Two Guys Watching The Rain,Shooting The Breeze.

[Eamonn 61]

I had received an E-mail from our Program Director,asking if I would open up camp for a pack that was holding a Halloween party out there tonight. I said OK. Then my good friend Mike phoned to say that the pump on one of the wells had gone bad. If I was going to be there we could put in a new one.

We both got to camp about 4:00, the pack leaders were due at about 6:00. I had arrived a little before Mike and had everything turned on. I had held a Jamboree Troop meeting at camp last night. So I had left the coffee press along with some cold drinks. Mike teases the heck out of me about the coffee press.

We were no sooner there when a storm came in, thunder, lightning the works. The pump is on hold till sometime tomorrow. But OJ has OA officer training at the Cub camp tomorrow at 8:00 AM and I have a meeting about Scoutreach.

I dearly love spending time with Mike. He is a super nice guy and an outstanding Scouter. At times we really get into it, people who don't know us think that any minute fisticuffs will be our only way of working out our differences. Pam my ex-DE would tell them that we were just like an old husband and wife.

Mike has been asked to give up being Council Training Chair and take on Council Camping Chair.

We sat watching the rain. He asked if I thought that I would come back and do training? I said no, that it was time for someone new, and that I had done my three years. He asked what I was going to do and I said that at this time I have no plans. We started to talk about Camping and how to make it better. I have a lot ideas. Most of my ideas have to do with making more use of our camps. Not closing up everything just because Summer camp is over. Mike knows that I can be like a bulldog , once I get hold of something I just don't let go. He listened as I outlined my ideas. He agreed with the big idea. That being not closing the camp and hiring people to operate the pool, the boat docks, the climbing tower. Then he asked who did I think would come up and use it? Before I could answer he kept going adding that only the troops that do stuff would come up!! This sounded very elementary to me. He kept going saying that the troops with a program would come up, but the troops that don't have a program would find all sorts of reasons not too.

I thought of the "When didn't it work." Thread here in the forum.

Nothing is going to work unless we want it to work. Sure there are times when people push to make things work, but if people don't want to make it, the sad thing is that it won't and most of the time the losers are the youth members.

As it rained we moved the conversation on to resident Cub Scout Camp. Our Cub Camp Director, who hails from another Council has made it known that she isn't coming back next year. Mike said that he is worried, the numbers show a decline in Cub Scout Campers last (This) year. I reminded him that membership was down and that to get a clearer picture he would need to look at the percentage who had attended camp.In my Cubmaster days we had nearly all the little guys attend camp. Dads would jump at the opportunity to go to camp as part of the needed adult ratio. They would split the week so that two Dads could get to go to camp. He asked how did you get the Cubs to go to camp? I said that it was a big part of our annual plan,everything we did as a pack other than camp was in the budget. We held three fund raising events a year, one was popcorn the other two were decided by the Committee. Popcorn paid for the year and the other two were never for anything, but the parents knew that camp was about $100.00. We as a pack promoted the heck out of camp. Mike asked how come last year when the District Cub camping Chair Had visited all the packs that invited him to show the camp video and answer questions at Pack meetings and other Pack functions, were the numbers still down. I answered that if you look at the packs that invited him, they were the packs who went to camp anyway. If the leader isn't behind it, it isn't going to work.

Our SE is really big on incentives for the leaders. We have shirts for Webelos Scout Transition, mugs for everything. The active leaders have enough **** s to last a life time and need to rent storage for all the mugs. These leaders don't care about a mug or a shirt, they do what they do because they care.

I know when it didn't work!! I have the answer.

It will never work with the people who don't care.

I like spending time with Mike because I know that he really does care.