We�re organizing for the annual girl scout troop overnight. The site is secured, the permission slips are out, the packing list is done, and the planning group met last Sunday to decide on events. This overnight, however, is looking less like a camping trip and more like a giant sleep-over party at which we will have to put up with occasional bugs. (Luckily, we lack Texas-size bugs.)

This group of girls has never been very outdoorsy. They have done the outdoor things because their leader has insisted. They�ve hiked, they�ve learned how to bake in a box oven, they�ve learned to start campfires, and they�ve done rubbings. They�ve learned how to use knives and to tie ropes. Now that we�ve gone to almost total girl planning, however, they�re insisting back�and they are insisting on a big sleep-over with lots of fluffy activities.

Gone is the outdoor cooking, hiking, and sand castles. Instead, the planning committee has hair styling, playing cards, and dancing on the agenda. Instead of singing (and either roasting or freezing) around a campfire, we will be presenting shadow puppet plays in the troop house. We are replacing hot dogs on a stick wrapped in partially baked biscuit with a fancy chicken dish (and something else for the vegetarians).

It�s a brave, new world out there full of art projects, skits (with beginnings, middles, and ends, fancy that!), some sports, and a lot of grooming. They are passing over to American teendom and dragging me with them. Little do they know that I was a deficient teen the first time and don�t intend to be a teen ever again. Luckily, however, I love talking with teenagers most of the time.

I no longer lead this parade into the woods or anywhere else. I ask where they want to go and facilitate their getting there. I�m not sure where we�re headed this time but I know its not out into the forest. Forget the s�mores. Anyone for hot chocolate, fudge, popcorn, and marshmallows?

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