11/12/17 - Many of us enjoy the fall season for a variety of reasons. Changing of the leaves, changing of temperatures, and my favorite, changing the clocks. Every November, we also get to honor our Veteran's, living and deceased, and this year was no different. Well...yes, it was different, and it was wonderful. In the past, our troop has participated in the annual local Veteran's Day parade and it was very nice to honor our veteran's and their memories of service to our country in past wars. This year, our troop decided to honor our veterans by picking up American Flags that had been deployed at interred veteran's sites in a local cemetery. We had great weather, and an wonderful turn out of cub scouts, boy scouts, venturers, and their families. We had a total of 56 people turn out for today's event. Members of Pack 193 from Brighton were also there, and while they have provided this service for the past several years, they didn't have too many show up today. They were very happy to see the folks from Troop and Pack 376 show up, roll up their sleeves, and made light work picking up probably 500 - 600 flags throughout the cemetery. You know the saying...."Many hands make...." well you know.
As it turned out, the sister cemetery to the one we were at, didn't have the people they thought were coming today, actually show up. So our team was offered the opportunity to help this other cemetery pick up their flags (about 3500 of them) next Saturday. Our Senior Patrol Leader (SPL) accepted the opportunity on behalf of our troop, so we get to honor our veteran's again next weekend. The young people and adults had a wonderful time performing such meaningful service work. With any luck, next weekend's weather will be cooperative, and we will have another good turn out.
11/18/17 – Today, we were at Riverside Cemetery’s sister cemetery
Fairmount. The weather was indeed
cooperative, a cool, gorgeous, blue sky day.
We had 67 people turn out from a variety of civic groups. Daughters of the American Revolution, BSA
Troop 376, BSA Troop 79, Cub Scout Packs 376 & 193, and their families all
contributed to this successful service project.
Our group was assigned 18 separate blocks to remove American Flags on
veteran’s graves. Fairmount had allocated
4 – 5 hours for our volunteers to collect the flags. In reality, it took us less than 2 hours to
cover all 18 blocks. When we were
finished, a light lunch was offered for volunteer fellowship. All the volunteers seemed very pleased with
their successful efforts, and Fairmount Cemetery was very grateful for the
assistance.
Earlier in the week, our Troop's Color Guard was invited to present the Colors prior to dinner at a Senior Living Center. Our Color Guard did a great job presenting the Colors, and was invited to stay for dinner after the ceremony. The center also lined up a Bagpiper who played patriotic music as the scouts marched in. It was quite moving. We sat down to dinner, and the scouts were at the top of their manners game, and the residents were duly impressed with how polite and kind the boys were.
Inspiration so moved one of the residents, that he went back to his living quarters, and retrieved 4 identical patches for the boys who were able to stay for dinner. The patches, like the one pictured above, were from a special trip he took in 1957 to Valley Forge, PA for the BSA National Jamboree. Once a scout, always a scout. It was clear he treasured those patches, having had them for 60 years. He was quite pleased to be able to give each of the Color Guard Scouts who were there one of these patches. Anyone who knows about scouting, knows that these very special patches are guarded like treasure by the scout who earned them. This resident's kindness for recognizing our scouts with this treasured gift left me speechless. It was all I could do to ask him if he was sure he wanted to part with his patches, and have him give the patches to the scouts himself with his own story. And finally, to thank him from the bottom of my heart for his recognition and generosity. The boys seemed to know they were heirs of this man's treasure, and all were very respectful and grateful for his recognition of them.
The residence also had a musical trio who provided patriotic music throughout dinner. This was quite fun as well, and the trio's music was very good. Many of the residents were singing along with the trio and were having the best time. I knew most of the words to many of the songs, as I'm not all that far behind the generation they were playing for.
I was a guest during the senior residence event, the adult advisor who now works with the Color Guard and is the primary contact for each venue set up, has done a wonderful job keeping the tradition of excellence our troop is known for going, and has branched out to venues we have never dreamed of before. It was a pleasure watching our troop, cubs, and ventures honor our living veterans as well as honoring the memory of our veterans who are no longer with us.
Yes...it was quite a week... a very good week.
