Smarts for sure-When I was just shy of 11, 4 of us we were shooting at cans with the .22 my parents had just given me. My 3-years-older cousin and I were arguing over whose turn it was to shoot, I lost my temper and walked in front of him, called him an ass**** and dared him to hit the finger I was waving back and forth in front of my neck-he shot me on the side of the neck-just barely grazed me, but it started bleeding, we all started screaming like murder was being done, and adults came running. As soon as my aunt who was a nurse saw that no serious injuries were present, we all got an ass beating for the stupid stunt, and the gun was taken away for several weeks...
Did you get smarter after that?
My dad told of a kid in Colorado who was chopping kindling for the stove. Another kid came up and said...”Betcha can’t hit this!” Then he put his finger on the chopping block.
But he did.
When we were young, many of the school toughs played football in school to impress the girls. Other toughs went hunting.
Several years later when they got the letter, “Greetings from the President of the United States”, they suddenly came down with back problems or had shot themselves in the foot.