Blending utility and art: the side by side

For the love of a side by side

To me there is something mystical and majestic about the side by side shotgun, a collection of beautiful lines, coming together to create something that blends utility and art. The side by side in question for me currently is an AYA No.4, a lovely ejector side by side, with subtle engraving and some bluing that inspires a confidence that I don't currently deserve

There is something beautiful to me about carefully catching a pair of smoking cartridges that are being ejected from a still smoking side by side, gently blowing the smoke out the barrel (because I saw it in a video) and carefully replacing them with fresh cartridges, making sure the names are the right way up and everything looks "just right" before closing the gun, and making a calculated decision to start the process again. Something I haven't experienced with an over and under, but something I'm sure is familiar to all shooters on some level.Don't get me wrong, these are a tool, they're designed to do a job but the elegance and the speed of them makes everything feel alive, on high fast clays they fly through the target, a gun designed for the field and for the peg.Perhaps out of my own amusement, or stubbornness I enjoy the looks as I walk down a clay ground, my spaniel at my side (occasionally pulling or distracted) and getting a side by side out of a gun slip, I think there's an expectation of novelty, but for me, this is my gun, it's the gun I could afford to buy and its one I am happy to drag through a hedge, and spend a day in a hide with. At the moment the issue with hitting things isn't the gun, it's who's holding it, and until that side is vastly improved, there is no need to change what I'm holding, it may not be the best, or the nicest or the most expensive, but it's mine.