Muddy Buddy

I remember when I was a boy scout back in the 60’s; we would go to camp for one week in the summer time. One of the traditions we had was a thing called the “Muddy Buddy”. We would walk down to the Delaware River and have what was basically, a mud fight. My friends and I had a great time slinging mud at each other and we ended up with mud in every conceivable place, hair, ears, even down our swim trunks.

Afterwards we would trek back up the hill and shower off the mud we could not wash off in the river, and then go to the mess hall together for lunch. It was great fun.

Back then, I could see no point or agenda in this activity other to just have fun, we were only kids after all, and this was kid stuff. Only after years did I realize that there was a point to this controlled mayhem. The lesson was; we could throw mud at each other, clean up, sit down and break bread together, and still be friends. At least that’s how I see it.

These days there is a different type of mudslinging going on, (still kid stuff as far as I am concerned). This mud does not wash off and is meant to hurt in a most vicious way. I am talking about the mud being slung at our council president William Petrick.

On this subject I can speak from personal experience.

I met Bill back in the seventies, when we were both members of the volunteer first aid squad and volunteer fire department here in town.

Although we had different personalities, we both had one common goal and that was to serve our community.           

As members of the volunteer fire department, when we put our personal safety at risk by going into a burning building to do a search for anyone who might be trapped inside, we did not ask if the person was of a particular race, gender, or political affiliation. We did not care about things like that, and still don’t. Our goal was to find them and bring them out to safety if possible.

When, as members of the volunteer first aid squad, we were awakened at three in the morning to carry someone down from the second floor who was having a heart attack, or who had just overdosed on drugs, we did not care about their personal persuasions. To us, they were a person in trouble and we were there to help them.

As members of these organizations, we got to serve the whole community not just a select few. We served the poor and the rich. Black, White, Hispanic, Oriental, male or female, it didn’t matter.

We got to see the dark side of our “sleepy little hamlet”. The drug addicts, the alcoholics, the homeless, and the illegal housing, which still exists today. We were the “grunts on the ground” so to speak. This was our way of serving our community.

To defame this mans character is an abomination. He is neither a racist nor a misogynist. I will tell you what else he is not. He is not a puppet or a yes man, which is the type of person our current mayor seems to want surrounding her. I guess when you cannot argue the issues successfully throw mud is the lesson now a days.

Joe Bayona