"18 Summers"

"You have 18 summers to make a difference in your children's lives; depending on the age of your kids, you may have as few as 6 summers remaining. How are you doing?"

As I look toward next year, I have to admit that I've been thinking of these words often since they were spoken by the Timucuan Federation leaders during the Broken Arrow ceremony at the State Campout. After seeing and participating in this ceremony, I began to wonder what they were doing that we were not doing. In the weeks immediately following the State campout, I exchanged a number of emails with their Federation Chief, Golden Bear, and also spent some time looking at their website and the activities and resources they have developed. To be perfectly honest, the Eola Federation and how we do things - very casually - is all I had ever known of the Indian Guide program. I had no idea how under-developed our program was until I saw how advanced their program is!

"You have 18 summers to make a difference in your children's live's; by now, you may have only 6 or 8 of those summers left - how are you doing?"

I quickly realized that, as fun as our monthly camping experiences with our kids are, they can be even better and more meaningful - that is, if we are all committed enough to make that happen.

In that spirit, here are some ideas I have in mind for next year:

* Recruiting: I believe this must be our top priority for next fall. We talked about it at the beginning of the year, did one presentation at The Christ School, then dropped it. The fact is that most of the kids in our tribe are getting older and will probably not be in the program much longer. For the sake of the younger kids that we do have, I want to see us bring more kids into the tribe now so it will continue strong for them after the older ones leave. In my opinion, we should have a goal of five new families. I also think our efforts this time around should be directed at the parents, not the kids. I think the best way for this to happen is to talk to our friends and neighbors - a personal recommendation goes a long way toward convincing someone to try something new. Another way to do that would be to do a presentation during a parents open house at school. I have heard mixed feedback from others as to the success of this approach, but it might be worth a try. I would need some help from some of you to contact the elementary schools in our area and find out how best we can do this. Here is where I think the Timucuan Federation shines - they have a recruiting video! You can see their recruiting video at this link: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DLcyVWetbrI ; I do not expect to make a video, but Roy and I did put together a good photo slideshow we can use, and make some of the same points the gentlemen in this video did. If you help me set these up, I'll put on the Indian regalia and go make the presentation!

* I hope to do more campfire programs within our tribe. I think stories and rituals, such as the Broken Arrow and Acorn ceremonies that the Timucuan Federation do, are valuable for helping the kids appreciate their Indian Guide/Princess journey more and it makes things more interesting as well. I also intend to create some more rituals or stories along the lines of the Legend of the Tomahawk to help teach the 7 Aims - that's something we all should know, and not just read them as we're doing the Aims walk at the Cornfest.

* Learn something about the Indian culture. Again using the Timucuan Federation as a model, each of their tribes teaches there kids something about the Indian tribe whose name they are using to help them understand their culture.

* Along with the stories and rituals, I want to try to work in some skill training. Mark Marshall tried to do some of that during his tenure, and I hope to build on that. Teaching the kids how to build a fire, use a knife, and even cook (as Jeff suggested), are great skills we can teach the kids. I'm already thinking that our October campout at Umatilla will feature lunch cooked by the kids - that ought to be interesting!

* To help enhance the campfire rituals I just mentioned, I'd like our future campsites to have at least a little bit of order to emphasize our gathering around the campfire. I'm thinking we arrange the campsite basically in a U-shape with the campfire located at the open end of the U (what can I say - it's the architect in me talking!). I'd like to also purchase about 4-6 tiki torches, or we can bring our own, to arrange near the campfire area. I learned from Chuck Bosworth a long time ago - the more fire, the better! (I think)

* I would like to have one of you to take charge of "war games" for the tribe. These would be games that we would have available at each campout if we have free time between other federation activities, that would involve the kids and parents. These might be games like a 3-legged race, balloon toss, kickball - anything to have us interact with our kids more.

* I'm going to "suit up" next year - complete Indian regalia to accompany the headdress. Again, I think this will make the experience more fun for the kids. I'm also already working on a tribal banner that can be displayed at our campsite and taken to the Federation campfire programs - just another item to foster some pride in our tribe.

* I'm going to do some research on crafts and put together a list of craft possibilities. Waiting for someone to come up with a craft idea and sign up every month seems to always be a stumbling block that I would like to remove. I actually cracked open the official book the other day - after 3 years or more of not touching it - and discovered that there are quite a few craft ideas - they've been under our noses all along! Another possibility is to just go ahead and designate the craft for each meeting at the beginning of the year, and we all pay money to cover the costs; that way it's done and we're ready to go every month.

"You have 18 summers..."

The Timucuan Federation's example at the State Campout really made an impact on me. I am really excited about next year, and hopefully you can tell, I want to make the experience for our kids the best it can be - basically, take it to another level that I don't think has been seen in the Eola Federation. If we are successful, we'll also set an example for the rest of our Federation to follow. To do that, I will need your help - we can only do as much as you are willing to support. As always, I'd love to hear your suggestions - I'm here to serve you and your kids during my time as Chief.

Yatahey!

Chief Bald Eagle