Weekend Highs

It's been a busy weekend for me– a celebration for Nativity graduates who are now graduating from high school, the wedding of two Dartmouth classmates, a day trip and hike in northwestern Connecticut with a friend who's also a teacher. And just as the dust settles from all of these festivities and travels, it's time for me to pack my lunch, set aside my sports clothes, and prepare for the start of the final five-day week of the school year. I'll treat the notable graces and blessings of these events in turn.

Imagine that, just before graduating from high school, your middle school invited you and your family to brunch, with a slideshow filled with laughter-inducing images of your younger days, and the gift of a book and a promise of support as you head off to college. For the second year in a row, members of the Nativity community– current and former teachers, administrators, and our alums and their families, gathered to honor and send off another group of young men to college, most of them the first in their families to embark on that journey. Though these students came and went long before I arrived, their presence reminded me of the latent importance of the work I'm doing with the 27 boys whom I formally instruct, and the 29 boys whom I hopefully teach in other ways. At the close of the school year, when the frenzied activity of eagerness for summer vacation can obscure the studies and tasks yet to be completed, signs of the future fruition of my efforts are as welcome and heartening as the spring blossoms I've been encountering over the past few weeks.

Following the event for the Nativity grads, and a quick stop at home to grab a snack and change into a nicer outfit, I drove to northern Massachusetts for my second Dartmouth wedding this academic year. The groom and I were acquainted through many games of cribbage with the chaplain at Aquinas House (the Catholic Student Center at Dartmouth), with whom we both remain good friends; the bride and I both majored in geography and can trace our ongoing friendship back to an early morning breakfast with secretaries, bankers, and fishermen at an iconic waterfront diner in Portland, Maine while taking a break from a fieldwork project during senior year. The wedding, conducted within an Episcopalian liturgy, was replete with the values of faith, commitment, love, and community– expressed in song, word, action, and fellowship. When she walked into the church on her father's arm to the delicately passionate piano and violin of Dvorak's "Songs my Mother Taught Me," I sensed every heart (including my own) suspended in admiration of the beauty we all beheld. When we as a congregation affirmed that we would "do all in our power to uphold these two persons in their marriage," I was reminded of the complimentary bonds of family and friendship that, in supporting and sustaining a marriage, uphold the exclusivity of that bond while also rendering it a gift that is inclusive of those who know and love its constituent persons. The reception– held in the church hall, had the feel of a church social, and everyone pitched in when it came time to clear plates and move tables and chairs for an exuberant hour of contradancing. Being in the fellowship of so many good, faith-filled people, discussing everything from Dartmouth memories to theological musings on the ministries which we study and carry out, was a truly delightful way to honor two wonderful friends who, in spending the rest of their lives together, will no doubt continue to inspire such wonderful gatherings long into the future. Congratulations and blessings to the happy couple!

My quest to reach the six high points in the New England states is now two-thirds complete, as a teacher friend and I meandered up a fogbound dirt road, then navigated some soggy trails and slick rocks en route to the highest point in Connecticut, located humbly on a slope leading from a wooded summit just barely in Massachusetts down to a level expanse of forest that contains a marker for the triple point where New York, Massachusetts, and Connecticut meet. The entirety of our hike was fogbound, creating some ethereal vistas along our journey, made more haunting and powerful by the roar of streams fed by springs and seeping runoff after a week of rain. Pictures and the words of Henry David Thoreau are perhaps the best glimpses into the atmosphere of the day.

The next Toyota Prius ad?

"Other roads do some violence to Nature, and bring the traveler to stare at her, but the river steals into the scenery it traverses without intrusion..."

–Thoreau, A Week

"It is astonishing what a rush & tumult a slight inclination will produce in a swollen brook." –Thoreau, Journal, 12 February 1851

The highest point in Connecticut– south slope of Mt. Frissell

Take care and have a great week, everyone!