One of my regular assignments with the scout troop is to meet with the boys assigned to do the food shopping for each trip and help them develop a proper shopping list. The idea is to get them to think about portions, amount, and cost so that we have enough food, but are not throwing tons of it away. It also helps control costs a little.
One of the food items that always haunts us is baked beans. The kids always want baked beans if they have hot dogs (it happens once or twice a year), and we always throw over half of what we prepare into the garbage.
On our most recent trip, we served brats and hot dogs for dinner. Naturally, baked beans were on the menu. As I talked with the boy buying the food, I made a point that we usually throw a lot of the beans away, so he should not buy 50 servings worth. Then I told him, "You don't need to buy the smallest cans, but two of the next size up would be okay." I had in mind a 28 oz can.
He showed up with two #10 cans of baked beans.
My newest assignment: compile a list of foods that we commonly purchase and catalog the size container that we recommend for purchase of each of these foods.
For the time being, I'd avoid camping near our troop.
Friday, September 23, 2011
Monday, September 19, 2011
Scoutmaster vs. Mother Nature
"If someone in your raft goes into the water, they are your #1 priority." That made sense at the time. It turns out, the safety talk you receive before going onto a Class III river is packed of important information but entirely devoid of nuance. My commitment to take the guides entirely at their word in this matter was going to cost me.
In other matters, it would serve me well, however. Before you get in the water, they teach you some important actions you can take to keep your boat upright. If your raft is going to hit a rock, you need to "love the rock;" that is, you need to move to the side of the raft that will make contact with the rock. It may seem counter-intuitive, but if you lean away from the rock, the side that makes contact becomes light. As the water hits the rock, it responds by pushing up. When upward pressure of raft meets light side of raft, passengers are soon introduced to swimming.
"Whatever you do, don't stand up!" The worst thing that can happen to you in a river is foot entrapment. This happens when a foot becomes caught in an obstacle, preventing the person from floating down stream. The pressure of the current tends to force the person face down into the water. Drowning is the usual outcome of foot entrapment.
"If you do fall out of the raft, grab hold of the purple strap on the side of your boat." Presumably, the raft is going out of the rapids. If you're in the water, out of the rapids is definitely where you want to be. Also, holding on to the strap means you're close to help.
After the safety lecture, we were instructed to pick up our boats, carry them to the water, and get onto the river. RH, AH, JT, WG, and I stood up. AH and JT lifted the raft by the strap on their side, RH, WG, and I went for the strap on our side--but there was no strap. Alright, whatever; we lifted the boat up over our heads and walked down the trail.
It was a delightful day. The weather was warm enough, although a few degree more would have been nice. We approached the first rapid.
SPLASH
AH is in the water. JT grabs him, yanks him back in (JT is about three times the size of AH), and we're on our merry way. It was a good time to emphasize to everyone the importance of tucking your feet into the sides to help keep you in the raft.
Most of the trip was uneventful. It took a little while for me to figure out the movement of the raft with this group (it's always different depending on how strong the paddlers are and where they are placed in the boat), and so we went through some of the rapids backward. I actually enjoy doing the Class II rapids backward, even though the guides always yell at me about that.
At long last, we reach a rapid called Double Hydraulic. Unlike most of the other rapids, it doesn't have a creative name. Also unlike most of the other rapids, going in here can be really really bad (as opposed to just irritating and inconvenient). If you look at the above map of the rapid, you'll see that you enter the rapid from the left side and make a left turn before hitting the two hydraulics. It is recommended that you don't hit the rock at the entry point, but it isn't a big problem if you do so long as you keep your raft upright.
The water moves fast though, and as we approached the entry, it became clear to me that we were going to hit our left side on the rock. I jumped to the left side of the raft, joining JT and AH. RH and WG didn't join us. The left side of the raft lifted, RH and WG fell backward into the water, and AH was sort of catapulted over RH's head into the water. JT and I managed to hang on.
My mind started racing. Get them out of the water. As quickly as I could I stowed my paddle, crouched up in the middle of the raft, and looked for someone I might be able to reach. I found all three of the now-swimmers on the left side of the raft, and watched as RH disappeared into the first hydraulic. I started to move to try and get to a position where I could reach him when he came back up. I didn't think far enough ahead about the consequences of the raft hitting the hydraulic that had just swallowed RH and found myself in a cool, wet, and unfriendly to breathing environment. When my head resurfaced, I didn't have enough time to look for the boat before I saw the white wall marking the second hydraulic. Close my mouth, close my eyes, please don't hit a rock.
In case you're wondering, it's a lot quieter in the wall of water than it is in the last second before you go in. I was lucky enough to not hit any rocks going through. Very shortly after coming up, another raft was at my aid and pulled me in. I began to look around for the other rafters. I look upstream. There's JT in the raft finally making his way out. How the....whatever, he's fine. Soon, I found WG, and I caught a glimpse of AH. But where's RH. I started freaking out. Where's RH? Where's RH? Of course, no one is answering me. I keep looking back up to the rapid. Did he come out?
In retrospect, I realized that I was in shock. If I had taken a minute to calm down, I would have realized that RH was ahead of the raft in the water. He would have come out first, and would be down stream of me. Sure enough, he was three rafts down. As soon as I saw him, sanity returned.
I can't say as much for one unnamed passenger in the raft. He responded by going into a much heavier form of shock than I had. We took five minutes to try and warm him up and bring him back into his right mind. But for a while, he was insistent that he didn't want to continue. Fortunately, once he fought off the shock, he was back to his usual cheerful self and anxious to hit the next rapid.
RH was very kind, and chose to blame the outfitter for letting us take a raft that didn't have a strap on one side. When he went down, he had tried to grab the strap, which would have saved us a lot of trouble. But I do appreciate RH trying to place the blame elsewhere.
Initially, I tried to avoid taking the blame myself. In the end, however, I have to face it; I never gave the order to move to the left side when we hit the rock at the entrance. That one simple command would have kept the boat from tipping, kept RH and WG in the boat, and RH probably would have been able to keep AH from going in at that point. I wouldn't have gone in if I wasn't looking to rescue the swimmers.
End score in this round of Scoutmaster vs. Mother Nature:
Mother Nature, +1
Scoutmaster, -4 (one for each lost rafter)
My apologies to those I lost. I'm glad you're okay and I won't blame you if you never get into a raft with me again.
Tip for future rafters:
1) Inspect your raft before you leave. If it isn't properly equipped, request a different raft.
2) Give every order possible. It's better to be annoying and micromanaging than to go through what we just went through.
In other matters, it would serve me well, however. Before you get in the water, they teach you some important actions you can take to keep your boat upright. If your raft is going to hit a rock, you need to "love the rock;" that is, you need to move to the side of the raft that will make contact with the rock. It may seem counter-intuitive, but if you lean away from the rock, the side that makes contact becomes light. As the water hits the rock, it responds by pushing up. When upward pressure of raft meets light side of raft, passengers are soon introduced to swimming.
"Whatever you do, don't stand up!" The worst thing that can happen to you in a river is foot entrapment. This happens when a foot becomes caught in an obstacle, preventing the person from floating down stream. The pressure of the current tends to force the person face down into the water. Drowning is the usual outcome of foot entrapment.
"If you do fall out of the raft, grab hold of the purple strap on the side of your boat." Presumably, the raft is going out of the rapids. If you're in the water, out of the rapids is definitely where you want to be. Also, holding on to the strap means you're close to help.
After the safety lecture, we were instructed to pick up our boats, carry them to the water, and get onto the river. RH, AH, JT, WG, and I stood up. AH and JT lifted the raft by the strap on their side, RH, WG, and I went for the strap on our side--but there was no strap. Alright, whatever; we lifted the boat up over our heads and walked down the trail.
It was a delightful day. The weather was warm enough, although a few degree more would have been nice. We approached the first rapid.
SPLASH
AH is in the water. JT grabs him, yanks him back in (JT is about three times the size of AH), and we're on our merry way. It was a good time to emphasize to everyone the importance of tucking your feet into the sides to help keep you in the raft.
Most of the trip was uneventful. It took a little while for me to figure out the movement of the raft with this group (it's always different depending on how strong the paddlers are and where they are placed in the boat), and so we went through some of the rapids backward. I actually enjoy doing the Class II rapids backward, even though the guides always yell at me about that.
At long last, we reach a rapid called Double Hydraulic. Unlike most of the other rapids, it doesn't have a creative name. Also unlike most of the other rapids, going in here can be really really bad (as opposed to just irritating and inconvenient). If you look at the above map of the rapid, you'll see that you enter the rapid from the left side and make a left turn before hitting the two hydraulics. It is recommended that you don't hit the rock at the entry point, but it isn't a big problem if you do so long as you keep your raft upright.
The water moves fast though, and as we approached the entry, it became clear to me that we were going to hit our left side on the rock. I jumped to the left side of the raft, joining JT and AH. RH and WG didn't join us. The left side of the raft lifted, RH and WG fell backward into the water, and AH was sort of catapulted over RH's head into the water. JT and I managed to hang on.
My mind started racing. Get them out of the water. As quickly as I could I stowed my paddle, crouched up in the middle of the raft, and looked for someone I might be able to reach. I found all three of the now-swimmers on the left side of the raft, and watched as RH disappeared into the first hydraulic. I started to move to try and get to a position where I could reach him when he came back up. I didn't think far enough ahead about the consequences of the raft hitting the hydraulic that had just swallowed RH and found myself in a cool, wet, and unfriendly to breathing environment. When my head resurfaced, I didn't have enough time to look for the boat before I saw the white wall marking the second hydraulic. Close my mouth, close my eyes, please don't hit a rock.
In case you're wondering, it's a lot quieter in the wall of water than it is in the last second before you go in. I was lucky enough to not hit any rocks going through. Very shortly after coming up, another raft was at my aid and pulled me in. I began to look around for the other rafters. I look upstream. There's JT in the raft finally making his way out. How the....whatever, he's fine. Soon, I found WG, and I caught a glimpse of AH. But where's RH. I started freaking out. Where's RH? Where's RH? Of course, no one is answering me. I keep looking back up to the rapid. Did he come out?
In retrospect, I realized that I was in shock. If I had taken a minute to calm down, I would have realized that RH was ahead of the raft in the water. He would have come out first, and would be down stream of me. Sure enough, he was three rafts down. As soon as I saw him, sanity returned.
I can't say as much for one unnamed passenger in the raft. He responded by going into a much heavier form of shock than I had. We took five minutes to try and warm him up and bring him back into his right mind. But for a while, he was insistent that he didn't want to continue. Fortunately, once he fought off the shock, he was back to his usual cheerful self and anxious to hit the next rapid.
RH was very kind, and chose to blame the outfitter for letting us take a raft that didn't have a strap on one side. When he went down, he had tried to grab the strap, which would have saved us a lot of trouble. But I do appreciate RH trying to place the blame elsewhere.
Initially, I tried to avoid taking the blame myself. In the end, however, I have to face it; I never gave the order to move to the left side when we hit the rock at the entrance. That one simple command would have kept the boat from tipping, kept RH and WG in the boat, and RH probably would have been able to keep AH from going in at that point. I wouldn't have gone in if I wasn't looking to rescue the swimmers.
End score in this round of Scoutmaster vs. Mother Nature:
Mother Nature, +1
Scoutmaster, -4 (one for each lost rafter)
My apologies to those I lost. I'm glad you're okay and I won't blame you if you never get into a raft with me again.
Tip for future rafters:
1) Inspect your raft before you leave. If it isn't properly equipped, request a different raft.
2) Give every order possible. It's better to be annoying and micromanaging than to go through what we just went through.
Thursday, September 8, 2011
The Magic of Doing
I just finished reading Girls Will Be Girls by JoAnn Deak. Fantastic book, by the way.
As you can tell, I'm trying to bolster my confidence about being a father of two girls1. I feel pretty good right now. This is a product of a) I'm doing most of the things that Deak said a father of a 3-year old should be doing, and b) 3-year old girls are a lot easier to get right than the 8-18 year old girls. Still, I'm glad I'm reading this now and getting ready for the harder years.
One thing I wanted to share that really resonated for me was in the last chapter. I suspect Deak put it in the last chapter so that it would be easily recalled. Translation: this might be important.
She talks about the inherent needs girls have for competence, confidence, and connectedness. What's the best way to develop all of these attributes? Doing stuff!
The stuff can be just about anything. Sports, arts, literature, service, cooking, camping, tutoring, civic groups, school newspapers...the list goes on and on. The key is to do stuff frequently and do a variety of it. As the girls get older, they tend to gravitate toward their favorite activities, but it's this initial push of trying something, experiencing it, and improving at it while sharing the experience with others that builds those three C's.
Why does this resonate with me? I see this same principle in action with my boy scouts. I talk with the older scouts at least once a year (when the new group of scouts is about to come in), and as often as I think is necessary, about their responsibility to protect the self confidence in the younger boys. I remind them that any criticism or bullying from them can cause great damage to a young boy's self confidence, and it can take years to repair the damage.
Luckily, the boys take this message very seriously and engage with the younger boys in very positive ways. They teach them how to do the basic scout skills, play various games, etc. Once they get these boys involved, you see drastic and rapid changes in the younger boys. It may seem silly, but the transformation really starts to become apparent about the first time that a boy can take down a tent without any instruction. It's simple, but it's accomplishment; and it starts the process of thinking I can learn this.
If you look at a group of boys who joined scouting together, you can see a clear difference in confidence between the boys who have been on 8 - 10 campouts and those who have been on 2 - 3. The ones that have done things are far more confident.
It's easy for me to frame this in terms of scouting--it's what I'm most familiar with. But remember, Girls Will Be Girls made the observation about girls. I see the same principle with boys. There's no reason to think that this doesn't extend to adults. Throughout our lives we should be working on being more competent, confident, and connected people. So let's all get out and do something.
1 This was a bit of a gamble. I have heard a number of times that parenting books will just tell you all the things you aren't doing right, thus diminishing your confidence as a parent. Not so with Girls Will Be Girls. Even if you don't have girls, you should read this one.
As you can tell, I'm trying to bolster my confidence about being a father of two girls1. I feel pretty good right now. This is a product of a) I'm doing most of the things that Deak said a father of a 3-year old should be doing, and b) 3-year old girls are a lot easier to get right than the 8-18 year old girls. Still, I'm glad I'm reading this now and getting ready for the harder years.
One thing I wanted to share that really resonated for me was in the last chapter. I suspect Deak put it in the last chapter so that it would be easily recalled. Translation: this might be important.
She talks about the inherent needs girls have for competence, confidence, and connectedness. What's the best way to develop all of these attributes? Doing stuff!
The stuff can be just about anything. Sports, arts, literature, service, cooking, camping, tutoring, civic groups, school newspapers...the list goes on and on. The key is to do stuff frequently and do a variety of it. As the girls get older, they tend to gravitate toward their favorite activities, but it's this initial push of trying something, experiencing it, and improving at it while sharing the experience with others that builds those three C's.
Why does this resonate with me? I see this same principle in action with my boy scouts. I talk with the older scouts at least once a year (when the new group of scouts is about to come in), and as often as I think is necessary, about their responsibility to protect the self confidence in the younger boys. I remind them that any criticism or bullying from them can cause great damage to a young boy's self confidence, and it can take years to repair the damage.
Luckily, the boys take this message very seriously and engage with the younger boys in very positive ways. They teach them how to do the basic scout skills, play various games, etc. Once they get these boys involved, you see drastic and rapid changes in the younger boys. It may seem silly, but the transformation really starts to become apparent about the first time that a boy can take down a tent without any instruction. It's simple, but it's accomplishment; and it starts the process of thinking I can learn this.
If you look at a group of boys who joined scouting together, you can see a clear difference in confidence between the boys who have been on 8 - 10 campouts and those who have been on 2 - 3. The ones that have done things are far more confident.
It's easy for me to frame this in terms of scouting--it's what I'm most familiar with. But remember, Girls Will Be Girls made the observation about girls. I see the same principle with boys. There's no reason to think that this doesn't extend to adults. Throughout our lives we should be working on being more competent, confident, and connected people. So let's all get out and do something.
1 This was a bit of a gamble. I have heard a number of times that parenting books will just tell you all the things you aren't doing right, thus diminishing your confidence as a parent. Not so with Girls Will Be Girls. Even if you don't have girls, you should read this one.
In Memoriam: Dave "Sleeping Bear" Adams (oh, and apple pie)
First, the recipe. Then the why.
Sleeping Bear's backpack-style apple pie
Crust
1 Cup Crushed graham cracker
1 stick Butter
Filling
1 1/2 Cup Dried apple slices
1 1/2 Cup Water
8 tsp Sugar
1 tsp cinnamon
Melt butter. Mix with graham cracker and form in bottom of a tupperware.
Add apple slices, water, sugar, and cinnamon to a pot and let cook until apples are hydrated. Let excess water boil out. Pour into tupperware.
The nostalgia inspired by the death of someone you haven't thought of in years is surprising. Yet, there it is--a result of a brief e-mail from my father forwarded to me from my Venture Crew Advisor.
My family, thanks to my brother, got pretty involved in a Venture Crew1 that specialized in pre-1840's fur trade reenactments. Wildfire--that's what we called our crew advisor--was a long time reenactment buff who brought in some experienced friends to help teach skills that weren't his strong suit. Without exception, the people that Wildfire brought into to program were--let's just say they were colorful.
Critter was the true epitome of colorful. I've never met him, but I'm told the aptly-named-Critter can sense fear like an animal; and he'll certainly take advantage of your fear2. If anyone could get close to the class of Critter, it was Sleeping Bear.
Sleeping Bear was also aptly named. His tent was always pitched as far away from the other tents as possible. We never worried about animals coming to camp when he was sleeping. Instead, we worried about the environmentalist groups complaining about noise pollution. But it wasn't his snoring alone that earned him the title of Bear. His temperament was a huge component of his name--particularly when he first woke up in the morning.
Rule #1 in camp was don't be stupid.
Rule #2 in camp was never wake Sleeping Bear without a cup of coffee in hand. If you had a mug of hot coffee in your hand when you woke him, you just might survive the ordeal. If you didn't have coffee, you'd likely be treated to a string of vulgarity that could only be published on the internet.
You also had to be careful not to violate Rule #1 in Sleeping Bear's presence. He didn't tolerate it, and he certainly wasn't shy about making his irritation known.
As with most people, however, Sleeping Bear had a lot more to him than you'd ever know from looking at him. This big bear of a man, with a thick scraggly beard grown half way down his chest and hair that hung to his eyes and over his ears was also that man that would teach us how to sew. He would show us how to sew shirts, or to sew leather.
"Sleeping Bear, I want to thank you for that brain tanned deer leather you gave me last summer," Shining Blade told him once. Shining Blade was about to go into his second or third year of college.
"I recall that was good stuff. Did you get good use out of it?"
Shining Blade grinned broadly, "Oh yeah!"
"What did you use it for?" Sleeping Bear's curiosity was definitely piqued.
"I made a present for my girlfriend out of it." Clearly, Shining Blade was one of the better students of sewing, having advanced well beyond shirts and pouches. This may, in fact, have been one of Sleeping Bear's proudest moments as a Venture Advisor3.
Sleeping Bear also taught us how to do bead work, make charcloth, and he would tell us stories of the mountain man history. He was as fierce a friend as he was a critic, and could be both in the same sentence.
In the e-mail from Wildfire, it was clear that Sleeping Bear was looking forward to the Fall reenactment rendezvous. He had told Wildfire, "Bring the Yukon Jack and I'll make the apple pie." His heart gave out just a month shy of that camp out.
I'm not sure if the rendezvous was scheduled for the first or second weekend in October, but since I'm scheduled to be backpacking the first weekend, I may take a few ingredients to make an apple pie in his honor. I've pulled this recipe together as a composite of a few other recipes and trying to adapt it to the limitations of a backpacking trip. Whether or not I add the Yukon Jack has yet to be determined.
1Venturing is a program sponsored by the Boy Scouts of America that gives an even stronger emphasis on high adventure and outdoor activity than does traditional Boy Scouting. While Venturing has it's own system of recognitions and awards, I couldn't tell you anything about them as I was just in it for the fun.
2Ask me to tell you a couple stories sometime. You probably think I'm making them up.
3Naturally, we had an interest in the careers of our advisors. Wildfire was retired Coast Guard. Cap'n Jack was a black smith. Doc was a dentist. When you asked Sleeping Bear what he did for a living, he'd say casually, "I'm a photographer." One day I heard him complaining about how he hated doing school portraits because "there's nothing you can do to make a chubby faced 10 year old feel good about how she looks in her pictures." But he did the pictures anyway when there wasn't much demand for his preferred line of work. I asked him what he preferred to do. "Adult photography," he told me. From the descriptions of the two projects he told me about it didn't sound as trashy as you're probably thinking, but I'm still amazed that he made it past the BSA background checks.
Sleeping Bear's backpack-style apple pie
Crust
1 Cup Crushed graham cracker
1 stick Butter
Filling
1 1/2 Cup Dried apple slices
1 1/2 Cup Water
8 tsp Sugar
1 tsp cinnamon
Melt butter. Mix with graham cracker and form in bottom of a tupperware.
Add apple slices, water, sugar, and cinnamon to a pot and let cook until apples are hydrated. Let excess water boil out. Pour into tupperware.
The nostalgia inspired by the death of someone you haven't thought of in years is surprising. Yet, there it is--a result of a brief e-mail from my father forwarded to me from my Venture Crew Advisor.
My family, thanks to my brother, got pretty involved in a Venture Crew1 that specialized in pre-1840's fur trade reenactments. Wildfire--that's what we called our crew advisor--was a long time reenactment buff who brought in some experienced friends to help teach skills that weren't his strong suit. Without exception, the people that Wildfire brought into to program were--let's just say they were colorful.
Critter was the true epitome of colorful. I've never met him, but I'm told the aptly-named-Critter can sense fear like an animal; and he'll certainly take advantage of your fear2. If anyone could get close to the class of Critter, it was Sleeping Bear.
Sleeping Bear was also aptly named. His tent was always pitched as far away from the other tents as possible. We never worried about animals coming to camp when he was sleeping. Instead, we worried about the environmentalist groups complaining about noise pollution. But it wasn't his snoring alone that earned him the title of Bear. His temperament was a huge component of his name--particularly when he first woke up in the morning.
Rule #1 in camp was don't be stupid.
Rule #2 in camp was never wake Sleeping Bear without a cup of coffee in hand. If you had a mug of hot coffee in your hand when you woke him, you just might survive the ordeal. If you didn't have coffee, you'd likely be treated to a string of vulgarity that could only be published on the internet.
You also had to be careful not to violate Rule #1 in Sleeping Bear's presence. He didn't tolerate it, and he certainly wasn't shy about making his irritation known.
As with most people, however, Sleeping Bear had a lot more to him than you'd ever know from looking at him. This big bear of a man, with a thick scraggly beard grown half way down his chest and hair that hung to his eyes and over his ears was also that man that would teach us how to sew. He would show us how to sew shirts, or to sew leather.
"Sleeping Bear, I want to thank you for that brain tanned deer leather you gave me last summer," Shining Blade told him once. Shining Blade was about to go into his second or third year of college.
"I recall that was good stuff. Did you get good use out of it?"
Shining Blade grinned broadly, "Oh yeah!"
"What did you use it for?" Sleeping Bear's curiosity was definitely piqued.
"I made a present for my girlfriend out of it." Clearly, Shining Blade was one of the better students of sewing, having advanced well beyond shirts and pouches. This may, in fact, have been one of Sleeping Bear's proudest moments as a Venture Advisor3.
Sleeping Bear also taught us how to do bead work, make charcloth, and he would tell us stories of the mountain man history. He was as fierce a friend as he was a critic, and could be both in the same sentence.
In the e-mail from Wildfire, it was clear that Sleeping Bear was looking forward to the Fall reenactment rendezvous. He had told Wildfire, "Bring the Yukon Jack and I'll make the apple pie." His heart gave out just a month shy of that camp out.
I'm not sure if the rendezvous was scheduled for the first or second weekend in October, but since I'm scheduled to be backpacking the first weekend, I may take a few ingredients to make an apple pie in his honor. I've pulled this recipe together as a composite of a few other recipes and trying to adapt it to the limitations of a backpacking trip. Whether or not I add the Yukon Jack has yet to be determined.
1Venturing is a program sponsored by the Boy Scouts of America that gives an even stronger emphasis on high adventure and outdoor activity than does traditional Boy Scouting. While Venturing has it's own system of recognitions and awards, I couldn't tell you anything about them as I was just in it for the fun.
2Ask me to tell you a couple stories sometime. You probably think I'm making them up.
3Naturally, we had an interest in the careers of our advisors. Wildfire was retired Coast Guard. Cap'n Jack was a black smith. Doc was a dentist. When you asked Sleeping Bear what he did for a living, he'd say casually, "I'm a photographer." One day I heard him complaining about how he hated doing school portraits because "there's nothing you can do to make a chubby faced 10 year old feel good about how she looks in her pictures." But he did the pictures anyway when there wasn't much demand for his preferred line of work. I asked him what he preferred to do. "Adult photography," he told me. From the descriptions of the two projects he told me about it didn't sound as trashy as you're probably thinking, but I'm still amazed that he made it past the BSA background checks.
Thursday, August 25, 2011
"You're not going to get excommunicated over this, are you?"
"Benjamin, can I talk to you privately for a few minutes?" SP11 pointed to an empty classroom. We went in, unfolded a couple chairs, and sat down for a talk.
SP1 is a pretty busy guy at Sunday meetings, so I understood when he didn't spend a lot of time with small talk. In fact, I'm typically a busy guy at Sunday meetings, and small talk doesn't interest me much anyway. I was quite happy to get to the point.
"I couldn't help but notice you were wearing a Boy Scout uniform last week2." In the sea of white shirts and suit coats, it does stand out a little. Yet, Being the lazy slob that I am, I will wear my scout uniform to my worship services when I have a scout activity that follows so closely on the heels of church that I wont' have time to go home and change my clothes. I figure the dress uniform is plenty appropriate for church services (although some people disagree), and the members of my congregation have seen me do it enough times now that, instead of weird looks that I'm dressed so oddly, I'm usually met with curiosity about which trip I'm going on today. In this case, I would be leaving to go to our annual week long Boy Scout camp.
"Why yes, I was wearing my uniform last week." I have quite the talent for confirming what people already know.
"I don't know if you're aware, but we released our stake scouting specialist a few months ago, and we haven't yet found a replacement." I honestly had no idea, and had never even heard of a stake scouting specialist. "So I thought it was fortunate when I saw you in a scout uniform." Oh boy, I think to myself. Here we go. "And yes," SP1 says, "this is leading up to a calling3."
I don't know what SP1 planned to say after this. I did notice him take a breath in preparation for his next statement, but apparently my silent laughter and shaking head interrupted his train of thought. The friendly smile shifted into confused worry.
"I'm sorry. I have no desire at all to work with scouting in the Church."
The confused worry barreled into dismay.
I give SP1 a lot of credit, however. He recovered quickly and immediately asked about the reasons behind my statement. More importantly, he never tried to tell me my feelings were wrong, misplaced, or invalid. Or at least he didn't try to make me feel guilty for feeling the way I did (more on that later).
After a few minutes of describing my views on LDS scouting and why I am not a fan, he thought for a second and gave me a challenge. "I understand your line of thinking," he said, "and I'll be honest; I agree with a lot of it. As I say more, however, please understand that the Church has specified how it wants the scouting program to be administered, they have given us those policies and guidelines, and there is very little that we can do here to change those." I can feel the crescendo to impasse.
"What I'm hearing from you," he continued, "is a lot of I want, and I feel. But we didn't want to extend this calling for you. We felt that you would be the person that could help improve the scouting program in the stake and give the young men a better experience. In the end, this is about preparing our young men to be faithful and capable adults." He's tugging on my heartstrings now. This is, after all, why I am involved in Scouting to begin with.
I agreed to think it over for a couple weeks until we could meet again and discuss if I was willing to put my personal disagreements aside for the benefit of the teenage youth in my stake.
Naturally, I discussed this meeting with my wife. Her first course of action was to laugh at me. She then proceeded to ask a couple questions about how much travel and time away from home this calling would require. In a stunning display of lack-of-faith, I came up with a series of questions aimed to find out if I could take on these responsibilities without disrupting my commitments to family and current troop. She and I agreed that if I couldn't keep those commitments, then this calling was not something I could accept. I then sent this list of questions to SP1.
Of course, SP1 was on vacation, and I knew I wouldn't hear back from him until he returned. Not wanting to be wholly unprepared for the event that I could accept stake scouting specialist position, I began to prepare myself for the long and miserable discussion about what Church scouting policies I could make myself live with and which policies I absolutely could not accept. After a few days, I had put together this seven page document (yes, it's long) about what I think makes a quality scouting unit and where my vision conflicts with Church policy.
Side story: I asked my scoutmaster to look over what I had written and include anything he thought I should add. He added a couple notes, then commented that I was being awfully thorough. He then proceeded to ask, "You're not going to get excommunicated over this, are you?" Thanks, David.
After having written all of that, I realized something--I didn't feel good at all about taking this calling. It wasn't just that I didn't want to do it, I also genuinely had an uncomfortable feeling whenever I thought about doing it anyway. This made me nervous. It wasn't that I felt good about saying no, I just felt bad about saying yes. And now I found myself bracing for the scenario where I was pressed to put my personal feelings aside in order to take an inspired calling.
This created a bit of a problem for me. My mind was pretty well made up--I wouldn't be taking this calling unless they were willing to ignore a lot of Church policies (some of which they already indicated they would not)--but how were they going to take it if they said they felt inspired to ask me to do this and I replied that I felt differently than they did. Don't get me wrong--I have no problem taking my own inspiration over the inspiration of my religious leaders. The concern this gave me was a) would they agree, and b) I didn't feel any inspiration about saying no, just strong discomfort in saying yes. Can you really say you're inspired to an action without any positive feelings?
Fortunately, I never had to have that discussion (nor did I need to show the stake my expose on scouting [my church membership is safe {for now}, Dave]). It turns out that the time commitment the calling would require would take me away from home more than my family could support, and it would also require me to take time away from the commitments I've made to my current troop. On those grounds, I turned down the calling, and SP1 graciously accepted those reasons.
Personally, I wasn't quite satisfied. I hadn't felt a single good feeling in all of this yet, and that bothered me. I don't particularly like navigating life on negative feelings. Naturally, the issues weighed on my mind for a little longer.
It was a few days later that I happened to be thinking about my life in larger terms than just the microcosm of the three week dilemma I'd been going through. I considered some of the choices I've made since having moved to my current home, and the resultant lessons that I've learned. Then there was this sudden wave of emotion and reassurance. I won't go into the details of all the things I was thinking about, but in that brief moment of inspired recognition, I understood that the decisions I have made and the things I have learned will impact my family and my community for years to come; and that I would lose the ability to make that kind of an impact if I had accepted the role that had been extended. Most importantly, I felt good about having said no.
______________________________________________
1 Stake presidency, first counselor. LDS congregations are referred to as wards, and a stake is comprised of 10-ish wards. The stake presidency oversees the administration of the wards in the stake and coordinates inter-ward activities.
2 I volunteer with a scout troop in my community. It is hosted by a local Episcopalian congregation. Since my scouting involvement is outside of the LDS Church, it shouldn't come as a surprise that leaders outside of my congregation were previously unaware of my involvement.
3 The local LDS congregations are administered entirely by volunteers. As is the case in most of the world, people are usually asked to volunteer. It is commonly held belief that callings, or invitations to serve, are inspired invitations given from the Lord through the local church leadership. Whether or not each and every individual calling is inspired can be debated, but I can assure you from my experience in Church leadership that local leaders try very hard to let inspiration guide the general function of the congregation as a whole.
SP1 is a pretty busy guy at Sunday meetings, so I understood when he didn't spend a lot of time with small talk. In fact, I'm typically a busy guy at Sunday meetings, and small talk doesn't interest me much anyway. I was quite happy to get to the point.
"I couldn't help but notice you were wearing a Boy Scout uniform last week2." In the sea of white shirts and suit coats, it does stand out a little. Yet, Being the lazy slob that I am, I will wear my scout uniform to my worship services when I have a scout activity that follows so closely on the heels of church that I wont' have time to go home and change my clothes. I figure the dress uniform is plenty appropriate for church services (although some people disagree), and the members of my congregation have seen me do it enough times now that, instead of weird looks that I'm dressed so oddly, I'm usually met with curiosity about which trip I'm going on today. In this case, I would be leaving to go to our annual week long Boy Scout camp.
"Why yes, I was wearing my uniform last week." I have quite the talent for confirming what people already know.
"I don't know if you're aware, but we released our stake scouting specialist a few months ago, and we haven't yet found a replacement." I honestly had no idea, and had never even heard of a stake scouting specialist. "So I thought it was fortunate when I saw you in a scout uniform." Oh boy, I think to myself. Here we go. "And yes," SP1 says, "this is leading up to a calling3."
I don't know what SP1 planned to say after this. I did notice him take a breath in preparation for his next statement, but apparently my silent laughter and shaking head interrupted his train of thought. The friendly smile shifted into confused worry.
"I'm sorry. I have no desire at all to work with scouting in the Church."
The confused worry barreled into dismay.
I give SP1 a lot of credit, however. He recovered quickly and immediately asked about the reasons behind my statement. More importantly, he never tried to tell me my feelings were wrong, misplaced, or invalid. Or at least he didn't try to make me feel guilty for feeling the way I did (more on that later).
After a few minutes of describing my views on LDS scouting and why I am not a fan, he thought for a second and gave me a challenge. "I understand your line of thinking," he said, "and I'll be honest; I agree with a lot of it. As I say more, however, please understand that the Church has specified how it wants the scouting program to be administered, they have given us those policies and guidelines, and there is very little that we can do here to change those." I can feel the crescendo to impasse.
"What I'm hearing from you," he continued, "is a lot of I want, and I feel. But we didn't want to extend this calling for you. We felt that you would be the person that could help improve the scouting program in the stake and give the young men a better experience. In the end, this is about preparing our young men to be faithful and capable adults." He's tugging on my heartstrings now. This is, after all, why I am involved in Scouting to begin with.
I agreed to think it over for a couple weeks until we could meet again and discuss if I was willing to put my personal disagreements aside for the benefit of the teenage youth in my stake.
Naturally, I discussed this meeting with my wife. Her first course of action was to laugh at me. She then proceeded to ask a couple questions about how much travel and time away from home this calling would require. In a stunning display of lack-of-faith, I came up with a series of questions aimed to find out if I could take on these responsibilities without disrupting my commitments to family and current troop. She and I agreed that if I couldn't keep those commitments, then this calling was not something I could accept. I then sent this list of questions to SP1.
Of course, SP1 was on vacation, and I knew I wouldn't hear back from him until he returned. Not wanting to be wholly unprepared for the event that I could accept stake scouting specialist position, I began to prepare myself for the long and miserable discussion about what Church scouting policies I could make myself live with and which policies I absolutely could not accept. After a few days, I had put together this seven page document (yes, it's long) about what I think makes a quality scouting unit and where my vision conflicts with Church policy.
Side story: I asked my scoutmaster to look over what I had written and include anything he thought I should add. He added a couple notes, then commented that I was being awfully thorough. He then proceeded to ask, "You're not going to get excommunicated over this, are you?" Thanks, David.
After having written all of that, I realized something--I didn't feel good at all about taking this calling. It wasn't just that I didn't want to do it, I also genuinely had an uncomfortable feeling whenever I thought about doing it anyway. This made me nervous. It wasn't that I felt good about saying no, I just felt bad about saying yes. And now I found myself bracing for the scenario where I was pressed to put my personal feelings aside in order to take an inspired calling.
This created a bit of a problem for me. My mind was pretty well made up--I wouldn't be taking this calling unless they were willing to ignore a lot of Church policies (some of which they already indicated they would not)--but how were they going to take it if they said they felt inspired to ask me to do this and I replied that I felt differently than they did. Don't get me wrong--I have no problem taking my own inspiration over the inspiration of my religious leaders. The concern this gave me was a) would they agree, and b) I didn't feel any inspiration about saying no, just strong discomfort in saying yes. Can you really say you're inspired to an action without any positive feelings?
Fortunately, I never had to have that discussion (nor did I need to show the stake my expose on scouting [my church membership is safe {for now}, Dave]). It turns out that the time commitment the calling would require would take me away from home more than my family could support, and it would also require me to take time away from the commitments I've made to my current troop. On those grounds, I turned down the calling, and SP1 graciously accepted those reasons.
Personally, I wasn't quite satisfied. I hadn't felt a single good feeling in all of this yet, and that bothered me. I don't particularly like navigating life on negative feelings. Naturally, the issues weighed on my mind for a little longer.
It was a few days later that I happened to be thinking about my life in larger terms than just the microcosm of the three week dilemma I'd been going through. I considered some of the choices I've made since having moved to my current home, and the resultant lessons that I've learned. Then there was this sudden wave of emotion and reassurance. I won't go into the details of all the things I was thinking about, but in that brief moment of inspired recognition, I understood that the decisions I have made and the things I have learned will impact my family and my community for years to come; and that I would lose the ability to make that kind of an impact if I had accepted the role that had been extended. Most importantly, I felt good about having said no.
______________________________________________
1 Stake presidency, first counselor. LDS congregations are referred to as wards, and a stake is comprised of 10-ish wards. The stake presidency oversees the administration of the wards in the stake and coordinates inter-ward activities.
2 I volunteer with a scout troop in my community. It is hosted by a local Episcopalian congregation. Since my scouting involvement is outside of the LDS Church, it shouldn't come as a surprise that leaders outside of my congregation were previously unaware of my involvement.
3 The local LDS congregations are administered entirely by volunteers. As is the case in most of the world, people are usually asked to volunteer. It is commonly held belief that callings, or invitations to serve, are inspired invitations given from the Lord through the local church leadership. Whether or not each and every individual calling is inspired can be debated, but I can assure you from my experience in Church leadership that local leaders try very hard to let inspiration guide the general function of the congregation as a whole.
Sunday, August 7, 2011
My Daughter Is Growing Up Faster Than I'm Prepared For
We have a kind of game we play to help Julie learn the scripture stories. We take out a copy of The Gospel Art Book, let Joules pick any picture she wants, and then Daddy has to tell the story of what's in the picture. Mama usually laughs at daddy because he uses words that are clearly too big for Joules to understand, but I'm trying.
In any case, we played this game for a few minutes before sending her to bed. I told her to pick a picture, and she picked this one:
Nope...I'm not ready to go into much detail about Potiphar's wife yet. Sorry, kid.
In any case, we played this game for a few minutes before sending her to bed. I told her to pick a picture, and she picked this one:
Nope...I'm not ready to go into much detail about Potiphar's wife yet. Sorry, kid.
Tuesday, August 2, 2011
Zombie Statistician
I met with a physician at work today. He just purchased a copy of the Nationwide Inpatient Sample (NIS) and wanted to do some research out of the data. His question was whether having a certain condition exposed a person to premature death. He wanted to know if I would be able to extract and analyze the data.
He purchased 12 years of data; each year contains a sample of just under 8 million subjects. As a starting point, he suggested we start with the 2009 data and see what we learn from just that sub-sample. The only concern he had was that we wouldn't have enough follow-up data to know if the patients had died.
To me, it was a simple solution: extract the data, pull the social security numbers, and run them through the Social Security Death Index. As I said this, I realized that it wasn't likely that this purchased data set would contain social security numbers.
"Well, the website said it had social security numbers."
I furrowed my brow and looked at the set of 30 or so CD's sitting in a binder on the table in front of me.
"You mean to tell me these discs have social security for some 90 million subjects?"
"I think so."
I try to suppress the panic attack and say, "I think I'm going to have you take these discs back to your office and I'll check with my supervisors to make sure I'm legally allowed to work with these data."
Turns out I am. Another panic attack. I'm allowed to work with these data pending my completion of a number of training modules on the internet. These will undoubtedly remind me many times over of the stiff civil and criminal penalties to which I will be subjected should I even accidentally leak any identifiable information. Forget the panic attack--my heart just stopped.
So there it is. I died at work today, but will continue sifting through this mountain of data in my undead state. And the worst part of it all--it wouldn't even make a decent straight-to-dvd movie.
He purchased 12 years of data; each year contains a sample of just under 8 million subjects. As a starting point, he suggested we start with the 2009 data and see what we learn from just that sub-sample. The only concern he had was that we wouldn't have enough follow-up data to know if the patients had died.
To me, it was a simple solution: extract the data, pull the social security numbers, and run them through the Social Security Death Index. As I said this, I realized that it wasn't likely that this purchased data set would contain social security numbers.
"Well, the website said it had social security numbers."
I furrowed my brow and looked at the set of 30 or so CD's sitting in a binder on the table in front of me.
"You mean to tell me these discs have social security for some 90 million subjects?"
"I think so."
I try to suppress the panic attack and say, "I think I'm going to have you take these discs back to your office and I'll check with my supervisors to make sure I'm legally allowed to work with these data."
Turns out I am. Another panic attack. I'm allowed to work with these data pending my completion of a number of training modules on the internet. These will undoubtedly remind me many times over of the stiff civil and criminal penalties to which I will be subjected should I even accidentally leak any identifiable information. Forget the panic attack--my heart just stopped.
So there it is. I died at work today, but will continue sifting through this mountain of data in my undead state. And the worst part of it all--it wouldn't even make a decent straight-to-dvd movie.
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