Since I was a Prep, I have heard of the fabled “Senior Spring,” a time when grades and test scores and eye-catching extracurriculars would no longer have to be chosen with college applications in mind. I soon developed my own “Senior bucket list:” swim across the lake, act in a black box, give blood and not faint, have a picnic on Senior Grass or Bissell Quad. Those never happened.

This year’s spring season has been an abnormality – a once-in-a-hundred-years event put a stop to everything pretty abruptly. I don’t think, and I desperately hope, this won’t happen next spring, but I do think this demonstrates how important it is to not push the things you want to do to “tomorrow.” 

I am not going to tell you not to focus on college, but don’t make it an all-consuming leviathan that decides what you do and don’t do with every moment of your time. There were so many things that I didn’t save for the spring that I’m glad about now. I worked on the farm, stage-managed main stage shows, stayed up too late in The Record’s editing room, and just enjoyed time with friends (when I maybe should have been focusing on a Supreme Court paper).

Those are the memories I am leaning on after being away from Hotchkiss and my friends for so long. 

If you are safe and have the ability to volunteer, you can really make a difference in people’s lives. That can take the form of giving blood (with or without fainting), sewing masks for essential workers, donating food to houses of worship or food banks, and even offering to tutor kids online in math, English, or foreign languages. But take care of yourself as well. 

Read a book (or, as I will be doing, listen to the audiobook), take a free online course, bake some bread like everyone else on Instagram, or toss out all worship of productivity for productivity’s sake! 

Avatar: The Last Airbender just dropped on Netflix for those of us living in the U.S. –  see if you can organize some friends for a live viewing, look yet again at that cute dog page, and stay in bed until three in the afternoon. Being away from school and games and friends is hard on everyone right now, and you shouldn’t be expected to be punching like Mohammad Ali coming out of it. Lean on your friends and celebrate not doing anything for a whole week.

You are a Bearcat, you are loved, and you are missed. Stay in touch. 

With love, 

Carter.