Blue Skies

Blue Skies. This seemed at first to be a strange traditional greeting between Woodcraft Folk. It got me wondering why people use this term and what it means for the people of Woodcraft? Woodcraft Folk is an educational movement for children and young people which promotes equality, cooperation and friendship. There are groups all over the world and it has been going as long as, and is as well established as the scouting movement. The deeper I delve into the origins of Woodcraft, the more I realise how much more there is to learn about this energetic movement of young people.

I find myself saying ’blue skies’ in my head a lot. Is it, I wonder, a greeting, an aspiration or an affirmation? I want to believe that blue skies means ‘may your horizons be clear and your path ahead bathed in light’. I also annoyingly find myself humming the Electric Light Orchestra song a lot more than I used to!

There’s still much to find out in my Woodcraft Folk journey. I know that the gentle, peaceful philosophy on life; the belief in cooperation, equality and openness strike a cord in successive generations and wonder why on earth I have not heard more about them. After all, the scouts and brownies are international movements of young people. They have local groups, different sections, camp outs, activity days just as Woodcraft do and Woodcraft go the extra mile to ensure that young people are not just the focus of the groups, they own the groups.

The term Blue Skies was apparently first coined by President Theodore Roosevelt who was a Patron of Woodcraft. Roosevelt defined Woodcraft as “a man making scheme with a blue sky background".

Whatever it is, 'blue skies' as a greeting fills me with optimism and perhaps that is the secret of these two simple words. Many use the phrase ‘happy days’ to express some measure of their contentment in life, but blue skies seem to me so much more appropriate.

I shall greet friends with the phrase and see whether it has the same infectious optimism for them as it does for me. Blue skies, warm sun, happiness and peace. What more could we ask of humanity?