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I returned from a poetry-writers conference a few years ago at Nichollas State University and heard my son (he went with me) talking about our "adventure." He didn't mention the load of literary magazines he had to help carry or how we ate alligator for dinner one evening.

"Hey," he said to his friend. "We went to a place in the motel and I looked up and saw my mom dancing with a big, fat clown to a song that went 'tweet tweet, about a bird dancing."

The humor brought a smile to my face; and then I explained to him that the "clown" was a Shriner taking part in a Shriners' event. My son knew his dad (who had recently passed away) was a 32nd Degree Mason. When he died, he was working toward becoming a Shriner.

The Shriners stand at the top of the ladder of Masons (fraternal order of Freemasonry). And Masons move up by "degrees"-earned accomplishments. The Masons are the largest and most widely established fraternal order in the world, goals, meetings and social events just like other fraternal organization.

Masonry were originally labors, stonecutters, in Europe. After the building of stone cathedrals died down in the 17th century they became societies devoted to general ideals such as fraternity, equality, and peace.

The Shriners' goal is to support Shriners Hospitals for children, most notably serving children born with birth defects or burned. The Shriners hospital idea developed in 1919 with the first hospital opening in Shreveport, Louisiana, in 1922. Headquartered in Tampa, Florida, there are now some 22 Shriners Hospitals and burn centers sprinkle in the U.S., Canada and Mexico.

Right now, I can think of oodles of times I've heard about children being "saved" by the Shriners: a baby born with most of the top lip and inside mouth missing, which required numerous surgeries at no expense to the parents after the Shriners flew the family from Alaska to Tampa and found them a place to stay; a child in Arkansas born with her feet turned in where without numerous surgeries she would have never been able to walk; a Haitian child, adopted by a Florida couple, who would never have grown without numerous back surgeries - she now she heads the For Haiti With Love Mission in Cap Haitian.

Learn more about this author, Patricia Lieb.
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