2024, Family, Gatherings, Music, Uncategorized

Groupies

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Next weekend our hand bell choir is performing at a ND State PEO convention in town. One of our ringers is a PEO member, and felt that they would appreciate our music. Instead of our usual sacred selections we are playing My Favorite Things from The Sound of Music, Ashokan Farewell, the Hawaiian version of Somewhere Over The Rainbow, and Puff The Magic Dragon, just the sort of selections retired teachers would appreciate.

A couple of years ago our bell choir director volunteered us for a State Eastern Star convention in Jamestown. She is a leading light in the Eastern Star. That was a pretty weird experience. It was also a 400 mile round trip hauling all our bells and equipment. At least the PEO convention is in town.

My father belonged to the Masonic Lodge. My paternal grandfather was an Oddfellow as well as a Shriner. I have little patience with these groups and their rules and secret handshakes. I know the PEO and service organizations have good intentions. The PEO supports women’s education. I was the recipient of a PEO scholarship as an undergraduate. It just amazes me that these groups can continue.

What fraternal or service organizations have you or your relatives belonged to? Propose some new groups that you might find interesting.

34 thoughts on “Groupies”

  1. I Propose “Gentlemen of a Certain Age”

    We’ve already got a “chapter” here in Holland, MI. Our eldest member is 95, and our youngest may have just reached 70. We sit, laugh and talk, with a book to “center” discussion, but from which we regularly diverge. Meeting in a smoke-free facility that’s “dry” may exclude some people, but smoke would discourage others. The laughter is palpable, and I think we may have met our pall-bearers since the group began after COVID.

    Last week we branched out. Someone suggested a timely article, so we added a session, off-site (at a tavern) and it was lovely. The next day we were back “at home” for our regular thing, though. 

    I think it could work. No ranks, costumes, handshakes or oaths, and plenty of laughter.

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    1. I like Gentlemen… GCA. Actually, that’s who Husband has lunch with on Fridays – at someone’s house (they bring their own lunch) or down by the lake in mild weather. They all themselves the Old Gents… talk about many of the things you mentioned above. It’s hard for them to slow down enough for Husband to get a thought in, but if he really has something to add, he manages.

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      1. We have 16, and usually at least 12 show up. I would hate for the group to get any bigger than it is, because that would mean having to divide somehow, and each of us seems to be precious enough to everyone else that we’d end up with two groups of the same guys.

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    3. My husband also has a group like this–retired professors, ministers, businessmen. They meet at a church where they view theological lectures and gossip. They have been together about 30 years. There are 15-16 of them. Best thing ever.

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      1. Our bunch has retired teachers, professors, writers and is possibly too heavy on former clergy (though we rarely get into theology or scriptural debates). I agree that a group like this is the best thing ever.

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  3. My dad was a Mason and a Shriner. He used to wear his fez out mowing the lawn on the riding mower. I remember him talking about the “grand Pooh Bear,” and it sounded like something I would enjoy but he wouldn’t explain. I don’t know anything else about his activities. He kept them a secret.

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    2. Did the Masons come to your dads’ funerals? One of my half brothers was a Mason, and I remember them performing some sort of odd ritual at the funeral.

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  4. I am currently an affirmed member of nothing, unless you count this esteemed group of Baboons. I usually make it clear up front that I am reliably unreliable. I no longer promise to be active in anything, or offer to serve on any committees. I am as noncommittal as a committee-less person could be.

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    2. The collective noun for baboons is a bit of a mystery.  They have been termed a troop, and tribe, or a congress. There appears to be some controversy about the term congress. Maybe an Esteemed Tribe of Baboons, or ETB?

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  5. Rise and Shine, Baboons,

    I belong to a group of artists/crafters that gather every 6-8 weeks for an afternoon of working on projects, gossiping and feasting. It is similar to those famous “Stitch and Bitch” groups of knitters and crocheters. I also belong to a group like that at the Arboretum which is part of the Arboretum Auxiliary. I just recently joined that group.

    One of the women in my artists/crafters group is a photographer who documented the Ren Fest for many years. She is in her 80s now, and her Great Grandmother was one of the founders of….PEO. She is very active in that group.

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  6. My grandmother was a member of the Eastern Star, which I didn’t understand as a child but I now know is the female equivalent to Masons. My father kept her Eastern Star ring all of his life after she passed away. He was not a Mason – we never discussed it, but I’m sure it had to do with the fact that he didn’t like to be told what to do and he really didn’t have much use for any kind of ritual whatsoever.

    My mother was a PEO member for many many years. In fact in her chapter over the years, she held every possible office that there was, including president for several years. Her group, however, aged out, and they made the decision consciously not to do any of the things that could have attracted younger members. They didn’t want to meet at night. They didn’t want to meet on weekends. There were some other factors involved. They knew this meant that eventually their group would have to disband and they did so last summer after. Another chapter in St. Louis reached out to my mom and asked her if they wanted to join her chapter and that they would also pay her dues. But she has declined. She does still still do lunch with her old PEO girlfriends, however.

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    1. The sorority wasn’t nearly as bad as they are depicted in movies, but it was an odd construct – to choose new members based on what you learn about a person at a “rush party”. It did provide some positives for me – set study hours, and a built-in way to get to know people. The greatest benefit, though, has been that about a dozen of us from my class started regularly “reunioning”, and find we have much more in common now than we did when we were in school.

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  8. Everyone seems to know what PEO is except me.

    I have a friend and several distant acquaintances who are Masons. I don’t know why. I had an uncle who was a Mason. He seemed to believe it gave him special status.

    Personally, I have never been part of a men-only organization and have never wanted to. What limited experience I have had with aggregates of men I have not enjoyed. I much prefer mixed groups of men and women.

    I’m not a big joiner in general. The one group to which I am a member consists of small press printers, book artists of various kinds, authors, artists, booksellers and book collectors, both men and women.

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    2. I don’t know either. I googled it and came up with Professional Employer Organizations, but I doubt that’s what it means in the above context. Whatever it is, I have never belonged to one, and neither has anyone in my family.

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