Wherein my childhood dream is--almost--realized

That's my Cub Scout handbook. Not because I once was in the Cub Scouts (oh, how I wish!), but because I saw it at a yard sale and bought it.

This week the Boy Scouts of America announced that girls would be allowed to join. In reading some of the news and editorial pieces about this proclamation, I learned that some Boy Scout troops have been allowing girls to join for years--for decades, some of them.

WHAT?!?

I am so, so happy for all the like-identifying young girls who are eager to go on those camp-outs and attend those rallies and, most important, get started on that prestigious Eagle Scout status.

And I am so sad and bitter that it has taken this long.

Seriously, what is the deal with all this gender isolation agenda?

And by the way, yes, yes, I know many modern-day Girl Scout troops do many of the wonderful things Cub Scout and Boy Scout troops do, such as hiking and camping, but they certainly did not in the 1960's when I wanted to join. And can I just be totally honest here? As a young girl, I didn't want to hang out with other girls. At all. Ever. I never played with dolls--I found it creepy. (It's a dead baby, after all, isn't it?) Playing "dress up" was like trying on really ugly clown costumes. (No. Just... no.) I didn't have the patience to sit and color in a book for hours (though I could sit somewhere quietly for long stretches putting words on a page, but that's an entirely different activity, isn't it?). I never understood the concept of "playing house," because the entire reason I wanted to play outside (with my male friends) all day every day was to get away from the chores and dust and drudgery of all that.

Plus I wanted to climb trees and dig in the dirt and plant things and play Cowboys and Indians and play with any toy with wheels made by Tonka--bonus points if the thing had winches or pulleys or sirens or a backhoe. 

Mind you, I was not what would be characterized as a healthy, outdoorsy kind of kid. I was a tiny, underweight thing with poor vision, malformed lungs, no muscles, and a constantly sniffling nose. But that didn't stop me from wanting desperately to go on fishing trips (never the hunting trips) with my dad, or to go camping or exploring. (Kind of like the kinds of things I like to do now--but no still no fishing.)

Alas, I was not allowed to go. "You're a girl. Girls don't do that sort of thing" still rings in my ears.

In the fifth grade, I tried joining the Girl Scouts. I barely survived a single meeting with my dignity intact. For that abysmal, torturous hour, we sat in the elementary school cafeteria with bars of Dove soap, pink netting and sequins spread on the table before us, our goal being to somehow transform all that girly stuff into a lovely gift for our moms. Dear Jesus, get me through this hour somehow and I promise I will never, ever be unfaithful to my true identity ever again, amen, I prayed.

So I hounded my mom for a year or two to let me join the Boy Scouts, to no avail. (By then, my dad had passed, but he would have said no, too.)

And so, yeah, if you know me well (or follow this blog on a regular basis), you know that I spend just about every spare hour of my life making it up to myself by roaming in the woods, hiking, going exploring and having similar adventures.

Label me as you will--tomboy, androgynous, gender fluid--this is who I am. No shame--I had enough of that as a child, so don't even bring it now. I'll cut you (not with my really cool Boy Scout pocket knife with the letters BSA right there on the handle, but with my words).

We are fifty years gone from my childhood, and still there is (shockingly) push back on the BSA allowing those-identifying-as-female to join--even from the GSA (of all people!). FOX News ran a story three days ago entitled "Eagle Scout: RIP Boy Scouts of America. You were great for 100 years." Because apparently folks still believe that once girls join a club, they ruin everything.

Please, America, I implore you on behalf of all the little Kays out there, whether identifying as "male" or "female" or somewhere in between (You know "Kay" is both a "boy's" and a "girl's" name, right?), to cast aside this ridiculous gender separation agenda and simply let kids choose. Girls and boys who want to play dress up and rock the (dead) baby will do so. Girls and boys who want to learn how to build a campfire and catch a lizard and operate the manual transmission on a Hemi-powered dually will do so. Trust me. Dear god, please trust me--you don't have to tell them which gender to choose. They already know what they are.

What Lies Beneath or Why We Should Encourage Girls To Be Whatever They Want To Be

I always think of yard work and gardening as meditative activities, so I rarely grumble when it's time to clear the flowerbeds of weeds. Armed with my shovel, I move forward happily in anticipation of the time it will afford me to work through plot lines for the book I'm writing, or (more treacherous terrain) try to figure out why I haven't been writing lately, or to contemplate my place in the world. It's monotonous work, weeding. But it's good, physical work, and each time I push the spade into the earth, taking care to avoid tree roots and water lines, I am grateful that at sixty I can still do this.

A few days ago, just as I'd begun to tackle a patch of soil near my agapanthus that had become overgrown with stray grass tendrils, I felt the shovel hit something hard. I moved back a bit, then gently pushed the shovel down deep and under, hoping to scoop up what I assumed would be a large rock. What emerged was softball sized. But it certainly wasn't a rock. I had unearthed the shell of a small tortoise.

I'm not squeamish (trust me; I've held freshly delivered human placentas in my bare hands and examined them to make sure everything came out all right), and I love all things reptilian (possibly with the exception of Diamond Back rattlesnakes, which I believe are the spawn of Satan), but I have to confess my stomach did a bit of a turn when I realized what I'd unearthed. After all, it was the body of an animal that had died. So I took a moment to have a quiet meditation over the remains before I began to examine them.

What I discovered was that the body of the tortoise had lain interred long enough to be reduced to a skeleton. As I slowly turned it over, the bottom shell fell away and all the bones sifted down through the dirt into the hollow of the shell. Slowly, carefully, I brushed and sifted away the soil. There was his skull—missing the lower mandible, which I found a few moments later. I recognized the pelvis next, as it was the largest bone. The tiny vertebrae that had once held the tortoise's spinal column in place were a marvel to consider as they rested in my palm.

In those moments of close examination, I was grateful to my college biology teacher who insisted we learn the name of every single bone in the human body. As a young person, I found the exercise tedious. Now I appreciate how well the knowledge has served me over the years. I thought of Annie Dillard and her amazing prose about the biology in her own backyard. And I recalled my first exposure to the writings of anthropologist Ashley Montagu. I was still in junior high (though already a confirmed writer), and I thought how wonderful it would be to spend a lifetime studying the unique zoology of humans and then writing about new discoveries and conclusions that could be drawn from them. Years later, a friend would introduce me to the brilliant illuminations of Loren Eiseley, but by then I'd launched into my college coursework as an English major, and there was no turning back. Still...

If I'd been given direction as a child, if I had not been told repeatedly, "Girls don't... " whenever I leaned toward the boy side, I would not have followed the discipline which seemed practical but has turned out to be a bit static and stuffy, and would instead have followed what always seemed to me to be so dynamic and exciting that it was, perhaps, just beyond the reach of an average tomboy being raised by a single, working class mom.

I have saved my treasure of turtle bones in a large metal tin. Perhaps before I retire I'll come across a student eager to find an engaging science project who will be happy to do the painstaking work of organizing, mounting and identifying this jumble of leftover parts. If I find her, she may have these bones with my blessing.