Due to the rate of crime going up, life isn’t like it used to be, and it seems like it’s not going to get any better. I remember growing up, if we were in the house we never locked the door. We only locked the door when we left the house and at bed time, and if it was a hot night in the summer time the door was left open and the only protection we had to keep out the thieves was a locked screen door. But nowadays the doors are never unlocked, and if you’re like me you sleep with a pistol beside your bed.

Today, we don’t live in a safe world. When I travel I always take my pistol to protect me and my family from those people that don’t care about human life. Some of those safe places that we used to go to and enjoy ourselves have become safe havens for crime. My wife and I still go to those places but now I carry my pistol to feel safe, and yes I do have CCW (carrying a concealed weapon) license.

Last year, a couple friends and I went through the 12-hour NRA Basic Pistol Course at the Lock Stock and Barrel in New Boston. Now that I have my CCW license I have to look for signs on the outside of storefronts to see if they have a sign that reads “no guns permitted inside.” And this is how I look at it when I see these signs: Do you really think that a person that is already breaking the law by walking around with a pistol without a CCW license is going to take their gun and put it in their car? My answer to that question would be NO, but I, along with other people that carry a CCW license, are the ones that would take their gun and put it in the car before going in the store, or go to another store because we don’t want to break the law as that would cause us to have our CCW license revoked. Businesses that put up these “no gun in store” signs are running away some of their best customers, because to be eligible to get your CCW license you cannot have had any felony convictions in your lifetime and you cannot have been convicted of any drug offense, have no mental defects or disabilities and you have passed a criminal history background check.

I think the sign should read, “You must have a CCW license to enter with a gun!”

Ray Mitchell

Portsmouth