|
|
Posted by: Lee Shake (leeshake@novagate.com) on 3/31/1998@03:01hrs:
In Reply to: Ten Mile River Boy Scout Camp posted by: Art on 3/30/1998@11:11hrs:
This one's for ART,
I've just finished reading that long string that Art started a couple of days back.
I got thinking about The Gathering and the Nostalgia/Trivia site and the NEAT folks that meet there and argue, joke, share, accuse/forgive, spout and LOVE. And I thought, "These are my friends, and I've never met them. I have no idea what they look like. I usually don't know their ages, but I know some of them better than I know the neighbors I've lived next door to for the last 26 years!
A truism is that we don't choose our friends. I can't say to Charlie or Art or Gina or rs, "You will be my friend." Even, "I want you to be my friend," doesn't always work.
The truism continues... All I can do is meet someone/s and decide, "I want to be YOUR friend." We don't get to choose our friends... our friends pick us to BE-FRIEND. Think about it.
I "Think" that Dan Blain started this whole thing. I don't KNOW that. But I think so. If that's true, then... Dan, there are a whole lot of folks on this site that are friends because of something YOU did.
Back to Art. I have another TRUE story to tell. One day, when my youngest son was about 13 yrs old, I'd told him that he couldn't do something he wanted to do. He was frustrated and tried to remind me that "This is a FREE country!" :-) With as straight a face as I could summon, I told him, "Son, you are absolutely right. It is a Free Country and you are always FREE to do WHAT YOU SHOULD, not necessarily WHAT YOU WANT."
He thought about that for a couple of hours and came back to me and asked, "What do YOU think I should be like when I'm an adult?" Do you folks hear the challange in that question? This is not a question asked of an equal, there is blatant Generation Gapism seething in this question. It implies that me, the old (out of touch with reality) fossil no longer understands the REAL world my youngster thinks he's already master of.
So I wish you could have seen his face when, in a split second I told him, "Son, when you are an adult that I can respect, you will be: TRUSTWORTH, LOYAL, HELPFUL, FRIENDLY, COURTEOUS, KIND, OBEDIENT, CHEERFUL, THRIFTY, BRAVE, CLEAN & REVERANT."
A week ago, I got a surprise e-mail from his lovely wife. She wrote to thank me for raising such a wonderful son and wonderful husband.
For those of you who are familiar with the Boy Scouts of America, you will have recognized what I told my son. As a parent, I tried to be the biblical "Sower of Seeds." I plowed all my kids brains and was diligent in sowing the very best seeds that I possessed, and I plowed and sowed often and lavishly. Some of the very best seeds came out of my experiences with the Boy Scouts. Trustworth, Loyal... that's something that we teach youth. But it's not something that only applies to youth, it REALLY applies to adults, citizenship, neighborliness, civility, honesty, dependability. It defines not only the way I want my children to be but it defines those folks that I decide that I WANT TO BEFRIEND.
Art, like it or not, I AM YOUR FRIEND. You're not perfect, (who is? Certainly not yours truly. But God isn't done working on me yet, or you either) and you're still trying to live up to that Boy Scout ideal and succeeding. I've known 65 year old adolescents, and I've known some very young adults. What Scouts are tought is what ADULTS need to know to be successful.
Hope I didn't bounce around too much.