From my last post, I was pretty down…my son was originally sad about the decisions that his den mates made, I was upset because he was upset. But with most things in life, time heals all wounds, and I healed pretty quickly.

I got the “hang in there” comments and what not, and I do appreciate them. More times than not, I am just venting…I know that there isn’t anything that I can do about it, but at the end of the day, I sure am glad to know that I have a good group of scouters out there who give me a boost when I am down.

Back to the other side of the coin…I talked it over with my wife and Sam, and we decided that Sam is ready to move onto the troop. He is 1.) 11 years old and 2.) he has met all the requirements for the Arrow of Light. He hasn’t been awarded it yet, nor has his Den Leader put in the paperwork, but he is ready.

I took him to a dinner on Wednesday night that the troop was invited to, at the Elks’ Lodge. He put on his new troop t-shirt, necker, woggle and hat. He didn’t want to put on his scout pants, but I told him that we are a fully uniformed troop, and we all wear scout pants if you have a pair that fit. He put them on and away we went. The rest of the troop was there, and we enjoyed a nice ham dinner, complete with mashed potatoes, veggies, and rolls.

At the conclusion of the dinner, the Elk’s Lodge presented us with a grant for $200. Now, remember, we charter with the Moose Lodge, meet at the Moose Lodge and do our fundraisers through the Moose Lodge. We have  great relationship with them, sans a couple scheduling faux pas. The money was a thank you for our troop helping them with this past summer’s Flag Day ceremony.

Also in attendance were some girls from Marion House, a place for teenage mothers to get assistance with a place to live, care for their children and mentoring to help guide them. The Elk’s gave them $1550 to help out with things.

After they got their check, I looked at Tyler and said, “Who do you think needs the money more? Us or Marion house?”

“They need it more than we do” he said, without skipping a beat.

“That’s what I think too, pass it down to the rest of the guys that that is what we are going to do.”

I turned to the CC and the other adults and said that we were going to donate our donation. They all agreed, and so we took the check back up to the front and re-gifted our gift.

Tyler isn’t much for words, so I did the speaking. I stated that we have been blessed with a great organization, great parents, great fundraisers and most of all, great scouts. Those kids at Marion house need the money for food and diapers, more than we need new troop t-shirts.

There really isn’t anything more to the story, other than some sweaty eyes…that night made the previous night, albeit a dark night, seem like a distant memory.