Column: Scout's Honor

column-scout-s-honor

Dear readers,

During the Kennedy administration I was in uniform. I was a cub scout.  Some of the happiest memories of my youth are from those few months.  Mrs. Skogland was my den mother.

I have vivid memories. In my mind’s eye, I can clearly see myself all dressed up in my finest cub scout couture. I am sitting on the piano bench next to Mrs. Skogland. She removes a paper music roll from a long rectangular box and carefully installs it in the player piano. Mrs. Skogland begins to peddle. The paper music roll, with its thousands of little holes, starts turning and the piano comes to life.

“Yes! We Have No Bananas” remains one of my favorite songs to this day. In fact, just writing about it has jarred it loose from one of my memory pegs. I can hear Mrs. Skogland’s player piano playing the tune as clearly as when I was sitting next to her on the piano bench. No doubt an ear worm that will remain with me for at least a week.

As the paper roll turned and the mechanism of spools, gears, pullies, and cogs made the piano play, all seemed right with the world. I only held the cub scout rank equivalent to buck private, but I couldn’t have been happier. I didn’t bother with earning badges or for that matter ever reading the cub scout handbook. Looking back, I think I missed the very essence of being a scout. I just joined for the uniform. 

Cub scouts all wore their uniforms to school on days when meetings were held. I liked those blue cub scout uniforms complete with yellow neckerchief scarf and little metal woggle holding it in place. I remember going to Breedlove’s Men’s Store on E. Washington Street to buy my uniform. My woggle sported a relief sculpture of an animal. 

On special occasions our den would join the other dens at the Knights of Columbus for a cub scout pack meeting. The Pinewood Derby was such an occasion. I thought of it as the cub scout version of the Indy 500.

Weeks before the derby, each cub scout was issued a block of wood, four nails, and four wheels. I spent hours whittling, sanding, and painting to turn my block of wood into a race car. It ended up being the crowning achievement of my career in the cub scouts. I still have my pinewood derby car and the trophy I was presented for my third-place finish.

Enough reminiscing, let’s return to the present. I telephoned my former den mother and we talked for the first time in 60 years. We had a lot of catching up to do. 

I learned that her name is Ruth. She and her husband, Toby, are now living in Seattle and still have that player piano. They are the parents of Marc, Ian, Neil, Loren, and Keith. 

Ruth is originally from Toronto. She and Toby relocated to Shelbyville due to Toby’s job at General Electric. She has many fond memories from Shelbyville and her association with the scouts. In addition to being my den mother, she spent several summers supervising the family camp at Ransburg Boy Scout Camp.

I thanked Mrs. Skogland for being my den mother. She was always much nicer to me than I deserved. I never read my cub scout handbook and only looked at the cartoons in “Boys’ Life” magazine. Thanks to Mrs. Skogland, I still learned valuable life lessons from my scouting experience. Leading by example, she taught me to be kind and help others.

After we ended our phone call, I wondered if Mrs. Skogland introduced me to the player piano 60 years ago to prepare me for a future where machines take over the world. Was she preparing me for this dystopian world of mechanization where the cyborg cashier at Kroger keeps telling me to “place your groceries in the bagging area?” 

Maybe, but most likely, she played “Yes! We Have No Bananas” for me because she discovered it was one way to get me to sit still until my mom came to pick me up.

See you all next week, same Schwinn time, same Schwinn channel.

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