Texting During Meetings in Girl Scouts

I admit that I grew up in something close to the stone age by today’s standards.  Not only did I not have a cell phone as a kid, I had a black and white TV – really.  And to this day, I do not have texting on my phone.  Oh, I can smell the honeyed scent of temptation and have thought hard about it.  My daughter has sworn that she is a freak of nature because she does not have texting and her friends all do, but I am still holding out. 

However, as I said, I understand the allure of being able to talk to someone almost instantaneously without disturbing others around you like full voice conversation.  It so handy!  It is so compact!  It is so sexy!  It also holds a great deal of nasty potential.  I’m not even talking about the statistics on people maimed and killed by multi-tasking drivers.  I’m talking about the affect it has on our need for instaneous gratification and how it turns us into selfish little brats.  I’m not just talking about kids here either.  I started to, but I think about friends and co-workers who whip out their phones in the middle of conversations and suddenly, there you are with your words halted in mid air while they check in on that other universe.  Yep – rude brats.

So, given that this is part of our culture, adults and cadettes alike, how do we keep our girls engaged in the troop meetings?  I’ve had girls sitting in a cluster, texting under the table and giggle in the middle of business.  I’ve had them drop their project and walk away to catch a friend’s phone call.  I’ve had parents do it as well – yes, even the giggling part.

We tried some role modeling and cell phone etiquette discussions.  That didn’t seem to stick.  (Except with the adults.)  I tried one-on-one pleading and reasoning.  “I find it very disrespectful and rude when you do this.”  They just got more inventive.  “Oh, it’s my dad, mother, second cousin twice removed is calling.”

My answer has been the basket.  It goes in the middle of table when we start the meeting.  All but one of the cell phones go into it.  The one cell phone remains operable for emergencies and things like “Come unlock the door.”  I have had moderate success.  I had to email parents first so that they would call the main phone instead of trying to reach their children and even then, they slip up occasionally.  Just the threat of the basket has cut down on the phone problem.  But I still carry it with me.  If you have some other ideas, I would love to hear them.

Dealing with a Period

Periods are as unique as each individual girl.  Some girls feel great and even experience more energy and a sense of well being during their period.  Others get headaches and cramping.  They may experience depression, anger or the jitters.   I wish I were one of the first group.  Unfortunately, I’m one of the latter.  Most of the time, they are just a dull annoying ache and I am a bit on edge with my emotions.  But occasionally, I have cramps so bad I doubled over, accomanied by diarreah and naseau.  I mean who has an appetite when your uterus is trying to claw its way out like something out of Alien?

The ONLY thing that makes the bad ones feel better is a couple of Ibuprofin every 4 hours and a comfy couch with a heating pad.  Thank you God for the invention of heating pads.  The second best thing is the heat patch – heating pads that you can actually stick to you and they go where ever you go.  Those are now a must in my supply cabinet, right beside the femine napkins.

Having had many years of experience now, I pretty much know what brings on the bad ones.   It starts with being under a lot of stress with a whole lot of this and that going on.  I don’t get to the yoga routine like I should, then I start eating comfort foods instead of what is good for me.  Stress goes up because I am not taking time take care of myself.   Suddenly, the period rolls around and I am now forced to take a break, on my back, in the bed because I can’t stand to be around anyone (and no one can stand to be around me).

At that time, I get out my period care package:
My heating pad (or stick on heat)
Feminine napkins (tampons made the cramping worse)
Lots of water (to flush out the toxins)
Vitamins (to put back in what my body is taking out)
Lavendar oil (because it makes me calm and happy)
Chocolate (because it makes me calm and happy)
Hot tea (because it makes me calm and happy)

You get the idea.

What are periods like for you?  What are your tricks for getting through them?

Standing Up

L and I went to the school orientation yesterday.  We shuffled around in long lines to sign in and stared around at the other anxious students and resigned parents.  Maybe I just stared around.  I think L might have been biting her lip and wondering if her decision to change schools had been such a good one. 

 

Later, I went to a local coffee shop to wait for L to get out of orientation – the kind with lots of character and corners to sit back in.  I saw one of the other moms that we had bumped into at the school and invited her to join me.  After all, I should be making new friends at the school like L, right?  We got into a discussion about why our children had left their previous schools.  Her son, Zev, was tired of being in an environment where he was afraid to express his political views which were a lot more liberal than the people around him.  Political views don’t just mean who you are going to vote for, but how you stand on issues like building a wall across Mexico, how to treat other people who are different that you and your friends (black, nerdy, gay), how do you want to be treated as a female by other girls, adults and boys.

 

 Zev found that when his friends would cut down gays and say bad things about other people, he was shunned for standing up and telling them they were wrong to be mean.  L has certainly tried to stand up for her values when pressured by her friends, only to get jeering instead of support. 

 

Both Zev and L have been extremely brave to stand up for what they believe in.  It is hard.  I mean, REALLY hard.  To swallow that lump of fear of how others are going to react.  To take that first step away from safety and step up on a platform where people can now through verbal stones at you.  Yep.  Hard.

 

Ok, a few people just get mad and go all guns-a-blazing for justice and wade in no matter what.  Without them, we would still be segregated; women would not have the vote; and we would still have child labor.  The blazing guns people open the doors. It is up to the rest of us to push them wide and let in the fresh air.  But we have to get past the first stomach flutter and the worry about what will people think.  That is the definition of “apathy” – people who want to care, but are too scared to really do anything about it.

 

Since getting past apathy is so hard, even for adults, start now.  Begin by standing up for yourself and your friends.  Tell people when they hurt you.  Point out cruelty when it happens to other people.  Be a voice for what is right instead of adding silence to what is wrong. 

 

When I walk away from something that I know I should have spoken up about, I have guilty feelings and it.  I can feel bad for quite a while.  But when I speak up, I may be really nervous at first, but I walk away feeling good.  When is a time that you wish you could have a redo and go back and stand up instead of walking away?

 

Can you give other girls advice about how to handle situations instead of being too scared to stand up for their beliefs.