This memory I have is so ridiculous that I think it's time to share it. In fact, this may be the first of these memories I may be writing about for the next few months or years. I don't know. What I do know, is that, sometimes Scoutmasters make mistakes. What I hope is that they learn from them. I don't know if mine ever would.
I graduated from my Webelo's pack to Troop 12 when I was just ten years old. I was younger than everyone else. It made it tough to be taken seriously by other scouts much less get along with them. The original Scoutmaster was Mr. Moore. He was a bit goofy, quick tongued, and got along great with the boys. This did not sit well with the some of the committee members, parents, and other adults.
I could see how he could rub people the wrong way, but I believe he put the boys needs and wants first. He was asked to step down as Scoutmaster. He refused and was fired because of it. All the other adults/Assistant Scoutmasters had a talk with us boys. They asked us not to quit scouting, and to give the new Scoutmaster a chance. Some boys quit due to their disgust over the whole matter. At the time the troop had over forty members, something I've never seen in any other Scout troop, then or since.
Mr. Cooper took over as Scoutmaster for the next six months. He did it as long as he was able, but his job took a lot of his time. I always got along well with Mr. Cooper. He stepped down, and went back to being an Assistant Scoutmaster within the troop.
That was when Mr. John R. (Bob) Brasher took over as Scoutmaster. He took the troop in unseen directions. I was roughly twelve years old when this happened. The first thing that happened was, he really took over. As in, the boys no longer planed what we were doing. He took hard control of the reins.
The first thing that was decided with no input of the boys was that Troop 12, (of Lutz, Fl.) was to become a backpacking troop. That's when a lot of boys quit. They wanted to be in the BSA. They didn't want to be involved in the Bataan Death March through Florida during the summers. And remember, it's summer in Florida nine months out of the year.
The thing I remember most about Mr. Brasher was he ability to talk out of both sides of his mouth at the same time. He once said that, "The Boy Scouts are not a military organization." But he also said, "We might have to teach these boys some (military) steps."
If you've ever seen Dr. Phil McGraw (Oprah's friend) spout off some nonsensical country saying, well, Mr. Brasher was the king of that. You have to remember that I was 10-13 years old while I was in Troop 12. I wasn't that mature for my age, and I had no idea what he was talking about half the time.
My Dad never wanted to talk bad about other adults in charge. He didn't want to undermine their credibility/authority. There was one incident that just made us ask what the cold hell Mr. Brasher was thinking. It was kind of the beginning of the end as far as me having any respect for Mr. Brasher as a Scoutmaster.
The Troop was on one of its death hikes. Again, you have to remember was summer is like in Florida. It's 95 degrees during the day, and only drops to 85 degrees at night. We were all carrying heavy backpacks. Remember I was only twelve years old, and carrying a 35 pound backpack. A lot of that weight was carrying water. I personally carried six quarts of water when I would start backpacking. I had two, 2 quart "wine sacks," and two plastic, 1 quart bottles.
Here's what a quart of water looks like:
When we were backpacking we would hike for one hour and rest for ten minutes. It was during one of the breaks that Mr. Brasher flat told me I should only drink this much water from my canteen.
This is what I actually drank:
Now imagine you have been gardening, landscaping, or mowing the lawn. If you've been out doing that for a few hours how much water would you drink? Also, imagine you are doing that in August in the beautiful state of Florida? Yeah.
Nowadays, outside activities are all about hydration. Heck, now they make kids drink before activities. Maybe that's going overboard if you are up in Canada, but when it's 95 degrees out in the woods of Florida, it's not a bad idea. Heck, there have been times when I'm doing lawn work out here, and I'm sweating as fast as I drinking water. I'm not being funny. I really have done that.
A couple of blogs ago I wrote about working on the travel trailer. It was so hot that I ended up drinking an entire gallon of water in six hours. Once I had showered and cleaned up, I started drinking even more. The reality was I had actually sweated that much out.
So when Mr. Brasher told me that I was drinking too much water I honestly thought he was completely full of shit. But more on that later. He actually had the audacity to walk up to my Father (days later, after the hike) and tell him, "Adrian drinks too much water." My Dad told him, "You all are out there backpacking in this weather and you're telling him to eat beef jerky and trail mix? And you wonder why he's thirsty? Mr. Brasher didn't have much to say to that.
But here lies a problem in backpacking that I was never told. I didn't actually find this out until later. Do you know what happens to a person when the following things occur?
1. Hard work (as in backpacking?)
2. Not taking enough water in that leads to dehydration?
3. Eating salty dehydrated foods?
4. Pre-teen boys not wanting to drop a deuce in the woods?
5. Extremely high outdoor temperatures?
I'm going to leave this WebMD link right here, okay?
I know folks may think that today's helicopter parents and coaches might be babying their youth, but look at what a lot of us had to deal with as kids. Doctors say something that I wish a lot of people would pay attention to.
They say the body has a natural system for telling a person that they need water. It's called thirst. If you feel thirsty, you should drink water. It's that simple. It's not like Mr. Brasher said, "You should only drink "this" much water." No! If a person is thirsty there's a reason why. It's your body telling you to put some water in it now.
Again, that was the beginning of the end for me with Troop 12. I don't know if I could even call it Troop 12 by that point. It was Mr. Brasher's Troop by that time. I ended up getting kicked out of Troop 12 about a year later. But that's a story for another time. For now, I leave you with this advice. Stay hydrated.
And here are the links I promised earlier.
Adrian reminisces about his childhood days with the Boy Scouts
Bored Scoutmasters and the Tale of the Wampus
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