From: “Bruce Parsons”
Date: May 18, 2009 11:00:10 AM EDT
Subject: Pelicans
Hi All,
Okay we have all had our fair share of receiving those great e-mails that promise eternal happiness or millions of dollars or whatever if we just pass it along to 10 of our friends. So we are all multi millionaires and have experienced divine happiness, right?
Okay maybe not but here is just one more for you to read and gain the greatest Karma you have ever experienced provided you follow the important directions.
Once upon a time we each received a letter stating that our application for employment had been accepted. The letter has changed very little over the decades, so much has changed very little over the decades. We were being given an opportunity to leave the confines of home, family, school and mainland and journey to a 40+ acre Island 6 miles of the coast of NH to spend the summer serving a religious and educational conference center. Some of us then, as is still true today, would cook or serve food, wash pots, do dishes, clean rooms, look for Rozzies hidden pennies, guard the dock, wander the island all night, clean the public rooms, manage the front desk, keep the generators, pumps, and toilets working, keep the buildings painted and standing, mow the lawns, prank the managers, run the marine lab, haul the trash, incinerate the aerosol cans, change the hymnals in the chapel, change the hymnals in the chapel again, paint the public restrooms so they appeared clean, land the boat, get yelled at by Arnold (pick your favorite captain) for landing the boat wrong, pump water, try to fix the pumps when they did not pump water, haul food and linens back and forth to and from the boats, haul more luggage than an average airport does weekly, laundry and more laundry, endless changeovers, showers twice a week, creating signs for what not to flush down a toilet or how to jiggle a handle, perform for the conferences, perform for the staff, have banquets on the pier, gatherings on Shack deck, and we loved doing all of it. From these experiences we eventually went out into the real world, many of us with a strong work ethic that we can attribute to what we gained during our time on Star. Some of us found our callings from our years on Star. Some of us have never left, wev’e become committee members, employees, Board Members, dedicated ongoing volunteers, conferees. All of us were changed. We found spouses. Our children have been Pelicans. We made friends, some for life, some we have lost touch with, many we would love to see again. Think about it, wouldn’t it be great to reunite with those old friends and aquaintences again. Well why not. Come back to Star for Labor Day weekend September 5th through 7th. You will be amazed to see how much has changed with Star and your friends but at the same time how little has changed. This is a great year to do so. There are many incentives in place to help make a weekend on Star affordable. Contact us and we will fill you in on all the details or go to http://www.starisland.org/conferences/2009/pelreunion/.
If you forward this e-mail to as many people in your address book who are, were, have children who were or are Pelicans, then you may just gain eternal happiness, or if you win the lottery then you could be a millionaire(you need to buy a lottery ticket). Mostly you may just connect with an old friend and have one of the greatest weekends of your life. Let’s see how many people we can connect with and how many people we can reconnect with.
Bruce and Carole