Dear Boundless Families:
It’s day ten of the boarding school, and our students’ small victories are adding up. Imagine kids plucked out of their Covid conundrums and plopped into our 600-acre wilderness classroom, where the moon and the sun compete in nature’s daily beauty contest every night.
It’s like the kids won the lottery. They get to have a life. And interact with actual human beings. Six feet apart mind you, but it feels real up here. And setting aside their usual clumsy transition to demanding structure, they can’t believe their good fortune.
They are actually grateful. Teenagers. I’m recovering from my coronary.
Our staff team all tested negative prior to the kids’ arrival. On Monday morning, student test results confirmed that Corona has come up empty in their young and immortal bodies. An almost perfect bubble has been formed.
Actually it’s a Laplace bubble, named after the scientist who demonstrated that the force inside a bubble counteracts the surface tension of the same bubble.
The result is balance.
We feel that balance this morning. A Boundless Laplace bubble. We remain mindful that bubbles can pop pretty easily. Cue the mask, goggles, and seventy-nine thousand other protocols.
But back to the small victories.
The students are learning so much already. They are conquering their inner demons. Little things like getting up on time, doing dishes, acknowledging kindness, supporting the straggler that wrestles with their snowshoes, mastering a metaphor in English. Little things, of course, add up to big things.
Most importantly, they are connecting with each other.
I popped by for an hour last night before dinner.
I was greeted by Dustin, and I couldn’t help but grin. This kid has rock star hair from the 70’s, so it stirs the favourable bias within.
“How’s my least favourite student doing?”
He clenches his fist that is marked by brightly coloured fingernails. He pretends anger, but cannot sustain hiding his smile. He and I don’t know each other yet, but there is time. We both want to, and this feels good.
I enter the large living room and there are three kids reading books quietly. Kids. Reading. Books. What the hell? Keishan is experimenting on the piano, tap-tapping away in peace.
Noah says, “Without our phones, what else is there to do?”
It’s chill time in that room after a day of “Community Karma” where they spent the afternoon building ski trails.
I’ll have none of it – too chilled out for me. Stirring the pot, I bellow,
“Trump is gone tomorrow. How do people feel about that?”
Taesean takes the bait. “He’s gotta go”. The conversation soon morphs into conspiracy theories, anti-vaxxing and the futility of love. In that order. I look up and now there are eight kids in the room.
There are some standouts students here. Daisy comes to mind. She has single-handedly created a young women’s program – which is another way of saying the girls have banded together and are providing crucial emotional support during the first week’s adjustment period.
Cole, who grew into a Game of Thrones character over the 6 week break – he growth-spurted into a giant – both in stature and group influence. It’s funny how teens mature. There is no steady growth curve. Sometimes it comes in spikes. Cole is such a lad. This unlikely leader just a few weeks ago has stepped up. He spends his days making connections, and the new kids feel at home. We couldn’t be more proud.
Things are well here, this day ten. It feels like we are over a hump.
Thanks for sending your kids to us.
Sincerely,
Steven
