Scoutmaster's Minute

Having spent the last two hours or so, updating the Scoutmaster’s Minute to its new weblog format (an exciting prospect considering all the new ways we can encourage writers to make new posts) I have been forced to read some rather profound thoughts accumulated over the last ten years.  Most obvious to me is the observation that regardless of what else happens, time passes.

I worked my last days on the payroll at Bear Paw almost 13 years ago now.  Every year since, I have visited during the summer camp season for at least a couple of days.  For the first couple of years, I was a returning hero.  I had tons of friends who were eager to see me.  I spent the whole week yucking it up and having a blast.  As years passed there were fewer and fewer folks who knew me.  It was very difficult for me to visit a place that meant so much to me and feel like such an outsider.  It remains one of the most difficult transitions I have ever made and still smarts to feel like a foreigner in my own land.

Well I have finally resigned myself that Bear Paw is the same place it has always been, just a little different now.

The lesson learned is pretty simple.  Bear Paw is not really a place, but an idea.  It is not about acres or buildings or trees or anything physical.  It is about the place that is made special and unique by all who inhabit it.  Every season as time goes by, the faces change and the landscape changes, but Bear Paw remains the same.  Once I learned that lesson, I discovered that you really can go home again, and again, and again.

To each one of you who is Bear Paw, keep up the hard work.

And as I plan my annual pilgrimage (this would be consecutive season number 25 had it not been for a one year gap for which my mother will not likely be forgiven soon) I look forward to meeting each and every one of you.  Tell me your story and I am sure I can tell you mine.

-Webmaster

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