WOG’s 2 Cents – Column by Brian D. King
For many years I would spend roughly three hundred days each year sitting around a campfire with students and staff. We are naturally drawn to fire, and kids are innately curious about fire and how to create one. The students have the responsibility to light the fire without the use of matches or lighters. This method of lighting a fire is quite an accomplishment for a person of any age. Many struggle with spinning or “busting a coal” with their hands. It is not unusual for it to take days, or longer, to develop the technique, skill, strength, stamina, grit, and mindset to make a pile of dust hot enough to start smoldering with just a wooden spindle spun into a softer fire board with your hands.
It is a milestone to bust a burning ember the first time, and it is a rite of passage for my students which is respected by all and a cause for celebration. On one occasion a frustrated student asked for me for a demonstration, and I busted a coal in less than 20 seconds. One of the students exclaimed, “He’s not human!” Another student quipped, “You sure made that look easy.”
To which I replied, “It is easy.” I carefully put the glowing ember in a dry tinder bundle of mugwort, then gently blew it from a smoking ember into crackling flames. “If this old man can do it, so can you all.”
I let the bundle burn out and handed the fireboard and spindle to a student. “Your turn, and the sun is setting, and the chicken is raw.”
Around the unlit fire the students and new staff were struggling, making more squeaking than smoke in their attempts to light a fire. After a while I hear a student request, “He the Keeper of True Knowledge Ripened with Wisdom Ol’ Sage of the Pacific Northwest, Oh Benevolent One, can you give me your two cents on what I am doing wrong?”
Well, that handle stuck. A few years later a new program director changed the lengthy moniker to Wise Ol’ Geezer, or WOG for short.
Throughout the years, the campfire remained the center of discussion, typically with me silently whittling while listening to the students. At some point I would eventually hear, “Hey WOG, you want to share your two cents on the topic at hand?” This became the usual method for getting help or guidance.
Each night when the fire burnt down to glowing coals and the sky was full of stars, and the students and staff would wind down on telling their experiences of the day and expectations for tomorrow, and after a round or two of jokes I would hear, “Hey WOG, can you tell us the story about when …”
I will share with you these campfire musings, or rather the “Two Cents of a Wise Ol’ Geezer.”
