Scout's honor

It's been a wild and crazy roller-coaster of a move from Providence to Warwick this past week. In the process, bits of flotsam have emerged from the discouragingly large sludgepile of our belongings.

Here's a snapshot, c. 1967-1968, of our Mattapoisett Girl Scout troop. There I am on the right in my dorky green uniform, tarted up with Yardley's silver lipstick and black eyeliner. (Can I just add that I was having a rare good hair day?) I remember most of the troop members' names, too - a veritable hit parade of 1950s standards: Debbie, Jane, Rhonda, Susan, Corinne, Ruth, Anne. Michael-the-girl, behind me, was considered a bit of a bohemian.

I stuck with Girl Scouts through high school, although frankly I was too much of a princess to get behind the camping scene. How would I set my hair in the morning? What if someone heard me going to the bathroom in the outhouse-like loo?

Nearly 40 years later, I remember the Girl Scout pledge: "On my honor I will try to do my duty to God and my country, to help other people at all times, and to obey the Girl Scout laws." I swear I did not have to look that up. It's one of those early mantras, like the Pledge of Allegiance and the Lord's Prayer, that stays with you for a lifetime.

Were you ever a Scout? A Campfire Girl? What?