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| Plymouth boarding house |
"Would you be available to cover Mrs. W's maternity leave as a Deputy Houseparent? " the HR lady asked. My first thought was, "What on earth does that mean?". The whole boarding school thing was foreign to me. My kids had been attending Kingham Hill school for several months as day students and every morning we passed the beautiful stone boarding houses yet I still had no idea what happened inside the walls.
Well, I said yes to the job and soon found out being a houseparent means learning to appreciate the sweetness and quirkiness of 26 boys between the ages of 11 and 14, who generate a lot of muddy clothes and really like to eat biscuits.
I am now on month 3 of the job and have learned their names, favourite sports and subjects, who does and doesn't get along with who and what kind of food makes them happiest. I also fold lots of laundry, field phone calls and coordinate appointments, put plasters (band-aids) on wounds, nag them to do prep (homework) and act like a mum (mom). Occasionally I sweep the boot room which is full of stinky cleats (football boots) and trainers (tennis shoes) even though that is
supposed to be their job.
Soon after starting the houseparent job I decided to implement the WORD of the WEEK.. finding the strangest and goofiest words for them to memorize. With help from one of the boarders, a German boy who is quite the linguistic genious, we have come up with words like:
arachibutyrophobia (the fear of peanut butter sticking to the roof of your mouth) and borborygmus (the digestive sounds the intestines make).
The incentive to learn the word is that the first boy to memorize it gets to choose the flavour of cookies that I bake on Fridays. We call it "Cookie Friday".. it has become wildly popular. One boy who is boarding from Russia yells loudly as he runs in the door, "KOOOKY, KOOOKY"... it makes me smile every time and conjures up memories of Sesame Street. Please don't confuse cookies with biscuits.. biscuits are what the boys get on a daily basis after sport and before they shower for evening "tea" (dinner). They are pre-packaged treats that break into bits when you bite into them. Cookies are more of an American thing: homemade and delicious and served piping hot from the oven. On the Friday before Valentine's day I decided they needed to experience sugar cookies decorated with pink frosting and sprinkles. I worked for over an hour mixing, baking and decorating them before setting them on a tray neatly covered with saran wrap while I quickly ran to the corner store for some milk. Upon my return I was dismayed to realize that the dog had discovered how to eat through saran wrap and reach onto counters.
Scruffy had eaten 40 of the 48 Valentine's cookies for the boys!!!
I think the neighbors must have heard me yelling at the dog as I put him out in the backyard to wait for the pink tinted excrement to pass. That day the boys didn't get cookies.. instead I showed them the picture below to explain the predicament. They forgave me and thanked me for the effort, darling lads. Actually darling chaps... they recently informed me that chaps are what they are, no longer wee lads.
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| Some of the boys hanging out after class.. all gave photo permission |
