We've Cleared the Tower

What a weekend! The Grand Family for 2010 made its first public appearance in our new travel outfits at Deputy Grand Matron School in Chowchilla, a three day tour of duty going all day Friday and Saturday and finishing up on Sunday morning. Our year is now officially launched. For those of you unfamiliar with this annual rite of passage, each year the Worthy Grand Matron (WGM) appoints Deputy Grand Matrons (DGMs or Deputies) to serve as her representatives all over the State, helping to teach our ritual and ceremonies so they are performed correctly in our Chapters, to check the books and records of each Chapter to make sure everything is in order and to be her eyes and ears. It's a big state and the time flies by. There is no way the WGM could do all this reviewing and supervising of all 190 or so Chapters on her own, so each Deputy is assigned a group of Chapters to oversee. This group of Chapters is called a District. One or more Districts can form an Association also. The WGM makes an Official Visit to each District in the State and it is part of the DGM's job to help the local leaders put it together. Sometimes there are Association events too. But a Deputy can't teach our ritual if they don't know it themselves and in most areas the Deputy is replaced every year. While each of them is required to be a Past Matron, having led their own Chapter and they therefore should be familiar with the ritual ceremonies, there is a gigantic difference between learning one part and learning all the parts. The Deputies even have to instruct the men in their parts and of course none of them have ever sat in any of the chairs that are limited to men. Teaching is also a separate skill from knowing, so even if they are good ritualists themselves, learning the work well enough to answer questions takes a higher level of understanding. To assist the Deputies in getting ready for their job, the Grand Officers, who had their own school a month ago to perfect their own work, demonstrate the various ceremonies for the Deputies and then coach them in the different parts. The big school this weekend was for all the Deputies from all over the state. We will also hold two Brush Up Schools later in the year, one in the North and one in the South. The problem is, two and a half days is not a lot of time to learn everything there is to learn. I have now been, over the years, to four DGM Schools and six Brush Up Schools and every single time I attend one, I learn something new that I have never heard of or done before. And sometimes I find out that the way I have been doing something is wrong. I love the fact that I am still learning, but my heart goes out to the Deputies. For most of them, they've never really studied the ritual at the level required to teach it and then they have to go back to their Districts and be IT, the One Who Knows, Teacher of All Floor Work, Giver of All Answers. It was obvious that all of the Deputies were really concentrating on learning everything we could teach them and they were a lot more confident and comfortable towards the end of the weekend. They asked really good questions and started to know what they did and didn't know so they could figure out what to ask. Maybe by the time I am done with this journey, I will actually know the ritual myself. The Grand Officers were great. Everyone was really putting in 110% to try to do their work perfectly for the Deputies and were unfailing in their willingness to show things over that someone needed to see. After all that hard work, we had dinner out on Saturday night at a local restaurant, but it didn't have a big enough dining room for all of us, so the Deputies and the WGM and WGP were in a big room in the back and the rest of the Grand Officers and their Escorts were in a smaller room in the front. We had a great time at dinner, even if some of us, including myself, who can't sing were doing it anyway. When you find someone sitting next to you who also knows the lyrics to Tom Lehrer songs, what can you do but sing a few? To liven up the evening, the Grand Officers decided to pay a visit to the DGM dinner, just to let them know that we missed them. We piled into their dining room with a rousing chorus of Together Wherever We Go from the musical Gypsy. Note to self - Before two dozen people pile into a dining room with sixty other people in it to serenade them, make sure your group knows all the words. We made up in enthusiasm what we lacked in tune or lyrics though, so a good time was had by all. The next morning, the DGMs had their revenge though. They treated us to new lyrics to the tune of Row, Row, Row Your Boat and did it as a round with each side of the room taking a different start. It was very cute, especially when some of the Deputies forgot the new words and just started singing the original ones. On top of the school all day, after dinner each night, I got to attend my first Line Officers' meetings. So I have cleared that tower too. We discussed a lot of stuff, but it was really nice to work in a group of people who are all trying really, really hard to do the right things for the Order and who are truly interested in reaching consensus. I know we probably took longer doing things that way, but it was very rewarding to listen to everyone's point of view, contribute to the discussion and reach a decision together, especially when we all have to live with the results. It could have been awkward with two people from last year gone and two new people in the room, but it wasn't and that was great too. Next weekend we start into November and that is Installation Month. Instead of traveling as a group in November, the Grand Officers get invitations to local Chapter installations and go to those events individually. I am already signed up to do my first Installing on November 1 in Soquel and will let you know all about it next Monday.

Off and Running

Guess what! I managed to get myself elected and installed after all, so this blog will have a chance to be used. Whew! I am totally exhausted. I know that the Grand Chapter session is really supposed to be three days, but there is so much to do the day before and the day after that it really feels like a full five days. On Wednesday, we had lots of practice, to look our best when the Grand Officers did their stuff and I had a bunch of meetings about various pieces of legislation that had been proposed by the members. That is the last time that I will be doing the legislation thing for a while though. I've done it ten out of the past eleven years, so I am okay with taking a little rest on that. The practices were really good to have, to iron out any kinks in who goes in from where, but the concrete floor is hard on your feet, even when you are in good shoes. The real sessions started on Thursday and the Grand Officers were all very enthusiastic and excited about the Grand Chapter Session really being here and now. The sessions and days and meals and parties seem to completely run together and I am pretty sure that if I was lucky I averaged four or five hours of sleep over the five nights. I had two breakfast events that I was in charge of planning, decorating and collecting the reservations and ticket money and I don't even usually eat breakfast. Instant Oatmeal is my friend! There's something unnatural about having a hobby that gets you out of bed earlier in the morning than your day job, but my fisherman friends tell me just to get over it. We get lots of presents. They actually have a special room where you can drop off presents for the Grand Officers and they collect them and help get them delivered to the Grand Officer's room. I am certain that I came home with more stuff than I took with me. It's a good thing that my escort brought his own car because we loaded both of them. We get lots of snacks and water and all sorts of cute little items, note pads, note cards, pins and such. I got another napkin nipper, which was good because I had left mine home and I needed one. You see, for sessions, we are in formal dresses with petticoats most of the time and the dress fabrics are very slick so your napkin tends to slide right out of your lap and onto the floor. It is very awkward to fish around for your napkin in full skirts, let me tell you. So a napkin nipper is a little clothespin that is usually decorated with beads or glue on stuff. You use it to pin the napkin to the waist or skirt of your dress and then you don't lose it. They're awesome! When you first start as a Grand Line officer, you get to pick an emblem that will symbolize your year and you get to choose flowers and colors and all sorts of things that all the ladies serving with you will use for their own local installations and events. All that stuff gets revealed after you are elected. I will try to post my sheet of stuff if I can figure out how to do it. My emblem is a silver standing balance against a starry night sky and my fun emblem, which is usually an animal or a character of some kind used for fun stuff is a dragon on top of a castle. No one has ever used a dragon before. By the time I left Grand Chapter, I had been given five dragons by various friends. My Installation Escort did the math and said that if I got five dragons a week for the 200 weeks of my four years, I would have a thousand by the time I am done. Be afraid! Be very afraid! For me the whole session was rather bittersweet, especially since I had just done it the year before and remembered what that was like. I loved being at the session and getting to participate in everything, but it was sad to think that the session is the end of a year and that you have to say goodbye to an amazing group of people with whom you have laughed and cried and traveled for a whole year. You still see each other as you travel around, but it is just not the same as when you are together almost every weekend and become a family. Last year and this year has taught me that you can dry your tears, join a new family, make new friendships and get close to another group and have a wonderful new year with them, but it is still a terrible wrench to say good bye to your old family. Here's the funny thing though. When the 2008 Grand Officers were done on Saturday morning and we did our "leave-taking" ceremony, we all hugged in a big circle and cried our eyes out. Even the men were tearing up and some of the ladies were downright sobbing. But when the 2009 Grand Officers did their leavetaking, everyone was just the lightest bit sad, but a lot more laughing and hugging and saying how great it all was and how we had the best year ever. It was just as emotional, but in a very, very different way. I wonder how it will be next time and each year after that. Saturday night was the Installation of the Grand Officers and it was truly spectacular, but I must admit that it was a touch long. I have trouble sitting for long periods of time because my spine is curved so my hips are uneven, and I could tell that I wasn't the only one that had trouble staying seated in my chair until the very end. I think some people left before the end and that was too bad because there were some lovely moments that they missed. My view has changed again, as my new seat is on one side and up on a little platform where my last two seats were in the rear and in the front at the floor level. My first seat, last year, had the best view so far, in the back facing the podium. I could see everything! This year I was in front of the stage, next to the stairs going up and I couldn't see anything at all. Everything was happening above and behind me. After I found out that the podium just above me was on wheels, I lived in mortal terror that someone was going to lean on the thing and it was going to pitch over right down onto me. Thank goodness it didn't happen! My new seat is halfway between the front and the back, but on one side, so to watch the action, I have to turn my head to the left constantly, which is okay for a while but rather a bother for several hours. I am sure I will get used to it just in time to move to the other side and spend an entire year looking to the right. After the ceremonies were over, they had us go into another room to give people a chance to congratulate us. I guess I was taking too long talking with the people who came over because a couple of Past Grand Matrons told me that it was supposed to be a kiss, kiss, hug, hand the person over to the escort, move on to the next person sort of thing and I was speaking with each person, at least a little bit and taking too long. I guess I need more practice at that. After the receiving room, there were parties for the 2010s and the 2009s, proving once again that sleep is highly overrated and that you have the best time when you are a little zoned. :-) Then you get back to your room and look at the umpteen more boxes and tote bags strewn all over your room and decide that packing is something that you do in the morning. You drive back home and barely get your car unpacked before you collapse in bed and get up the next day to go to work and wonder when on earth you are going to unpack before you re-pack for the next weekend. AAAAAHHHH! Next weekend I am going to Chowchilla for Deputy Grand Matron School. I will tell you all about it when I get back.

Ready or Not, Here I Go

Greetings! This blog is about the adventure of a lifetime on which I am about to embark. This first post explains what I think I am doing and about my fraternal order. I belong to the Order of the Eastern Star, a fraternal group closely related to the Masons, and the largest fraternal order that allows both men and women to join. For a man to join, you have to be a Mason and all the ladies are related to a Mason. You used to have be a fairly close relation, but they have expanded the categories a lot, so if you want to join and we can shake your family tree hard enough that a Mason falls out, we can probably figure out a way for you to qualify. Our Order has local groups all over the country and many parts of the world. The local groups are called Chapters. The presiding officers of a local Chapter are the Worthy Matron and Worthy Patron. The leadership in a Chapter is what we call a progressive line. You start as a lower level line officer, an Associate Conductress, and then you go through a year in that office and two more years in two other offices, Conductress and Associate Matron, before you get to be Worthy Matron and lead your Chapter for a year. In your second year, as Conductress, you choose a man in your Chapter to lead your Chapter with you and he serves as Associate Patron and Worthy Patron along with you. In areas, like states, where there are a bunch of Chapters, those Chapters can form a statewide/countrywide group called a Grand Chapter. In California, where I live, Grand Chapter officers are chosen from those who have already served as the presiding officer of their local Chapter. Each year, the presiding officers of the Grand Chapter, the Worthy Grand Matron and the Worthy Grand Patron, choose ten members from our state to serve as state officers. I have been fortunate to serve as an appointed state officer the past two years. Serving as a Grand Officer means lots and lots of travel all over the State, and I do mean all over, from Crescent City to El Centro and everywhere in between, mostly on the weekends since many of us still have a day job. It is wonderful and exhausting all at the same time. I have loved it for the past two years. Here's the rub though. In addition to the ten appointed officers, the Grand Chapter has elected officers. Among these are the Grand Line Officers, who go through a progressive line, just like in the local Chapter. For ladies, we start with the Associate Grand Conductress and proceed all the way to Worthy Grand Matron, the head of the Order for the entire State of California. They say that you are not just committing four years of your life, but that it is really forever. And I was warned that if you are going to do this, you need to be prepared to spend $60,000 to $80,000 over that four years to do it right. That's a lot of money. So here I am, having put my name in to be considered for the office of Associate Grand Conductress of the Grand Chapter of California, Order of the Eastern Star. Whew! What a mouthful. Since I am running unopposed, I feel pretty good about my chances of being elected this next Friday and being installed into office Saturday night. And after that, my world will never be the same. I am told that the difference between serving as an appointed officer and a Grand Line Officer is night and day, so no matter what I think I know about it, I won't really know about it until I do it. I thought it might be nice to share these thoughts and experiences with others who might find them interesting. I also hope that it will help get some information about Eastern Star, the Best Fraternal Order Ever, out into the world. So my plan is to post at the beginning of each week, hopefully Monday or Tuesday, about what I did and learned the weekend before as I travel up the Grand Line in California. Right now I am getting ready for our Grand Chapter session in Visalia. I hope everything fits into my car and I hope you enjoy this ride with me.