Now we’re going to have girl Boy Scouts.

What’s the next target in this modern social upheaval of everything we thought that made sense in life? Up is down and in is out.

The harbinger for me came several years ago when one of the grandchildren lost a toy cowgirl in the mulch pile in the backyard. We dug without success for several days trying to find his plastic figure dubbed “Cowboy Girl.” Years later, I still poke around in the rotting leaves hoping to find it.

That cowgirl has now joined the Boy Scouts.

Having recently experienced a Virginia girls softball tournament, I suspect the Boy Scouts of America isn’t changing its long-standing rules out of a sense of fairness and equality.

The more likely goal is to collect membership fees from girls and double the number of potential recruits. The Girl Scouts organization now has a monster competitor, and the girls group cried foul last week insisting that the Boy Scouts leave the girls alone.

Follow the money trail.

There’s lots of cash in youth sports and clubs.

Girls softball, lacrosse, baseball, swimming and other youth sports are now almost like owning a horse. In the immortal words of Bert Bahnson, the sage of Farmington, “If you want to break a man, give him a horse.”

If you have a horse, you have to buy a saddle and a trailer and a big double-wheeled truck and go to rodeos every weekend and pay entry fees. There are veterinarian bills and oats and hay and special rodeo clothes and a cowboy hat to buy. There are riding lessons and stable rental fees and curry brushes and …

The updated version of Bahnson’s witticism is to let your child join a travel ball club. That’s a horse of a similar color.

The Boy Scouts of America has been the target of every kinds of social pressure to allow gay and transgender members and leaders into the organization, enduring countless lawsuits to remake its rules. For years, BSA had stoutly defended itself against the social pressures to change with the times. The organization last week caved without a whimper to girls.

It was a smart move or the organization. It might alienate some boys who don’t want to play with girls, but the chance to add millions of potential dues-paying members must have influenced the decision.

I hope the Girl Scouts don’t admit boys as a way of counter-punching the competition. Some things need to remain sacred. Girl Scouts should be girls.

It’s too late for the boys.

• • • • •

That was definitely a chill in the air Tuesday morning as a weather front moved through to rob us of the pleasant temperatures during the weekend. Summer is over.

I resisted the urge to pull out a jacket.

Mid-October is our traditional time for first frosts. It didn’t get that cold here Tuesday morning, but the morning temperatures are falling closer. A killer frost will soon rob us of the last tomatoes and flowers. It’s really fall.

• • • • •

It was a gutsy call by Davie County High coach Tim Devericks to go for the win, not a tie, Friday night against undefeated West Forsyth. Gutsy, but it didn’t work. At the goal line, Davie had a foot to go for a first down — and five yards more to win as time expired. Or a sure-footed kicker could send the game into overtime.

The gambler went for the win. And lost.

Just another outstanding West-Davie football game in the Yadkin River series.

– Dwight Sparks