One day, when we lived in Indianapolis, I walked my younger daughter and son — 6 and 4 at the time — to the local library. On the way there, they each found a stick they wanted.
"Why do you want a stick?" I asked.
"Because they're cool sticks!" they said.
I couldn't argue with that. I love a good stick. I've always been a fan of sticks, and even now, I still keep an eye out for cool ones when I'm out walking.
"Plus, we might meet bad guys," they added.
"Well, fight them with the sticks if we do. That'll give me time to get away."
They didn't think that was funny; my genius is unappreciated.
When we got there, I made them leave the sticks outside. "But what if someone takes them?" they wailed.
"No one is going to want your sticks," I said. They hid their treasures in the bushes by the front door. "Keep them there, and we'll get them when we leave."
We went in, took care of our library business, and came outside to a shocking discovery.
"Someone took them!" my kids yelled. "Who would take our sticks? We were only in there for ten minutes."
"The bad guys?" I asked.
"No, it was probably some mean librarian who hates children!" raved my daughter.
This was the most likely answer. Probably not the children-hating part, but I could imagine someone cleaning out the bushes. Still, my son and I didn't rule out bad guys.
We even checked the trash can to make sure, but no dice. Definitely bad guys.
"This sucks!" shouted my son. I don't know where a 4-year-old learned language like that; probably his mother.
The kids groused and ranted the entire way home about the injustice of someone taking their really cool sticks, so my wife and I promised to help them find better ones.
Sticks are amazing. Nothing beats a good stick, I don't care who you are. Anyone who had fun as a kid has a great story that starts, "One time, I found this really cool stick."
When I was around 8, my dad built a bow for me out of a curved branch and a bicycle inner tube, with some smaller sticks for arrows. My best friend, Eric, and I would race around the neighborhood with the bow and arrows, looking for bad guys. It had an effective range of about five feet, so if we ever got within two yards of a bad guy, they were in trouble!
It started in 2003 when Boone Hogg and Logan Jugler found a stick on a Utah trail. They started OfficialStickReviews as a joke to review the stick for a few friends. But it took off and now has 2.3 million followers, including Olivia Wilde, Dermot Mulroney, and Lin-Manuel Miranda.
The two don't gatekeep the sticks that get submitted, they just share them. They get hundreds of stick videos per day, and a community has sprung up around Stick Nation. They've even developed their own terminologies and philosophies: "modded" sticks have been altered or carved, while "natty" sticks are natural. The sticks are ranked on their curves, "aura," and background lore.
There are sticks from the U.S.A., Philippines, Jordan, Argentina, Ireland, and New Zealand, just to name a very few countries. I even submitted my own while I wrote this column.
Last November, someone submitted an ice stick with the message, "I'm in Antarctica, and there are no sticks here. Nothing grows, and we can't bring sticks either. I found an ice stick. Does this count?"
There was some discussion, but in the end, nearly everyone agreed that it was, in fact, an Antarctica stick.
Although Stick Nation member and Hollywood A-lister Olivia Wilde said, "I don’t know, guys, this feels like a real slippery slope concession."
I named her an honorary dad.
There are straight sticks, bent sticks, gnarled sticks, and curved sticks. There are sticks for whacking and for walking. For back-scratching and roasting marshmallows. For hiking and fishing, sword fighting and jousting, casting spells or conducting a symphony.
They can even help you with walking and supporting yourself.
Years ago, I hurt my knee during a retreat weekend. I found a stick someone had broken off a tree, making it the perfect height and shape to serve as a cane and help me hobble around. (That's the photo above.)
I used it the entire weekend, took it home, cleaned it up, and applied three coats of polyurethane to it. This is the stick I submitted to the Stick Nation. And if I ever hurt my knee or ankle again — which I have done three more times — I have a way to get around.
Thanks to the coolest stick in the world.
Photo credit: Erik Deckers (hey, that's me!)
My new humor novel, Mackinac Island Nation, is finished and available from 4 Horsemen Publications. You can get the ebook and print versions here.