A lesson learned at NOAC

I was sitting in the dining hall of the University of Tennessee in Knoxville, but I wasn’t a student there. In fact, no one around me was. No, we were all there for a very different reason: The National Order of the Arrow Conference.

We were the hundreds of grown-ups who took a week of vacation and paid for the opportunity to spend it volunteering. Across the room, I spot two adults in particular who look really familiar, but I can’t quite place their names. I know they’re from my home lodge, and were fixtures of the Scouting events I used to attend back in New Jersey as a teenager.

We’re doing that thing—you know the thing—where we glance at each other from across the room, tacitly (telepathically?) trying to decide if we should acknowledge each other. We both seem to agree that it’s not worth the awkwardness, and move on with our meal without making conversation.

To be honest, I’m relieved. I’m thinking, these two older guys from back home, they probably wouldn’t be too excited about why I’m here this week: to staff ArrowPride, the first-ever official LGBTQ+ affinity space at a national Scouting event.

I don’t know for sure how they feel about LGBTQ+ inclusion, but I had experienced enough generalized homophobia in Scouting growing up that I didn’t want to take my chances. (Not to mention, my home council kicked off the series of events that would lead to James Dale’s Supreme Court case).

So I gladly clean off my table and leave the dining hall, eager to get back upstairs to the ArrowPride space. The preparation for, and operation of, that program soon consumed my week, as I’ve written about previously in great detail. I didn’t give much of a second though to those two older men from my lodge. Instead, I was absorbed in the beauty of ArrowPride, captivated by the hordes of young people who gravitated to our space and made it come alive.

By the end of the week, I felt sure that we made a positive difference for hundreds of delegates and staff members alike. But I had a lingering doubt in the back of my mind: Our space was pretty self-selecting, right? If you sought out ArrowPride, of course you’re going to be supportive, I thought. There were certainty still plenty of people at this conference who would prefer we not be here. People, I thought, like the elder members of my home lodge.

When I went to the dining hall for my last meal, I sat down alone, happy to have some peace and quiet after a long, exhausting week. But there, across the room, I saw them again: The older guys from back home. They were seated near the exit, and it being the last day of the conference too, I figured I couldn’t reasonably avoid them any longer.

So I ambled over to their table on my way out, and we re-introduced ourselves. Then they started to comment on what I was wearing. By this point in the week, I was absolutely covered in rainbow swag. I had a rainbow bracelet, patch, neckerchief and staff polo; my affiliation with ArrowPride was painfully obvious. I was bracing myself for what they’re going to say about it.

“This stuff is actually really cool,” they started to say. “We love your patches and neckerchief.”

“Oh … okay,” I stammered. I wasn’t prepared for this reaction, but I was buoyed by their enthusiasm. I went out on a limb and offered some of the extra rainbow swag I had in my pocket, and told them about the book I was writing.

“This is really great work, it’s important. We’re glad that you’re here doing this,” they told me.

When they said that to me, I was completely floored. These were, quite honestly, the last people I thought would ever react that way.

As I walked away from that conversation and left the conference, I realized that, maybe, I shouldn’t write people off so quickly. How many other people had I unfairly counted out?

Next time, I resolved, I’d give people a chance, scary as it may be. And if I’m lucky, people will continue to surprise me.