My mom was a Girl Scout and loved it. Naturally, she enrolled me in Brownies (the prerequisite to Girl Scouts) when I was in preschool or kindergarten. Right after you join, you need to buy the uniform. As a typical little girl, I liked pink, baby blue, and anything sparkly. The uniform for a Brownie was head-to-toe brown, which was immediately off-putting. More importantly, I had no idea what Brownies or Girl Scouts did. My mom hadn’t gotten around to telling me about the wilderness skills she had learned, the camping she’d enjoyed, or the friendships she had formed through the club.
We met in a school cafeteria, Brownies through Girl Scouts in sixth grade. Each age group had its own lunch table. Pretty much all I remember happening was my group leader making a big deal out of reminding a selected victim that it was their turn to bring a snack for the group next week. “Jennifer, don’t forget. Next week it’s your turn to bring the snack. Tell your mom that you have to bring a snack next week.” I remember thinking, If it’s so important, why don’t you just make copies of a note and hand it to a different person each week?
At the end of each meeting, all grade levels would gather in a circle. I’m sure some words were spoken (probably the Girl Scout motto that I didn’t memorize), and then we’d hold hands and, one by one, wait for the person next to us to squeeze our hand. Then we’d pass it along by squeezing the hand of the person on our other side. That was my favorite part of Brownies.
During one pivotal meeting, instead of our normal lunch tables in rows, the cafeteria was set up with smaller booths and one or two of the older Girl Scouts behind each booth. We younger girls must have been told to stop at different tables and talk to the Girl Scouts at each booth. I’m not sure if it was a science fair, information fair, indoor circus, or what. I wandered around the room, doing my best to avoid interacting with anyone. I spotted a leader asking one of the sixth-grade girls to go out in the hall with her, and I trailed them to the doorway and spied on them. The leader asked the Girl Scout if she would be the one to start the hand squeeze during circle time. From the girl’s rapturous expression and blissful response, you would’ve thought that some high honor had just been bestowed upon her. It was like she just learned that she had been nominated as the presidential candidate for her political party.
Deflated, my thought was, So, if I stay in Girl Scouts for another six years, maybe one day I’ll be chosen for the immense responsibility of starting the hand squeeze? I could handle that now. At that point, I lost all interest in Brownies and Girl Scouts. What was there to look forward to? What was there to work toward?
If I had been more mischievous, I would have started my own hand squeeze when everybody formed a circle, but I didn’t think of it back then. Surprisingly, judging by the one hand squeeze that came from one direction, no one else did, either.
Photo: Rock City, Lookout Mountain, GA
