Ep. 141: THIS COUNTRY LIFE - Kids and the Outdoors (Part 2)

think I got a thing or two. The Teacher, Kids and Outdoors Part two, I'm passing the platter with a second helping of kids and outdoors. It doesn't take a lot to get them interested, and you can be a minimalist or go all in with what your activities are. The key is to just find something that they'll enjoy and benefit from and get gone doing it. I've got some good information to share, so y'all get easy and listen up. But first, I'm going to tell you a story.

Since we're talking about kids and outdoors, I figured i'd share this one. Tams boys, my nephews, were fourteen and eleven, and wanted to go coon hunt with me. One night thirty years ago. I was hunting with a friend of mine, David Boudra, the same friend that I was hunting with a few months later when we saw a mountain lion less than two miles from where this incident took place. Now, that was the second sighting of my existence and David's first,

but that's another story. David and I had driven down to Thames to hunt the bottoms behind his house. David lived an hour away and our work schedules only allowed us to hunt a few times a month, so we tried to take advantage of every opportunity. I didn't have a dog then, and as long as it wasn't you could just about bet we were going to go. Had we been able to hunt more, I'm sure we wouldn't have gone that night because the wind was howling like crazy,

but it wasn't raining, so we were going. We stopped at Thams to visit before we cut loose, and to get Matthew and Will. Nothing could have made me happier. These two hooligans were and are just like my own sons, and taking them with me was going to be just as much fun for me as it was going to be fun for them, or so I thought. The boys each had a couple of decailed flashlights, and it didn't

really matter. David and I had good lights and they were going to be walking with us anyway, So we left the house on foot, walked across the gravel road next to the creek. David cut his old hound Spot loose. It wasn't long before he struck in trailing a coon. Now, normally we would have just stood our ground and listened for him to tree, and then casually walked to him, picking our way through the easiest route through the woods, but the wind was blowing so hard that we basically

had to go with the dog to hear him. Some of the walking was good, but some of it was pretty rough. Briars and old tree tops from where some timber had been cut a year or so before made it challenging for me and David, much more so for Matthew and Will. Add the fact that we were having to move at a pretty good pace to keep up with Spot greatly enhanced the degree of difficulty. We followed that hound for the better part of an hour, back and forth and in circles, trying to keep up with him.

We'd walked close to a mile by then, I'm sure, but we hadn't moved off the same twenty acres that we started out on. Spot eventually made a tree in there, and when we got to it we saw a big old hole in it. We looked and looked for that coon, but never found it, figuring that he was in a den, which is where we all should have been. The wind hadn't let up an inch. David pulled Spot off that tree. He recast him, and he didn't go far before opening up on a track and took off like he was

late for work. We were fixing up to get the wagon hitch to keep up with him, and there was no way those boys were gonna be able to go. So I made a decision, a decision at the time I thought was right and best for all involved. To this day I regretted. I walked to a little gap in the trees and pointed to the night light that was visible and what I thought would be an easy five minute walk, and I said something to the fact that, boys,

there's your house. Me and David are going to have to chase this dog, and y'all ain't gonna be able to keep up. You can get home from here, can't you. I wished a million times over the years that I had that opportunity again. They were my responsibility. My brother had allowed me to take his only two children into the dark of night, feeling confident I would take care of him, and I didn't believe me when I say I almost didn't tell this story because I'm ashamed of it,

what little forethought I put into it. I've trained my whole professional career for the worst case scenario, evaluating and considering every possible negative circumstance that could occur, and to recognize and worked through the problem for the best solution. It didn't matter if it was a simple traffic stop on the highway or a high risk entry into a nest of bad folks. I was supposed to be thinking two moves ahead, but this was just a coonhut. What

could go wrong? If I had that opportunity again, I'd say, boys, there's your house, y'all come with me, and David's gonna go with spot, and that's where this story would have ended. But that's not what happened. They looked at me and said, yes, sir, we can make it. There, we can go, and off they went, in a beeline straight for that night light. That was burning in their front yard, their flashlights leading the way until they got out of sight, And when they did, I turned my back to them and took

off to catch up with David and that dog. Now it wasn't like walking in a park. They had to cross a shallow creek and weave their way back to the gravel road. Will got hung up in some sawbriers and waded water over the top of his boots, and then the batteries and the flashlights started fading out. Then they lost sight of the night light, and they got turned around, and then they got scared, and I would have been to. The night was black as four foot

up of bulls behind, and the wind was relentless. Their daddy had always told them if they ever got lost in the woods around their house that all they had to do was walk till they hit the road or found the creek. If they hit the creek, all they had to do was follow it downstream and it would pass right in front of their house. Now that was one hundred percent truth. But they weren't in the woods

where they normally played. They were across the road from their house, and on this side of the road, the creek forked and one went to the road and one fork went deeper in the woods toward a big beaver pond nearly a mile away. Well guess which one they took. And they didn't make a choice and take the wrong fork. They were walking down the creek in the dark, and

that's just where they ended up going. Forty five minutes later, Dave and I had spot by the collar and we were walking back toward the road when I thought I heard someone holler. We stopped and listened, and every now and then we could hear through the wind, we could hear a man hollering. I thought it sounded like Tim. Then I got scared. I hollered back, and I took off toward where he was. When I got to the road and saw the boys weren't with him, my heart sank out of my chain and I felt sick to

my stomach. David and I headed back toward where we'd last seen them, and Tim took off around the other side of the block of woods we were hunting, and on the road that went on the other side of the beaver pond. I've been scared a few times in my life as a direct result of my profession. Sometimes with no warning I'll think about one of those times, and when I do, they give me the chills, and for a moment, I'm right back in that place again. That night is one of them. David and I didn't

find them, but Tim did. They heard him yelling, and they walked out to him on the road, nearly a mile from where they'd gotten turned around. Other than being scared, they were okay, but I wasn't, and I'm still not. The lesson hears this. We should prepare our kids for these scenarios, and had they been prepared, it wouldn't have been a problem. Sending them off without proper equipment was my fault. The least thing I should have done was give them my light, but I didn't think their lights

would start going out, but they did. I also didn't think they'd lose sight of that night light and get turned around, but they did. Adding to the confusion was the wind that made it nearly impossible to communicate from very far away. Now, the biggest thing was I didn't hold up my end of being the adult. I had checked those two rascals out of my brother's inventory, and it wasn't up to them to check themselves back in that was all on me. In spite of everything I

failed to do that night. They lived. Now they've got a house full of youngins too, and believe it or not, none of them have ever asked to go coon hunting with me. It was a wonderful act of inclusion to want those boys to go with me, and a terrible lapse in judgment that could have gotten them hurt. I learned a valuable lesson that night, and that's just how it happened. In Part one of Kids Outdoors, I gave a few basic ways to pry those grocery goblins off

the couch and out of the house. If you're just tuning in, it's a simple recipe. Find something that they can do with you, and go do it. Remember it don't have to be technical or labor intensive. Nature walks are just sitting on the porch watching the world go by beach just about anything on TV, except, of course, for that one show that's based out of Montana. It's about a group of folks going outside in places all over the world, getting close enough to nature to literally

take a bite out of it. It's my favorite. Oh and the guy that started it all published a book about getting kids outside. It's called catch it crayfish, count the stars. It's pretty sporty. And he'd be the first to tell you get outside first and watch us second. So I learned something this week. Y'all remember my friend Terry Garner. He was the guy who met trout fishing that I talked about in my podcast entitled The Power of Hello. If you haven't already, I suggest you listen

to it. It's one of my favorites. But until you do, let me give you a quick review. I went fly fishing one day after suddenly deciding I was a fly fisherman, and I quickly found out I wasn't after seeing a guy fishing near me gracefully catch fish like orchestrated ballet. Well, I caught nothing and looked like I was sword fighting with the invisible man. We met on the bank and made friends, good friends. Terry married up. He out kicked

his coverage. As they say, his wife, Terry spelled taor I is a Jedi princess of the fly ride herself and a dynamo educator who retired after forty years. Her retirement lasted about as long as my patience. The possum tree and dog and she went to work for a nonprofit called Outdoors Tomorrow Foundation. Man, I have been doing some digging and talking to Miss Terry about it, and this program is fantastic. It's a whole curriculum geared for

all students K through twelve. Okay, Brent, it's a good program. How will it help my kids at home when they're doing these activities at school? Well, I'll tell you simply, by stirring their interest and getting them involved in projects that creates motion in their bodies and exercises their brain beyond cartoons and an app on a tablet, all while teaching them a skill. Getting them interested in school will

keep them interested at home. It's a fact that kids who spend more time outside away from electronics, have fewer sleep issues, feel better about themselves, and have better academic scores. Now that last one reques as a disclaimer from yours. Truly, if you spend all your time outside and none inside studying, it may negatively affect your academic scores. My problem in school was I was more interested in what was going on outside than inside, and that's true today for me.

But you can have a healthy balance of both. Apparently, I've seen it from my kids, but children whose first exposure to the outdoors is at school go home and get their parents and siblings interested, and the next thing you know, we got a whole new group of folks participating and supporting all the things that we like to do. It's like being in the major leagues and having an endless supply of minor leaguers working their way up through

the system. Reva Hanson, the wizard behind the Curtain, who edits this podcast, is going to put a link for the Outdoors Tomorrow Foundation website and the show description, and for y'all that are too lazy to look it up or too technically challenged like yours, truly, get your pencil ready. It's www dot g t F dot com. They've got nearly forty activities that they teach kids. I'm positive there's

something in there for everyone. Show it to your kids, teachers, your school board, the PTO, and get these folks to look at it. It's really good. You know, my son Hunter, who I talked about in part one, when the deer ran out and jumped between him and me, Dad and my brother Tim, he told me once that he felt cheated not getting to grow up like I did, which was basically fair, showing up at the trough at feeding times and when I was finished, only to wander back

out into the wilderness. Unfortunately for him, I couldn't make a living on a small farm like I grew up on. With the job I had, we had to move occasionally. He didn't have the opportunity to organically acquire the skills when he wasn't with me the way I did when I was out on my own roam in the countryside. He was solely dependent on my schedule and when I

could take him. We didn't live on the old home place or near any of any of my family that could have substituted for me when I was off playing cops and robbers. This program would have been tailor made for him and others like him. I really encourage you to get your schools involved to check this out. Miss Terry will be glad to talk to any of you and all of you and the school administrators. You can reach her at Terry at goo TF dot com. That's t A. R. I at go oo TF dot com.

All right, I've been rambling on and we've done gone a long time without telling the stories. I'm gonna tell you one. Hunter was badgering me one Sunday afternoon after church to go fishing, and I eventually caved under the pressure and loaded all our fishing gear, including his, and we headed to the river. We stopped to visit it with our friends at the bait shop and bought some crickets. It was the middle of the afternoon, so instead of taking a boat, we decided we'd just fished from the

new dock just down from the boat ramp. Hunter was six years old and all boy. We got to the fishing dock, we got our fishing poles ready and our hooks baited and started fishing. And Hunter hadn't had his fishing pole in his hand long enough to catch fish when he decided he's got to pee. And being a boy of six who was famous for waiting until the last minute, he needed to pee right now. Daddy, I got a pee. He threw his fishing pole at me.

I told him just pee off the dock. There wasn't anyone around, and judging by the way he announced his current condition, I don't think he would have cared or had enough time to relocate. He let it rip red. Adare could have put him to work putting out oil well fires with what he had generating over there. I went back to fishing, hypnotized by my cork that was starting to get a little action. Then he hollered owl

some bit me. I looked over where he was standing and I saw a red wash about the size of a humming bird flying away. Oh no, the little man has gotten stung. That turned out to be the understatement of the decade. Where to get you, bud was the blue jeans still around his knees. He turned towards me and to look on his face told me exactly where he'd been stung. Whammo, right in the wrong place to

get stung. I remember thinking this is not good. Hunter started squalling and I wanted to After looking at that sting, it looked bad, and I figured we're probably going to have to get this looked at. So we loaded up and we headed to the bait shop and a first aid kid. Our friend at the bait shop gave me some of those antiseptic ampules that you bring can apply to this thing. They would hopefully relieve some of the pain.

I called ahead to the doctor's office to tell him what had happened, and then we were on the way. The male nurse that answered the phone asked me what the problem was, and I said, well, my son got stung by wash. He said, is he allergic? And I said no? And he said is he getting nauseated or having any trouble breathing? I said nope, and it was just a wasp thing. I said, yep. And I could sense his disbelief and why I was bringing a boy to the doctor for a simple wasp thing when he

wasn't allergic showing any signs of being allergic. He said, well, okay, where'd he gets stung? And I told him and he went, ooh, man, got you y'all come on on the way to the doctor's office. Hunter says that it's more comfortable for him to take off his breeches. The blue jeans apparently were applying pressure to his wound. Freedom he now enjoyed sporting a wife beat her T shirt and SpongeBob boxers afforded

him the luxury of being mostly pain free. After driving at the doctor's office, he settled in the chair in the waiting room while I filled out the catalog of questions that go with seeing the doctor. Finishing the history of the world as I knew it for the insurance company. I turned around to check on my little buddy, to see him sitting in a seat with each leg spread apart and resting on the arms of the chair, reading

a newspaper. Make yourself at home son. In relatively short order, they called us back to one of the exam rooms. Hunter's doctor walks in reading his chart, and as he's sitting down on his stool with a slight grin, he says, ooh man, what happened to you? Hunter never cracked a smile. The little guy stood up, dropped his boxers to his ankles, points and says, take a look at this, exposing his offended appendage that now resembled an airport windsock on the

wind swept planes of Oklahoma. Then he starts telling the good doctor of the story, beginning about his first birthday and hitting most of the highlights and finally getting to the park where the was stung him in the nether regions. After about five minutes, the doctor's eyes were starting to glaze over. When Hunter finally finished the story and seizing the break, the doctor said, well, you're gonna be all right. I'm gonna give you some medicine so you won't get

sick from the sting. It was just a waltz. The doctor spun his stool around from Hunter and he was reaching for his chart when Hunter tapped him on the shoulder, and he said, actually, I thought a sniper got me with a twenty two. I thought that doctor was gonna have a stroke. Laughing, he fell off his stool and was banging his fist on the floor of the exam room,

and I couldn't catch my bread. I looked over at my son standing there with his drawers down to his ankles, hands propped up on his hips, and grinning like his next line was going to be thanks. I'll be here all week. Be sure to tip your waitresses, kids, and outdoors. It's a magical elixir for memories, and the good ones will always outnumber the not so good ones. My wounded

warrior is a registered nurse now. He graduated nursing school at the beginning of the pandemic and was thrown into the fire work and ICEEU for a year and a half. He'll be married in a few months, and one day he may have some grocery goblins of his own. If he does. I hope he looks back on those times with me as much reverence as I do with him. I texted him a few minutes ago and ask him that now, since he's been a nurse, has he's seen any similar injuries to people like the one he received

the day we went fishing. His ForWord response summed up to severity of that wilderness trauma so many years ago, perfectly none that lived. Dad. I thank you all for listening. Get some kids and get outside. You'll both be glad you did. This is Brent Reeves signing off. Y'all be careful