TARGET PRACTICE : Taking Aim : Your parents wouldn’t allow it, but now you’re on your own and can learn to shoot a gun. The lesson has an impact.

You never learned to shoot when you were a kid because your dad didn’t believe in hunting. Your dad also had this thing about guns--he hated them.

“Guns in this house?” he’d say when you’d whine about an Erector set or a microscope or some other educational gift you’d get for a birthday or Hanukkah. “Never.”

There were a lot of nevers in those days: You’ll never have a motorcycle, you’ll never stay out past midnight, you’ll never drive my car. And, back then, never meant never. Or until you moved out of the house.

Years go by. You do move out. You go to college. You graduate. You get a job, an apartment and bills.

Like the song by the Suicidal Tendencies says, “You’re an adult now.”

In dad’s lingo, that means you’re “off the payroll,” but to you, it means not having to ask permission to do things. Like finally learning to shoot a gun.

The only problem is, now you’re scared to death of them.

You’d spent time in Israel with people who carried them everywhere. This convinced you once and for all that you never wanted anything to do with the nasty things. Operation Desert Storm showed you why.

Still, the nagging desire to shoot a gun remains. Then comes the day you are driving through Oxnard and you see it.

A huge sign on the side of an indiscriminate warehouse says, “The Shooter’s Paradise.” Indoor target practice, ammo, handguns, targets, the whole she-bang.

You pull over and go inside, ostensibly to check it out. You are confronted by a thin, mustachioed man standing behind the counter, toting a small, high-tech pistol on a waist holster.

Like other times you’ve been this close to armed and swaggering gun nuts, you are scared and disgusted. But also a tad envious.

Still, side holsters in Oxnard? You want to say, “Buddy, this is Ventura County, not the OK Corral.” Instead, you ask him if you can take a lesson.

You learn that the National Rifle Assn. conducts a monthly home firearms responsibility class, a necessity if you wish to purchase a handgun these days.

Trigger-finger seems to be daring you; no, he’s actually sneering in your face, as he explains the details: The cost is about $45, including gun rental, ammo, targets and instruction; it takes about 3 1/2 hours.

You sign up.

In the days leading up to the class, you think back to other times you nearly learned to shoot. Your uncle was going to take you and your younger brother once, but your parents stepped in.

Then your friend Bruce’s dad was going to teach you and Bruce to shoot, but after the three of you hiked up into the hills above San Jose, he decided that guns were really toys for adults, not kids.

You think about this as Los Angeles County Marshall Joe Dukes takes attendance at your NRA shooting class. “Will I be a failure?” you keep asking yourself.

Dukes is about as far from your other would-be teachers as could be. He is professional, detailing his various experiences in firearms instruction and his numerous certifications.

Gun laws are the first things learned by your fellow classmates: a retired couple in their 70s, a husband-and-wife shooting team who seem to be in their mid-30s, several would-be security guards, and one strange man who sits in the corner and takes copious notes.

There are laws about being charged with felonies for improper storage, felonies for letting kids at your guns, felonies for shooting people. It is important to remember, Dukes says, that “you can’t use a firearm to protect your property.”

He tells the class of a hypothetical situation where an assailant is breaking into your home. It is against the law, he says, to shoot unless you are threatened physically.

“I suggest you take your firearm and hide,” Dukes says.

Many classmates are upset about this law. They seem to want to shoot someone and assume you do too. You keep quiet.

Then the class gets down to business. A movie is shown entitled “A Woman’s Guide to Firearms.” You think this is a bit sexist, but what can you do, fight the NRA?

The movie shows a nice woman who worries that someone is going to break into her home. She calls a neighbor, who asks if she has a gun. She tells him yes but, alas, she doesn’t know how to use the thing.

And there is the premise for your class.

Everything the woman learns in the movie you will learn as well. How to pantomime aiming the gun (close the left eye in most cases), how to stand (feet at shoulder width and arms outstretched) and even the crucial follow-through, which means maintaining your stance.

It feels ridiculous when you and the class stand up, form make-believe guns with index fingers and thumbs, and assume the shooting position while pointing at targets of bad guys around the room.

The serious stuff begins when you get a real gun in your hand. Yours, a Smith & Wesson .357 magnum with a four-inch barrel, feels good. It’s a bit heavy, but your hand wraps around the handle like it was made for you.

“The secret to shooting,” the instructor says as he stands directly behind you and corrects your position, “is a good one and a two.”

You are incredulous. All this time, all this money and he’s giving dance lessons? Has the NRA gone soft?

Hardly.

You learn that if you listen closely while slowly pulling back the trigger, an audible click is heard halfway. “That’s the one. Did you all hear that?” Dukes asks.

Continuing back, you hear a second click just before the trigger pulls all the way back and sets off the gun. With this knowledge in mind, and other information and practice on loading and reloading, firearms safety and maintaining your aim, you are ready.

Donning goggles and earphones, really old ones (the kind your dad had on his eight-track stereo in the 70s), you head into the range. Targets are mounted and sent down the aisle, and you wait while other classmates get one-on-one instruction.

Finally, it is your turn. You load, take off the safety and assume the position, as taught.

You slowly pull back the trigger, listening for the clicks while maintaining your aim. You do not breathe.

The first shot is a direct hit, right in the heart, a 10. Smoke slowly wisps over the barrel as the retort rings loudly through the headphones. You hardly move, barely breathing, and do it again. It is another 10, as is the next, and the next, and so on.

Dukes asks you how it feels, and you barely manage to croak, “Good, real good.” You are in a frenzy.

Your hands shake, from the power you realize the gun has, and also from the control you realize it exerts.

You are shooting, and shooting well, but there is still a nagging feeling that something is wrong.

Slowly you pull the trigger back, listen for the one and the two, and then “click,” nothing happens.

You turn to Dukes, a surprised look on your face, and ask what went wrong, imagining the worst.

“You only got but six bullets,” he says, laughing and moving on to the next student. You finish your box of bullets, pick up your card for completing the NRA class and slowly walk to the car.

You listen softly for a one-and-a-two.

* THE PREMISE

There are plenty of things you have never tried. Fun things, dangerous things, character building things. The Reluctant Novice tries them for you and reports the results. After all, the Novice gets paid to do them--and has no choice in the matter. If you want to tell the Novice where to go, please call us at 658-5547. If we use your idea, we’ll send you a present.