Bid Miles was feted on her 86th birthday this evening. She is definitely a member of Tom Brokaw’s
"Greatest Generation", my father’s generation. She was a great friend of my Aunt Mary D. Friends from our community and from the Girl Scouting community all over Missouri were in attendance. While her accomplishments are many and varied, Girl Scouting has been her passion. It might be too much to say that she built Camp Latonka single-handedly, but probably not too much to say that it wouldn’t have been built without her.
Since my wife is the current president of the Cotton Boll Girl Scout Council, and grew up in Scouting here, she was one of tonight’s many sponsors. Since I had all that experience parking cars with the Boy Scouts, she felt I was a natural choice to stand in the driveway as a doorman and valet parking boy. Fortunately my Scouting experience also prepared me to stand quietly in the drizzling rain for two hours, swatting the ever-present mosquitoes (soon to be the official symbol of our community — look for them on T-shirts, or anywhere else that is insecticide-free). I wore my cool orange motorcycle vest to keep people from running over me. It worked.