Common Sense

You have beem waking each day with a cloud over your head, not knowing what it is or why it is there. I can tell you what it is. It is your soul telling you that you are not doing what your heart is telling you that you should be doing.

How can you fix it? Listen to your heart, seek out the answer to what is missing in your life and start doing it. One way to get started is to attend an Appleseed Event. We will get you started on a path that will help you find the answer. Come to an event and learn to become the master of your rifle, learn the fundementals of shooting and master them, then you will be told about the history of Americans and how they let nothing stand between them and success, begginning on April 19th, 1775 and the events that occured at Lexington Green, the North Bridge in Concord and along Battle Road on the way east to Boston.

Every journey begins with the first step, there has to be a beginning and we will give you one at an Appleseed Event. Not all Americans care about their country and the ones that do often find themselves in despair about what impact they could possibly ever have on the perilous future awaiting our Nation. Let us show you how to get started on your journey as an American Patriot, and how to live the life of a Rifleman.
Scout

I am posting this for Junior Birdman who is on the Appleseed Trail.

“Do you Remember What Happened Tomorrow”, by Junior Birdman

Yeah, I know, you’re thinking that the Birdman got his words mixed up again. Not true though. What you read is just what I meant to say!

You’ve heard it before; that those who do not remember history are doomed to repeat it, that there really is nothing new under the sun.

I subscribe to that kind of thinking, and I believe it is borne out over the centuries. If certain civilizations had only paid heed to what had happened to the civilizations which had risen and fallen before them they might still be around today.

Nearly every great civilization or culture appears out of obscurity, rises to greatness, and eventually slides back into obscurity again, buried by other civilizations or cultures. Sure, we remember the Romans, the Greeks, the Persians and such, but how many of us know not just that they rose and fell, but why? Modern schooling seems to be heavy on the names and dates, offering to teach the young what to think about these things, but not the more important how to think critically.

As a student of history I am bothered by the way things in this country have been going in the last few decades. Why? Because I know how great this country was and can be, and I know the fate of countries which ignore history and scream headlong into their own brave new world, smug in the concept that they’re so much smarter than their ancestors. Why, we could never slide into the despotic ways exhibited by rulers and regimes in times past, right?

No, those people were around long before we were even born, so how could they possibly be as smart as us? And besides, it couldn’t happen here! Not in the US of A!
Should I list all the countries that fell thinking just that? The list would be quite long.

This country rose out of desperation. A people oppressed in many ways sought to throw off the yoke of tyranny and create a country where people could live their lives without constant interference from government. Where that government derived its powers by our consent. A place where those wishing to excel could do so through their own ingenuity or hard work. And conversely, a place where those less inclined to hard work could live to a standard acceptable to them. Yet all would be able to pursue what they thought was best for them.

I like that sort of arrangement and I think it served us well for a couple of centuries, yet there are those who don’t see it that way and would like to induce upon you and me a system where THEY decide these things, oh, but you still get to pay for it and then some.

I could stand around the water cooler at work and complain about it over a cup of coffee. I could shout at the TV when politicians grab face time and promise still more idiocy. I could argue the finer points of legislation with others on some website. All seemingly good things, right? We the people, exchanging opinions in the great marketplace of ideas. Not ACCOMPLSHING anything, but venting my spleen sure feels good.

We here at Appleseed like to call that “Pointing out the icebergs”. You see we consider the country to be a ship in peril. We’ve hit an iceberg or two, and we’re taking on water.
What you do next may greatly affect the outcome of the story of the ship, our country.

You can do one of a few things: You can keep standing there at the bow with all the others, pointing out icebergs and shouting above the din.

You can go back to your berth and crawl into bed knowing that we’re so much smarter than those other ships which sank before us and that when you awake in the morning we’ll be sailing along peacefully.

Or……you could head down below, grab a bucket and start bailing.

The Appleseed project is about bailing. And there’s never enough folks down below doing the hard work that must be done. And once the bailing is done there’s still a country to put back on the right course.

We take great pride in that little green patch we wear, the one that says “Rifleman”.
We earned it you know. Lots of sweat and frustration, and even more perseverance were required to be able to sew that patch on, and it says a lot about the person wearing it.

But sometimes I think it should say “Bucketman” because it’s a lot more important what a Rifleman does off the range than what he does on it. A Rifleman persists. And not just at the range. A Rifleman knows who his congressmen and senators are, and more importantly THEY KNOW WHO HE IS!
When was the last time you wrote your Congressman or Senators? (Do you even know who they are?) Do you understand the greatest and most dangerous issues coming before our representatives right now? Are you awake, aware, and active? Or is that couch just too comfortable?

The men and women who bought and paid for your liberty and gave you the greatest country in history now look to you to see if you’re willing to work to keep it. Are you willing to help ensure that your own children’s liberty won’t be smothered under the burden some wish to place upon them? Will you be able to look your grandchildren in the eye after making their tomorrow worse than your yesterday?

Grab a bucket and join us below decks and help us bail. Wake up and be the man or woman you want to be, an American who is aware and active and doing something to change the course of the ship.

Together, we can make your kids yesterday worth looking forward to. JB

http://www.kipling.org.uk/poems_copybook.htm

Recent events in our country have set in motion a chain of events that might possibly have terrible consequences for Americans. What happened to cause this? Why did this happen? How did we get to this point? The answer might surprise you because the answer is, it doesn’t matter. It simply does not matter what kind of ice the iceburg was made of, where it holed the ship, or why the ship was even sailing in iceburg infested waters in the first place-none of it matters!

It does not matter what got us here, it only matters what we do now that we are here. How the fire started in the house is not that important while the house is burning. Much more important than anything else at the time is to stop the current fire from burning anything more. There will be plenty of time once the ashes have cooled to discern the cause of the fire. To make sure it does not happen again and to build a new house.

But right now, the house is on fire and the focus of this program should be on putting out the fire. Without the fire extinguished, what else can be considered? Do you stop and try to philosophise about possible faulty wiring or the burn rate of dry tender v.s. damp, when the blazing roof is falling around you like dripping lava? No, you do not, you grap an axe and a hose and get to chopping and spraying.

The Appleseed Project is 100% dedicated to this endeavor and we have to remain focused in order to complete this mission. We have to continue to build this current machine and run this current mission to fruition, even though we might have more fun with building a different machine and doing something different with it. Right now, the Appleseed Project needs every single man and woman and every single minute we have available to us to run this mission of putting out the fire

The fact that one person was elected over another one is not the biggest problem we face. The bills being considered for debate over firearms and the 2nd Amendment are not what we should be focusing on either, these are all of only peripheral importance . We should be focused on getting every single person we can to wake up and become involved in becoming the “We The People” the Founding Fathers wrote about. Once this has been done everything else is inconsequential because laws can be repealed, or will never come up in the first place, rights will be safeguarded because “We The People” wish them to be. Money will be spent in government as we say it should, watched over by our elected officials, or we will tar and feather them and run them out of town on a rail.

Why is this such a hard concept to follow? Each and every American citizen has this power and if we simply use it we can change this country in a fundemental way for the better just as the Founders meant us to.

Wow, how powerful is that? We have ownership of our government and they have accountability to us, not the other way around. Do you want to stop trembling in your bed at night thinking about whether you will have any rights when you wake up? About whether you will have ATF agents bursting into your home in the middle of the night and arresting you for legally owning a firearm, or if you will have IRS agents seizing all of your assets to fund your governments support of elementery school sex education and transgender acceptance classes for your six year old?

When you go after a disease, you do not target the symptoms of the disease, you go after the disease itself. You don’t go down to the school and get some signs and stand there uselessly and impotently picketing behind a cordoned off protest area while the socialist educators are parading their ideas before your children regardless of anything you can ever say or do.

Instead, you go after the people to whom the responsibility was delegated to, the people who feel the very same way you do and the people who hold the ultimate power to make a real and lasting change.

In this world of Blogs and eletronic information we are depending less and less on slanted views of world and local events presented to us by the talking heads in the media and plugging ourselves into written words by people who actually witnessed the event or news.

In an effort to take control of how our program is being presented to the public we have taken another step in that direction also and have started our own Radio Show on BlogTalkRadio. We felt after several radio interviews on different radio shows that no one was able to define the Appleseed Program better than us, so we have gone to the internet airwaves and are broadcasting worldwide to all who will listen to our message.

You can access the site at http://www.blogtalkradio.com/AppleseedRadio and you can call in at,

Call-in Number: (347) 308-8790
Please join us Tuesday nights at 7:00-9:00PM Central time.

That is the creed of the Appleseed Instructor. Anytime, anywhere, ready to roll, ready to show up, plug in and send the signal “all ahead full” to begin an Appleseed event. I love that about our guys. Before I had Appleseed friends my only close comparison for such “ready to go” buds were my two dogs, Scout and Boo Radley. I could always depend on them to be ready anytime, day or night, to accompany me looking for a lost calf or to get cattle back in off of the highway or check on a sick animal. Never a complaint never a “too tired buddy, go without me this time”. Just a fearless, happy dog smile and a wagging “ready to go” tail.

Now, I don’t mean to compare our instructors to dogs, (the dogs were much cheaper to feed and house), but they do share some great traits. Always ready to go, ready to instruct, to pass on the message of rifle marksmanship and the message of how our nation began with determined, courageous men and women on April 19th, 1775.

Did I say they had to be at an event to start their instruction? Because if Idid, I misspoke. Our guys are ready to give a class anywhere, at their mail box, at the drive through at McDonalds, at the magazine rack at Walmart. If they see someone reading a Shot Gun News and looking at Fred’s column while their wife is grocery shopping, why, that is the signal to launch into their “elevator” speech and turn someone who is thinking of taking the first step, into someone who is ready to take their first step, their first step towards becoming a student and eventually an instructor of rifle marksmanship and safety and their first step in the safeguarding of the liberties and rights of theirselves and their fellow Americans by spreading the word and the story of the Founding Fathers and the American Colonists on April 19th, 1775.

If this sounds like you, or like the you that you have always known you could be, we are waiting for you here at appleseedinfo.org. We have a place for you and a bucket with your name on it. So you can take your place in the bucket brigade helping to bail out the water rushing in through the holes in the hull, the stern, and the bow that is rapidly sinking the USS America.

Don’t wait, don’t put it off, the water is rushing in almost faster than we can meet right at this very moment. There is nothing to think about, no confusing decisions to make. Do you watch the ship sink with your wife and kids, your mother, your father, brother and sister on it or do you start bailing? You know the answer before you even hear the question.

This is an entry I am posting for Junior Birdman while he is out on the road.

“I Ain’t Signing Nothing”
by Junior Birdman

A recent post on the forum caught my attention. It was in a thread by a writer, (A new member), who had complained about not being able to understand many of the abbreviations he saw in the various posts.

(Appleseeders are a busy lot, and have little time to post lengthy replies and so often use abbreviations specific to Appleseed when they post)

An effort has been made to remedy that on a thread posted within the Instructors area of the forum where there now resides a list of abbreviations and their Appleseed meanings for new folks to reference when they aren’t sure what an abbreviation means.

Unfortunately, those who aren’t “working” on the forum can’t see the list with all its abbreviations and explanations, nor any of the other countless tons of great information to be found. This was pointed out to the original poster, along with a suggestion that he might sign on as an Instructor in Training.

His reply was typical of modern Americans:” I’m not signing up for anything”.

I thought about this a while and determined that he had indeed signed up for something.

You see, you don’t have a choice whether or not you sign up for something. You sign up for SOMETHING every time you do or don’t do something. We’ve seen it all too. So many reasons not to “sign on” and help us bail:

“I don’t want to be on a “list”.

This one always leaves me speechless for several reasons: First of all, what list and why don’t you want to be on it? If there’s a “list” composed of real Americans who want to do something and save the country, why wouldn’t you want to be on it?

By not being on the list, you are automatically enrolled on the “other list”.
The one filled with the lazy, apathetic, ignorant, and uninterested.
The ones who don’t even know the country’s in trouble.
The ones who don’t think it’s worth their time and effort to keep their own children from being enslaved.

There’s a “list” of folks against such things? SIGN ME UP!

I’m just glad Sam Adams, John Hancock, George Washington, Paul Revere and so many others weren’t worried about their names appearing on some list, and believe me, they WERE on a list.
If there was ever a time to be on a “list”, it’s now.

“I don’t have enough time”.

(Probably the most popular excuse for not signing on) What this means is that you’ll sign on for college football, basketball, baseball, soccer, fishing, hunting, antique shopping, Dr. Phil, Oprah, and all manner of other things that take so much of your time and do nothing to turn the country around, but not for getting out there and DOING something constructive to save the country. You know, the same country your kids will have to live in. And their kids. (And their kids too)

And you KNOW things in this country aren’t going the way you’d like for your kids and grandkids to live the kind of life you’d prefer them to live. Think you could cut out one ball game now and then to ensure your own kids have a decent country to live in?
No. I guess it’s too much to ask. Don’t sign on to help us at the Appleseed Project. Somebody else will do it, right? You can sign on to bring more chips and dip to the game next Saturday. And don’t think about how the guys who paid for your liberty spent 8 years, 24/7/365 doing nothing but that. And they didn’t even have chips and dip most of the time.

“I don’t want to get involved with some” (You supply the excuse)(Anti-government/ Militia/ Gun nut/ Scary/ etc, etc) “group”.
(I have a hard time discerning if this one is real or simply a not so well thought out variation of the lazy, apathetic, ignorant type displayed above)

OK, lets say this one more time. (For the 785,291st time) Appleseed is NOT anti-government. (In fact, quite the opposite) Appleseed promotes the kind of government America was founded on, should have, deserves, and will have when we again become a nation of thinkers and doers, not couch slouches.

We teach YOUR American heritage, the way the country was created, so that liberty reigned and people were free. And we have the terrific advantage over those guys back in 1775 because we have an ESTABLISHED government of the people, which we can petition with our grievances for legal redress! We just want to wake folks up and have them PARTICIPATE in their government the way it was designed.

And believe me, that is MUCH harder than some anti-government group who simply wants to sow hate and discontent and overthrow of the government. We don’t want those kinds! We want thinkers and doers who are willing to get up off the couch and get involved in OUR government. We are the government, how can we be against us?

Militia group? Let’s see……I’ve been to something on the order of 30 events with this outfit and have never heard the word “militia” mentioned, (Except when telling the history and heritage of the country. And let’s face it, that’s what they were!) We’ll ignore the constitutional meaning of the word for now, that might be too uncomfortable for you, and simply say that you won’t find any camo clad military wannabees in this outfit.
What you will find are men and women who are awake, aware, and are DOING something to fix what they see wrong around them. Just the way the founders envisioned. Working within the system with other awake and aware folks to make this country work the way it was intended.

So don’t sign on to help us and you “volunteer” for the ranks of those who don’t see a need to change anything. You sign up to remain on that couch, too lazy to even get up for another Hot Pocket during the commercial. That’s what others are for, right? You can always holler at the spouse, kids, dog to get one for you, right? Somebody else will do your part. That’s the American way, after all, right?

No, you don’t have to sign on with the Appleseed Project. But you do have to sign on for SOMETHING. You don’t have the choice to opt out. I encourage you to think it over and sign on to the right group. The one that will make a difference in your children’s life. And think of the men who DID something for you, unfazed by having to” sign on”.

“Posterity, (That’s YOU!), you will never know how much it cost the present generation to preserve your freedom. I hope you will make good use of it. If you do not, I shall repent in Heaven that I ever took half the pains to preserve it”

The above quotation was written by John Adams after riding out to see for himself the carnage and destruction after 19 April, 1775. What he saw was the result of the actions of people who “signed on” to defend what was right, what was theirs, regardless of the eventual outcome.
They faced death by hanging, bayonet, shot and shell, disease, and the loss of their families and property. Their own children faced starvation.

And yet they thought enough of YOU to get up and do something.
They signed on where it would make a difference.
Others “signed on” by leaving the country or even fighting against their own liberty.
Still others “signed on” to ignore the present circumstances. After all, why should they get involved, right?

But ALL signed on to something.

We don’t have to face an armed enemy. We have so many advantages over our ancestors. And yet the Appleseed Project must beg you to sign on? I suppose that’s just how Americans are now. What a pitiful shame.

But here at the Appeseed Project, we’re WORKING to change that.

And we invite you to sign on with us. JB

The longest journey begins with a first step. That is from an ancient Chinese proverb, but it could well be from an Appleseed event. At the end of an Appleseed event we have what we call the “benediction”. This is where we acknowledge the hard work and persistence of the participants. Those men and women who shot to Rifleman standards will be recognized and given Rifleman patches. All wil be commended for their hard work over the last two days.

But that is not all we talk about. We talk about how the people who have stayed there until the end of the day on Sunday have shown that they have something in them that separates them from most of the rest of the people in their country. They have a drive and a desire to do something more with their lives.

They decided that they would go to an Appleseed event and learn to shoot, and not just learn to shoot, but to learn to shoot better than 99.99% of firearms owners in America. And they did, they went to an event and they did learn to shoot, they succeeded! They set their mind on accomplishing something and then they accomplished it.

They took their first step, and for some people it was a big one. Many of these foks have never fired a rifle before in their lives. And doing this, and doing it well, was not something they thought they could do, yet they worked at it and to some degree, mastered it. A first step.

We then tell them that there is nothing that is beyond them, nothing they can not do, that they are now on a new path, a new journey and this is the first step.

That is the message of Appleseed, hope. That we can change things for the better. Not that there is nothing we can do, so we should all get in our bunkers and get ready for Armageddon. At Appleseed we feel we can actually head off Armageddon at the pass.

So you woke up from the coma you have been in for the last ten or maybe even twenty years, and you took a break from the football game or movie of the week, or whatever it was on tv, and happened to take a look around you and saw that things had changed somehow in this country. Something had happened while your life was on auto pilot all those years and it wasn’t something good. After some more looking around and some more consideration, you decide that something is definetly not right, in fact, something is definetly wrong with the country.

You might not have been able to put your finger on it, and even if you could have, you would not have had the first clue on what you might be able to do about it.

And now you have somehow managed to become exposed to the Appleseed message. Maybe you were listening to a radio program and heard about it or you read something aboout it on another blog or forum. You now know that there is an Appleseed Project and you know something about what we are trying to do.

So what now? What do you do with this knowledge? If you are like the majority of the folks involved in the Appleseed Project, you are busting at the seams to get started with the process of repairing the damage done by neglect and abuse in this country. But where to start? How to begin the process?

It is easy. Just log on to the appleseedinfo.org website, go to the “RWVA Links” and click on”RWVA Forum”, at the top click on “register for an account” and click on it and fill out the information. It is very simple and not at all invasive of your private info. We just have a few questions we need you to fill in. Then once your account has been approved(just a formality to screen out spammers and online junk pushers) you can go to the “Must Read” section and click on the new members thread and just check in and say hello. Once you do that be sure and mention that you are here to work (you are here to work, right? It is a working forum :))

Someone should jump on you like a “Chicken on a June Bug”, if they don’t, PM Scout, or WCMartin, or RifleWoman or funfalaer and we will get you to the right location to get you started with some easy tasks. There is so muuch to be done, but we know folks have different amounts of time they have availoable to donate to the program. Any amount of time you have to give to this program and to your country we are extremely grateful for.

We have jobs ready from tiny quick listings of events to national positions where you will be helping to make policy for the program for years to come. You decide what you can do and how much and we will plug you right in. If you are doing one of the smaller tasks and decide hey, you are ready for more, we are always ready to give you more.

We need instructors to teach at Appleseed events, but we need tons of other follks for every thing under the sun too. Any time you need a hand or some help, just let one of your fellow Appleseeders know and they will be more than willing to give you a hand. And welcome aboard, we have been saving this bucket just for you.

This is a post by Fred on the Appleseed Forum site. I go back and read it often because of how relevant it is to America today. You can find the original post at
http://appleseedinfo.org/smf/index.php?topic=518.0

The Rock Squirrels at Crater Lake
by Fred

The locals call them “rock squirrels”. To Fred they looked like regular chipmunks.

On a recent Appleseed trip to the Northwest, he ran into them at both Mount St. Helens and Crater Lake; in each case, the poor things being pummeled with food by park visitors, despite the “$100 fine for feeding wildlife” signs.

There were even some ‘cutesy’ signs, telling the animals not the accept the food, that it might harm their digestive systems. Guess someone in the Park Service doesn’t like Doritos?

In fact, more pictures (it seemed to Fred) were being taken of the ‘cute little critters’ than of six-mile wide crystal-blue Crater Lake, stretching to the horizon, or gigantic Mt. St. Helens, looming six miles away, whisps of steam drifting up.

And it was at Crater Lake that a fellow tourist said the following to a group of fellow ‘feeders’:

“The park rangers told me not to feed them.

“They said, give them too much food, and they get lazy, and forget how to survive on their own.

“Then they simply lay around on the rocks, sunning themselves.

“And when winter comes, they die.”

So, naturally, everyone was feeding them.

In fact, it looked like more people were taking pictures of the cute squirrels than the magnificent lake spread out before them, 1000 or more feet below…

Now, there’s a lesson here, for you.

A parable, if you will.

These squirrels are Americans. As American as you.

After all, they were born here, in this country, on this soil - just like you.

And that’s your major claim to being an American, right?

Certainly, the squirrels know and care nothing about liberty or freedom, nor are they aware of their heritage (if they have any).

Again, like you. [Remember, this is addressed to SGN readers - I understand that being on this site, you may(!) not quite fit the parable, unlike 99.99% of your fellow Americans.]

And the cause?

Too much food.

That’s the cause.

There’s so much food in this country now that obesity is being gradually medicalized into a “number 1″ problem.

Too much food, and you grow fat and lazy.

Too much food, and you forget what is important.

Like how to survive.

Like, how to think.

You know, use that lumber room you have upstairs…

When you don’t use your brain, it atrophies.

Goes to sleep on you.

Becomes worthless.

What is the survival value of “being stupid”?

Sorry. This being a certified “kinder-and-gentler” site, I meant to say “slow thinking”.

Now, the park rangers did not say anything about predators.

But I bet, if there were any, that fat, lazy, sleeping rock squirrels who can’t move very fast and are asleep would be pretty tempting to them, huh?

Now, ask yourself: are there any predators loose on this planet?

Does the phrase “axis of evil” come to mind?

Or does the word “Chinese” come to mind?

Say the word “Chinese” and what comes to mind - I don’t know about you, but it does to me - are words like “smart”, “clever”, “hard-working” - and “hungry” - not physical hunger, but a cultural “hunger” to be dominant, to make up for the past centuries of shameful submission to the West.

Remember, these are the guys that 56 years ago pushed a US Army to near defeat (yep, the Joint Chiefs were dusting off plans to evacuate the Korean peninsula) - with captured Japanese rifles and machine guns, and a few mortars - and a lot of Chinese.

In a preview of Vietnam, it seemed that firepower - air, arty, or anything else - could not stop the Chinese, if they wanted to pay the price.

You know, it’s amazing what little things come from too much food.

As it goes with rock squirrels, so it goes with humans, seemingly.

Bet you never thought you’d be compared to a rock squirrel at Crater Lake, right?

Yet, it’s a pretty good comparison.

A lot of points that are simlilar.

Which is why it is a parable.

Now, the big question: If you as an American can’t be differentiated from a squirrel, I submit you have a problem…

Parables are supposed to make you think, to clarify things in your mind.

Maybe this one will accomplish its purpose.

But only you can make it do so.

Recently I happend to watch a show on social interaction among people around the world and one segment dealt with New Yorkers. The general perception of people not from New York being that with New Yorkers crammed into contact with one another, it had caused them to develope introspective personalities, shutting themselves off from one another. Because of this, they were thought to be less likely to be willing to interact with others in the form of answering queries or pleas for directions, help, etc. from strangers on the street.

This tuns out to be a general mis-conseption. They are in practice all too willing to give strangers advice, answer questions, point out directions. Alert you if you are doing something incorrectly (even when you didn’t ask), help pick up a sheaf of papers dropped by a passeby, all things which socially groomed humans are known to do in their interactions with each other on a daily basis. They want to be helpfull, and they wnt to share their part of the human knowledge they posses and ad it to the common whole.

When you posess knowledge, that knowledge is only worthwhile if you share it in some fashion. Knowledge that just rattles around in your scull and ferments is not going to produce anything for you but vinegar. And there is much satisfaction to be gained from sharing your knowledge and skills.

Say you have the ability to take some milk from a cow, and through your knowledge and skill, you can transform that milk into rich creamy butter, which could then be spread on top of a nice piece of fresh warm bread, (that someone else’s knowedge let them make). That would be very usefull information, but not if it remains inside you, unused. If it does not get passed on and handed down, it is a dead end .

When you share your knowledge and skills you derive an immense amount of satisfaction from passing it along, sometimes completely out of proportion with the tidbit you shared. The sensation of satisfaction is not unlike hearing that you have won something. Some free gift or some competition. The same type of pleasurable feeling.

When you supply that missing piece of information, it is like you are standing in the same room with the bomb squad guys when they are trying to diffuse the nuke that is about to go off and snuff out hummnaity. But fortunatly for humanity, you were there to tell them, “The green wire guys, not the red wire, the GREEN wire”. And by sharing your piece of the pie that makes up human knowledge, you have become a hero for your species.

Appleseed understands this because Applesed instructors come to the program, first, to serve their sacred obligation to their country by teaching at events. But they remain because of the intense satisfaction they derive from instructing. That same wonderful feeling they receivefrom being able to help their nation and pass along their knowledge of rifle marksmanshipand safety, and, the knowledge they pass on about the men and women involved in the birth of our nation on April 19th, 1775.

We do not pay our instructors in the Appleseed program, they are all volunteers. So why do they do it? Because it satisfies that genetic obligation to their fellow human beings of sharing information that will help ensure our survival. It satisfies that obligation to pass along information that will ensure the survival of our nation also.

Wow! That is some excitng news. The Appleseed program is providing Americans from all walks of life the opportunity to become heros. The opportunity to do something, to become a mentor and help someone along their path to becoming a Rifleman.

At some point in your life you had a teacher or good friend that really moved your life difection in some way. You know what I am talking about, or if you don’t, you missed one of the high points of your life. When you met someone and ther teaching or friendship and kind words had a great deal of impact in your life,

As an Appleseed instructor, you have a chance to be that person and make a change in someone’s life. Let me tell you that I have not been to an Appleseed event where a life was not changed, not a single event, And that is one of the things that keeps me coming back week after week and pushing the program as hard as I can, Because I know that I am making a difference, I am doing something to add my little piece of the puzzle to the pool of human knowledge and to help insure the survival of my fellow Americans and of the country I love.

Become an Appleseed instructor and help pass on the skills heritage and knowledge of those who came before you to your posterity.