Do a Good Turn

Julie and I started encouraging our son Cameron this past summer to think about joining scouting. In his case, Cub Scouts. We wanted him to start thinking outside of his own box, to learn new skills, and to have fun outside of the home. At the start of the school year, the local Cub Scout pack put on a information meeting for parents and future Cub Scouts. Cameron said he was interested.

We went and he ended up joining. I also volunteered to be an assistant den leader. It was my intention to invest more time into my kids when we moved to Minnesota. Back in California, I invested so much time into our church (which is not a bad thing) and started to realize that my kids were growing up rapidly and that I should do something about it. Well, here was an opportunity looking me right in the eye. I took it. Cameron and I have been enjoying it very much and it has provided some great time for us to spend together.

This last Saturday was the annual pack community service project. We spent the morning doing fall yard cleaning for an elderly couple who were too sick and too weak to do it for themselves. It was good to get Cameron out and do something for someone else and to explain to him why we were doing it. The Cub Scouts have the philosophy of 'do a good turn daily.' What that means is we should do something for someone else, whether it be big or small, every day. How simple and easy is that?

Well, we ended up filling 30 tall compost bags from Lowes with leaves. We could have spent the whole weekend there. It looked as if their yard had not been cleaned in a long time. We only stopped because we ran out of bags. Still, it was a good experience. The boys did as best as they could, but I think the parents did most of the work. That's OK though. I think the elderly couple were very grateful.