Glenn Simpson: My Journey Into Freemasonry
My story begins seven years ago while “working” on a capstone project for my Associates Degree. I was perusing the internet conducting research on Patanthera leucopheia –Eastern Prairie white fringed orchid. I had gotten side tracked and looked up Freemasonry because I saw it on TV the night before, and needless to say I spent the remainder of that afternoon looking into websites of something that I thought Hollywood made up.
A few days later while riding in the car with one of my best friends I mentioned it to him. I chatted about the things that I found interesting, and he just smiled and agreed with me as he tried numerous times to steer the conversation in other directions.
A couple of weeks later we went on a fishing trip to the northern part of Wisconsin. We drove for hours to get to our spot. All along the way I chatted about what I had found about Freemasonry. While we were out on the boat, not catching a thing, he mentioned Freemasonry to me as if he had not only been listening, but he retained every word—strange credulity at that…. We sat there chatting about it, and I told him about the “cool” things that I found on the web since I last chatted to him about it. At the end of our conversation, we paddled back to shore. It was twilight now and the sun created a scene better than Van Gogh could have painted.
When we returned to the cabin his father was sitting in his favorite wingback chair with his glasses hanging off his nose, his feet up on the ottoman and his laptop across his tired knees, for he had been out with the pups all day. My best friend preceded me and proceeded to exclaim, “…Glenn has something that he wants to ask you!” with this huge smile across his face as he walked into the other room. I sat down on the right side of the couch, which was closest to him and proceeded to state what I had on my mind. “I have been poking around and I wanted to ask you about being a Freemason.” His glasses nearly slid off his face and as they moved down his nose, he grabbed them and stated, “What do you know about being a Freemason!” His tone startled me, and as the look in his face dissipated we had a meaningful conversation about what it means to be a Freemason. That day I realized that this was a path that I wanted to travel, and I never looked back…
–Worshipful Brother Glenn Simpson Jr.