OBSERVATIONS AT THE WATER'S EDGE

Each month, my field artillery unit "brothers"  and friends gather for lunch at a local restaurant.  We are loud (We lost most of our hearing due to cannons--and perhaps 'rock and roll'.), boisterous (In the middle of the restaurant, we start by pledging allegiance to the flag.) and happy.  Sometimes we talk about our aches and pains, but most of the time we talk about life--and express our opinions.  (How do we!)  There is very pleasant, young waitress (Nearly everyone is young to us!) who takes care of the entire group (usually over 20 men) and does a great job.  She knows that if she keeps our glasses filled, we will all be so engaged with each other that it won't matter how long it takes for the meal to come out.  Besides that, the food isn't that bad either!

We were a National Guard unit that went "active" Army during the Vietnam War. Some of us joined simply because we preferred to serve with people we knew--"our" people--rather than be drafted. (Enough said about that!)  We are a brotherhood--molded, with a common bond. 

(Bring) Down the Plane

As I understand the history, "in the beginning", our unit was a rifle company, and later made into an anti-aircraft battery that was deployed in World War I. It was then that it gained its crest--which you can see here.  When I "signed up", folks said it meant "Down with the plane". (which seemed like "political protest" at the time, but I accepted it.  It was the sixties.)  I've since determined that a more correction translation of "A BAS L'AVION"  would be the command to 'down' the plane or in today's language, "(Bring) Down the plane!"

Yesterday, I went to lunch with my "brothers".  Several asked me when the next "post" would be on The Pudelpointer Chronicles.  It pleases me that they enjoy it.  Here it is.

Morning on the Merrimack

That very morning I was doing water drills with K-Lee at the Merrimack River, and I observed something that made interrupt the training for a while and let her "do her thing".  There must have been turbulence upriver at the dams because there were hundreds of little foamy bubble-patches approximately 3 by 6 inches floating down the river.  They had about the consistency of soap bubbles blown by a child.  K-Lee was distracted in our retrieving drills, and would stop partway in her return to investigate the foamy "patches" that drifted by.  At first, I was trying to correct her behavior. 


Then a small voice inside me whispered that she had never seen anything like that before, so I took the bumper from her as she sat by my side and then released her to go play.  

She swam to the middle of the river and popped the bubble patches like a child popping bubbles that someone else was blowing.  (I thought back to how I would pop bubbles when I was a child.  Now I have very little interest.)  Thinking that she would go through this experience and then tire of it, I gave her freedom--without correction--to "pop" as many the foam "rafts" as she wanted.  It took a while, but she finally was satisfied.  Seeing that she was ready, we began again--with more success.

Water Retrieve

Early in today's morning cool, patches of the river's surface sparkled like diamonds in a jeweler's showcase.  Several schools of tiny minnows were feeding on the surface.  Each time a minnow broke the surface, its splash twinkled with a captured ray of the early morning sun. I released K-Lee to investigate.  After all, she's a "thinking" dog--like a child in so many ways. She tried to catch the minnows without success.  Now, it's not a new thing for her and she can more readily problem-solve the task at hand.

So the rhetorical question I have is this:  "Are we taking the time to let our children and grandchildren have experiences that build up their confidence and understanding--are we allowing them to fail and learn from the failure -- or are we (for our own expedience's sake) telling them "what" to do, "when" to do it, and (sometimes) "why"-- when we should be letting them discover 'the law of consequence' and how to benefit from it??  

After all, when you don't get what you want, you get wisdom.