A Quarter Inch from Death: The Shot That Changed My Life

Not many people can say they were a quarter inch from death. I can. And it changed my life forever.

Do you ever look back at your younger self and think, “Man, I was heading down the wrong path”? I do—especially when I think about junior high. I wasn’t a bad kid, but I was a good kid making bad decisions, especially with the wrong crowd.

The summer between seventh and eighth grade was a blast. I spent every day with my older brother Dave and our best friends from down the street. We played football at the park, rode our bikes like we were Ponch and Jon from CHiPs (for those too young: it was a TV show about California Highway Patrol officers). That was our turf. We played cops and robbers, lit fireworks, and even tossed unexploded ones into bonfires at the park. Once, the fire spread to some dry grass. We stomped it out—barely. More luck than skill.

We’d light hollow flowerbed sticks and pretend to smoke. We threw tomatoes from people’s gardens. In winter, we’d sometimes throw snowballs at cars. Not the worst stuff, but definitely not right—and definitely escalating.

At night, we played a game called “chase” at the park—a mashup of hide-and-seek and cops-and-robbers. When we got bored, we’d make noise until the real cops came and chased us out. We weren’t evil kids, but we were definitely little sh…nikes.

And then there was Brandon—Dave’s friend from his grade. Brandon and his brother were like accelerants. We were already tiptoeing down a sketchy path, but they pushed us into overdrive.

That summer, my brother Matt got a BB gun. When Mom wasn’t home, we’d sneak it out. It started with target practice on green army men. Then it escalated to someone shooting from a second-story window at friends in the street. The BBs were tiny and the gun was weak, but still—what were we thinking?

The Hour That Changed Everything

Then came the day that would be the catalyst that would change my life forever. I can still remember it like it was yesterday. My family had just finished dinner and our best friends were going to come over. I walk out of the house and see my two best friends walking together along with Brandon who was walking in the lead.

I walked down the driveway to greet them. When I was about five feet away, Brandon pulled a pellet gun from behind his back and fired at my head.

He’d pumped it to the max. This wasn’t the BB gun we’d been messing with. This one shot harder, faster. The pellet was shaped like a bullet.

So when he released the trigger, the pellet traveled that short distance and it hit me in the side of the chin. I didn’t know it then, but it bounced off the bone and traveled down my neck—under the skin.

I don’t think Brandon meant to kill me. We weren’t fighting. He was just doing what he always did—taking things too far. Maybe he thought it was funny. Maybe he didn’t understand what a pellet gun could do.

But it bled. A lot.

Dave tossed me a towel. We were still trying to hide it from our parents. That towel was soaked. The others left, and I stood in the bathroom, staring at a bulge in my neck. Was it adrenaline? Or was the pellet still in there?

Dave and I grabbed flashlights and searched the driveway for the pellet. Nothing. After ten minutes, I gave in and told my parents.

They rushed me to the ER. I remember the numbing, the disinfectant, the scalpel slicing into my neck as the doctor told me to hold still. The doctor pulled out the pellet and dropped it into a plastic tray.

He looked at me and said, “That pellet was a quarter inch from a main artery to your brain. If it had gone just a little to the left, you’d be dead. Do you want to keep it?”

I shook my head. “No.” I didn’t want a souvenir of the secret I was still keeping.

Secrets, Lies, and Lessons

At that point, I still never told my parents about the BB gun. When they asked, “Why would he shoot you?” I just said, “I don’t know.” I think they knew there was more to the story, but I wasn’t talking.

We ended up suing Brandon’s family. They paid the hospital bill and threw in about two grand for pain and suffering.

Two thousand dollars for almost dying? Yep. I mentioned the pull of the trigger was the start of the life lesson… Not the sole life lesson. It came out at the disposition that we were playing with BB guns and I hadn't told our lawyer. At that point I just wanted it done so when the other group offered a settlement, I was ready to be done.

Afterward, my dad sat me down. “Dan,” he said, “there are two people you never lie to: your doctor and your lawyer. They’re both trying to help you, but they can’t if you’re not honest.”

The Fallout

My Dad

My dad was furious. If Brandon had been an adult, I think my dad would’ve gone after him. Brandon was a big teenager but my dad was bigger and tougher. Dad was a big man—six-four, a veteran, not someone you wanted to cross.

He asked Dave, “How can you be friends with someone who shot your brother?”

Dave didn’t argue. He ended the friendship. He chose me.

My dad said something else that stuck with me: “You’ll have lots of friends in life, but you only get one family. I haven’t talked to the guys who stood in my wedding in years. But my siblings? They’re still here.”

Truth is, Dave and I were always best friends. That choice wasn’t hard for him.

I didn’t see Brandon again until high school. He should’ve graduated by then, but he’d been suspended or expelled. We ended up in the same study hall. I sat as far from him as possible. I was scared. To my relief, we never spoke.

Eventually, Brandon and his brother disappeared from our lives. Rumor was they ended up in juvie or jail. To say I dodged a bullet? Yeah. In more ways than one.

The Ripple Effects

I didn’t play football that fall with the eighth-grade team. Maybe I was punishing myself. Maybe I was embarrassed of the recent wound. Maybe I was just tired of being second string and a tackling dummy. That’s a story for another post.

I’m not saying I was perfect from that day on. But it was the beginning of something. A shift. A core value that still guides me: Do what’s right.

Lessons Learned

• Choose your people wisely. One bad influence can derail everything. That’s the hardest part of parenting—you can do everything right, but your kid’s friends can still lead them astray.

• Don’t lie to your doctor. Or your lawyer. They can’t help you if they don’t know the truth.

• God will call it. That’s something I say sometimes. That day, God wanted me to live. Maybe I had an angel watching over me.

• But don’t leave it all to fate. The star player who hits the game-winning free throw might get a lucky bounce—but that luck is built on thousands of quiet, sweaty reps in the gym. You can’t control everything, but you can control the path you walk.

I didn’t learn all of that in one night. But I did learn this: don’t put yourself in situations where bullets—real or otherwise—might fly.

Choose the right path. Choose to be good.

Do what’s right.