The Scout

I haven't had time to post too much this fall--we've been really busy and honestly, with a baby, I try to use all my spare time for sleeping. That's why I haven't gotten around to this topic: we have a Boy Scout in the house. A really handsome one!

He's in a new Den with only two other boys. There was some big controversy at the beginning of the school year where they had totally overloaded one Scout Master with too many kids. So, they broke up the group into three and we're in the smallest. Connor has been working on learning the "Bobcat Trail" and he's doing fairly well. I really need to sit down with him this week as his "Akela" and get him through the last few pieces of memorization. His Pack meeting is in a few weeks and he needs to be ready.

One of the reasons I wanted Connor to be involved in scouting is that it is a good framework for learning that the world does not revolve around you. Since we don't go to church, we need an environment for our kids that helps us to foster their sense of place in the world--and in service to others.

Today we collected groceries for a local food bank. We started "Scouting For Food" last week by dropping off empty grocery bags at about 200 houses. That's him up there running back to the car after hooking a bag on someone's front railing. It took us 1 hour and 45 minutes to drop off the bags and he was a sweaty mess.

Today we went back to pick them up. It took half the time to pickup. I'd say we got about a 15% hit rate. I think that's pretty typical, but really, that's pretty sad. All these people in half million dollar houses. They can't cough up a bag of canned goods? Really? I was STUNNED by the number of houses where the bag we hung on their railing was still in the same place a week later.

Regardless, our car was full of food that other people need. And I'm proud of my scout for giving his time to help other people. Nice job!