those words.

Grant found a hammer.

Neither brother remembered that the rifle was loaded.

This oversight would become important shortly.

Grant rested the muzzle against the arch of his right foot while attempting the repair.

Again, this detail would become important shortly.

Brent suggested a gentle tap.

Grant delivered one.

Whack.

BANG!

The rifle discharged.

The bullet traveled through a leather boot.

Then a sock.

Then an entire foot.

This was not the intended outcome.

Although in fairness, nobody had spent much time discussing intended outcomes.

Grant immediately informed Brent that something unfortunate had occurred.

Brent examined the situation.

His little brother had just shot a hole through his own foot.

Brent found this hilarious.

Not mildly amusing.

Not ironic.

Hilarious.

Grant was less enthusiastic.

Brent assured him everything would be fine.

The body heals itself.

Everybody knew that.

To reinforce modern medical science, I believe they poured rubbing alcohol on the wound.

This was considered advanced treatment.

Possibly because it hurt.

For the next two days the boys monitored the injury using the standard rural diagnostic system.

Did it fall off?

No.

Then it was probably fine.

Forty-eight hours later their parents returned home.

The foot had swollen.

The infection had arrived.

Grant looked considerably less healthy than when they had left.

At this point even Brent began to suspect that a bullet passing completely through a human foot might require professional attention.

The local doctor took one look and began administering penicillin with the urgency normally associated with house fires.

Grant came surprisingly close to dying.

Which was unfortunate because he had already survived being shot.

Fortunately the antibiotics worked.

Within a week he was nearly back to normal.

The foot healed.

The infection disappeared.

The family survived.

And life in Coronation returned to its usual quiet routine.

So whenever somebody tells me that nothing ever happened in Coronation, I smile.

Because I remember a summer afternoon when a twelve-year-old boy shot himself through the foot while repairing a loaded rifle with a hammer under the supervision of a fifteen-year-old acting parent.

And somehow that wasn’t even considered unusual enough to make the newspaper.