I have had the privilege to attend meetings of 5 different grottoes in Texas, and 3 of which were in the last few months.
There seems to be subtle differences in the grottoes' meetings, that in some ways is sort of like culture differences between different ethnic groups. One grotto has a auditorium like environment with a speaker addressing the audience from a podium. Another grotto has a Knights of the Round Table setting. Another has a leader standing in front of the audience, like one job seminar presentation. Another is like a class-room with a teacher and a dry-erase board. One grotto has organized agenda that they ritually go thru. Another has an atmosphere like a British Parliament session. One has mostly 20 year olds. Another has lots of 50 plus year olds. Another has a mixture, but mostly 40 year olds. One grotto usually gets someone who has never been caving at each meeting. Another gets people who went caving in other areas before moving to their town. One grotto seems to have 20 chiefs and no indians. Another has all indians and no chiefs. One grotto strictly talks about caves, and another at least before the meeting has open controversial discussions. One grotto eats while everyone is giving their presentation. Another eats before the meeting at a random location. Another meets off-site before to eat and meets again off-site to drink beer after. Some grottoes have had the same format for decades. Others change the format with each new president. One meets in a room that looks like a beer-drinker's man cave. One meets in a rock-climbing gym. And another in a chemistry building. One grotto shows slides from a Hawaii trip, and another shows trips to a cave back in the 60's that was bull-dozed closed. One grotto displays a fancy digital calendar projected from a laptop. One grotto appears to dress more formally. One grotto seems to have a larger number of Mexican cavers, while the other grottoes are from towns with a larger Mexican population. Another grotto seems to have more cavers who somehow make money caving, or at least have jobs that allow them to cave as often as they want. But these are all subtle differences. The things they have in common are amazing. They all seem to say "ooh..." the same way when someone shows a picture of a wall full of fishtail speleothems. And the way they talk about the 10 feet of cave they found like the way members of the Alcohol Annoymous meeting talk about they have been sober for 10 days. Or the sympathy the give each other, when their caving plans fall apart because of some unexpected situation. And how they sarcastically poke fun at one another as they explain why it took so long for them to climb up a 60 foot pit. It is fun to attend other grotto meetings, and lets you see things from a slightly different perspective. David Locklear caver in Fort Bend County --------------------------------------------------------------------- Visit our website: http://texascavers.com To unsubscribe, e-mail: [email protected] For additional commands, e-mail: [email protected]
