Be Prepared" is the motto scoutmasters and troop leaders instill in millions of boys and girls soon after they take the oath of the Girl and Boy Scouts of America.

As these boys and girls become men and women, it is two words that will help them succeed in any kind of situation.

I was a Brownie, Cadet and even a Junior Girl Scout and when I worked as a news reporter for a CBS affiliate, I was host and narrator for an institutional video for a local Girl Scout program “Open Air, Opens Minds”.

Therefore, how the "Be Prepared Girl Scout's motto escaped me throughout my life remains a mystery.

I believe, however, the universe provides just what we need when we need it and it always arrives right on time.

The "Be Prepared" motto returned to my repertoire on Tuesday morning right before my youngest twin daughter, (then, 18 years old) told me on Tuesday afternoon, her friend asked to marry her.

Instead of panicking and feverishly digging around in my Parent's bag of tricks for some words of wisdom, I was prepared. I looked my daughter in the eye and asked calmly "Are you prepared to be a wife, and mother?" She answered "No". I asked, “what would prepare you?" She answered, "Get my education."

In my opinion that seemed like one of those answers, she thought every parent would want to hear. I wasn’t the one. "While getting an undergraduate degree is a start, there is so much more to do to prepare to take on the responsibility of a husband and children", I said. "When you say I do", I told her, "You become your husband's emergency contact. You become your child's guidepost. You are their mile marker."

I reminded her when her friend's father got married it was obvious he was prepared to take care of the family because after the father's untimely death, he provided well for his family.

I mentioned that my father was prepared to be a husband and father and he too provided after his death. My mother was prepared to be a wife and mother and held our family together after my father died... In each case, these people prepared for a life together.

I was honest with her and told her for me "not so much". Although, I grew up in a time where being a wife and mother was the last thing any girl wanted to be; it was all I dreamed. However, since it wasn't vogue, I never prepared to get married and I definitely wasn't prepared to be anyone's mother.

Further, by the time I was a teen I was in the high school foundry, casting molds, making drill bits, and drawing, free hand, tools in space.

There were no home economics; there was no preparation to take on the responsibility of family - and I never voiced that being a wife and mother was all I wanted. If I had, I would have heard "You are far too 'bright' to waste your life on such things."

Still the heart wants what it wants and it will plot your steps even when you think you are going in the opposite direction.

Unfortunately, the heart doesn't prepare - it is all action and never realizes that preparation comes before taking on the responsibility. The heart knows it will work out -and it does - but the quality of the life remains in question.

So while your heart is in charge – fear paralyzes your brain; its memories making it near impossible for you to live.

Case-in-point, when I'm sitting in a restaurant looking across the table into my date’s eyes, I ask myself - if we were to marry and he was stricken with cancer, stroke or became incapacitated in some way - would I be able to wipe his ass after he soiled his adult diaper.

I wondered if I would be able to be his human expectorant when the phlegm drained into his throat and his muscles too weak to aspirate it.

I look into his eyes and see my own house of financial disrepair and I wonder if I can ever make enough money to take care of him the same way he has prepared all his life to take care of wife and children...

Unfortunately, this former Girl Scout is not prepared.

I want better for my daughters –and being prepared is the way to get them there.

Fast forward to today. One year later, my daughter is not married. She is in college, preparing in her present for her future.

All my daughters are on the same path – “Preparing” as my mother always says, “for war in time of peace.”

If I were to make one New Year’s resolution, it is this:

“BE PREPARED” in 2011

Note: Originally drafted January 11, 2010.

Copyright (c) 2011 Mel Hopkins