Girl Scouts Centennial Celebration

The Girl Scouts are now 100 years old but I got the gift. Over the weekend, I attended the Girl Scouts Centennial Celebration in White Plains, New York, with the 2500 scouts who pre-registered for this major event. The purpose was to celebrate scouting with expo-like booths and to recognize the 178 teen Girl Scouts who were receiving scouting's highest honor, the Gold Award. Since Girl Scouts are encouraged to build character and take action to "make the world a better place," Leaders had previously been asked to provide descriptions of some of our best "Take Action" projects. My troop submitted an application which explained the "Be Smart, Don't Start" anti-smoking program I had done this past November for Girl Scout Troops throughout our area. More details can be found in the October posting entitled, "Great American Smokeout"  Our project was selected to be included in the expo from submissions from all over the seven counties that comprise the Heart of the Hudson Council. Our goal was to discourage young girls from starting to smoke, while also providing them with information to help them encourage loved ones to try to stop smoking.

Our display included a laptop presentation of the very powerful "Splode"video from the TheTruth.com website, as well as a load of craft supplies so that all of our visitors could design posters, banners and signs with anti-smoking messages, and inspiring cards for various smoker family members. Some of the stories those little girls told me were really hearbreaking - like grandparents who died of cancer, or were sick now. I asked each girl to place her hand over her heart and make a promise to herself that she would never start smoking, and would always remember how smart she was now, and not let anyone talk her into bad choices. 

I was amazed and pleased about how receptive the girls and their parents and Leaders were to our table. The most memorable moment came when a troop returned to our table for a second visit. They had brought along a slightly older woman who I took to be the Troop Grandmother, probably the Leader's mom. I heard them telling her how she just "had to hear the info at this booth." Our eyes met & we both knew she was a smoker who had just been ambushed. As gently & tactfully as possible, I talked with her about what we had been doing at the table all day. Then I told her about my late father, Harry Schulman, who had gotten sick of his two pack a day habit and made up his mind, "I'm not going to smoke today. I don't know about tomorrow, but I'm not going to smoke today." Being a salesperson at heart, I had to go for the 'close' and asked her if she might try this tomorrow. She said, "No, TODAY!" Wherever she is, I send her blessings and thanks for that special gift.

Great American Smokeout

Sherwood Martinelli is the author of the vast majority of the articles you enjoy on these pages daily. However, today I would like to step in to tell you a story about my dad, Harry Schulman. Most Mountaindale neighbors would remember my mom, Bessie Schulman, better because she lit up every room she entered. My dad was more of the strong, silent type who never swore, and would only drink a single cold beer after mowing our lawn on a hot summer day. No vices that I knew of. Then, one day, he surprised me by telling me that as a young man he had been a heavy smoker. Like 2 packs a day heavy. The interesting part of the story was how he told me that he had suddenly quit, “cold turkey” as they say. My dad said he just woke up one day and told himself, “I’m not going to smoke today. I don’t know about tomorrow, but I’m not going to have a cigarette today.” He then proceeded to do that every day. As far as I know he never smoked again for the rest of his nearly 80 years.

My late mother-in-law, Bobbie Schmitt had been a smoker, too. I remember one year when she had the flu in November and felt too sick to smoke. Then the next day was the Great American Smokeout and that motivated her to try to go the whole 24 hours without a cigarette and that worked. She was also able to quit smoking! I bring this up because next month we have the Great American Smokeout on Thursday, November 17^th, which just happens to have been Harry Schulman’s birthday. He passed away in 1995. I invite all of you to honor his memory by making the same decision to challenge yourself to not smoking on his birthday this year.

If you and I are both lucky, you might make the same choice on November 18^th as well. You won’t have to go it alone. I’ll be rooting for you! There is also the American Cancer Society Quit For Life® Program which is a telephone-based coaching and Web-based learning support service to help people quit smoking. I have also engaged our local Girl Scout community by creating a “Be Smart, Don’t Start” Program to be held a week before the Smokeout. It will involve youth from the Towns of Fallsburg, Thompson and Mamakating. I was inspired to do this after attending a meeting of the Sullivan County Tobacco Free Coalition on Tuesday. One of the facts they mentioned is that if you can prevent a kid from starting to smoke until they are 18, they are far less likely to EVER start. That’s huge! You don’t have to suffer quitting an addiction that you never started. The Coalition strongly encourages stimulating policy changes; such as creating more Smoke Free Zones, especially on playgrounds and the like; and also sees the need to reduce the pro-tobacco impressions young children are bombarded with at convenience stores & gas stations. Please feel free to contact me directly for more on this at 845-434-4747.

Thank you & Good Luck!
Barb Schmitt