Campouts & Callings

In our ward, I am the Assistant Scoutmaster with specific responsibility for the "new" 11-year old Scouts. I don't like that in LDS units, this is a no-man's land for scouting... but that is a subject for another post. One of the numerous regulations on the New Scout program is that they are only allowed 3 campouts per year. This past weekend, I took the boys (with additional leaders, of course) on a camp to Garden Valley, Idaho. At this particular site, there is a spring of hot water that emerges from the earth that someone in the past tried to collect into a pool. I tried to explain this to the boys, but it was clear that they were thinking swimming pool, not wading pool. The spring runs into a "pool" about the shape of a queen size bed. It hits me at mid calf for depth, so if you want it to cover you, one must pretty much lie down in the pool - which naturally means that no-one else can enjoy it with you. With that reference point, it was pretty entertaining to see that some of the boys had brought swim goggles with them - like they were actually planning on enough water to float in...

Overall the camp experience went fine. We had good meals; no one forgot to bring their share of the food. We just didn't have great execution on how we were going to cook the food and then clean it up afterwards. No one remembered to bring water, so it was difficult to make hot chocolate, but you only really needed it in the morning when it was cold outside. There was frost all over the tent, so I imagine it got down to 25 degrees or so that night. I was pretty cold, so I didn't sleep so well, but I don't usually sleep well when I am away from Kristin.

There were a few minor injuries, mostly as a result of trying to close the pocketknife and getting a finger in the way. But there was one tent of 4 boys who thought it would be more fun to stay up laughing and carrying on until 3:30 a.m. while everyone else was trying to sleep. We had them run up and down the mountain for good measure. It was a pretty steep mountian and somewhat treacherous footing coming down at high speed. One of the boys biffed it but executed a perfect front shoulder roll and landed on his feet and never broke stride! One other boy biffed it hard and it looked like he was going to snap his neck. He ended up with pinecone scratches all over his back and sides - and a large headache - but otherwise not too much worse for the wear.

Then on Sunday, the event that Kristin had been warning me about actually occurred! While I was playing the prelude music on the organ, the First Counselor came up next to me and asked me if I would accept a calling as a ward organist. I told him "I am not giving up Scouts!" and he said that they would like me to continue in Scouts and supplement with the organ playing. Our ward has 4 organists now, so playing once a month should be do-able for me. I can have time to practice for 4 weeks - so that should be OK.