2pattyesque

Last evening, these scouts (J, T, W, T and J--see the letter pattern in that?) helped at the American Legion in one of the Tri-cities. T, fourth from the left, had done an eagle project to construct the pit for retiring flags. Note the white gloves--the boys had to wear the white gloves for handling the flags. I think for them it was more pyromania than patriotism.

My night photography is lacking, not to mention the slow shutter speed required by the camera in this setting. We had the roaring fire right by us, the bright lights of a ball field behind us, and the pitch black night right around us. I couldn't get a good picture despite any variety of camera settings because, really, I needed everyone to stand stock-still while the camera slowly captured the image but I was taking pictures of action. I chose the best pictures to post but even they are not good. This is T (the eagle scout to be). I think the bright light in the upper right corner of this photo is the moon.

These are my boys, J and T, standing on either side of their uncle T. Uncle T would periodically push flag fragments into the fire with this stick.

Here they are putting a large, over-sized flag on the fire. It looks like it is taking all four of the older scouts while W looks on by the box of flags. There were about thirty flags to be retired, with several of them being very, very large flags that came from the Heritage Park.

I think this is my T and the other J putting a flag on the fire with the other T shown behind them in the middle and my J behind on the right side. I think most of the flags were made of some kind of nylon which just--poof--went up in smoke the minute the flames touched that fabric.

It was a surreal event. I told my boys they'd had two unusual experiences so far in their lives that involved flags--this event and the time hundreds of scouts holding flags lined a long street to a Tri-city cemetery while the funeral procession of a young soldier made its way to the cemetery.