Students Share Thanksgiving Messages

At Tower Hill’s annual all-school Thanksgiving Assembly, students, a faculty member and the head of school shared messages of thanks that can be found below (Lower School student Pasha Jadali’s will be added soon). Senior Jane Mitchell read A Pebble by James W. Foley, students shared kind words with their neighbors, and the Upper School Chorus sang the alma mater. Happy Thanksgiving from Tower Hill School!

 

In the beginning of October, I started a clothing drive to collect clothes for Friendship House. The reason I did this clothing drive to collect uniforms for children in need was because of the quote “To whom much is given, much is expected.” I feel very lucky for all the opportunities I have been given such as having a wonderful family, having great friends and most of all being able to go to Tower Hill. Because of all these wonderful things I have been given, I wanted to pay it back to the community. Being grateful for all that you have is the parent of all virtues. It allows you to be compassionate, have respect for others and to be kind. I am very grateful for all the people who contributed to this drive by donating clothes, and I would also like to thank William Miller for helping me transfer the clothes from school all the way to the Clothing Bank of Delaware’s warehouse. Thank you!  

Let me start off with a quick story. A few years ago, I was walking down the streets of Wilmington with hundreds of other teenagers as part of a church activity that we were a part of. We weren’t walking in the safest place in Wilmington, so we were a bit frightened, especially when the people who lived in the area were staring at us. However, as we were walking, somebody in our group started waving. At first, the people living in the area didn’t wave back, but when more and more people from my group started waving to them, they waved back with smiles on their faces. Not long after, everybody was waving to each other, and some people even had conversations with the people living in the area. This story exemplifies the true power of reaching out to others and being kind, which is our school’s word this year. It only takes one act of kindness to make a difference in someone’s life. Once you start being kind, others will be kind too because kindness is contagious. My message to you is this: Never ever be afraid to be that one person who starts waving because we are always in need of more kindness in the world.

 

Liz Brown, Ph.D., Science Faculty
I want you all to do a little mental exercise with me. Close your eyes and think about what comes to mind when I say the word “family.”  Who did you see? Did you see mothers and fathers? Sisters, brothers, aunts, uncles, cousins? Was it a happy picture? Is this the same picture you would have drawn upon only last year? 5 years ago? Hopefully what you saw was a picture unique to you, carved and whittled into form by your individual life experiences and your distinctive worldview. There is an old adage that says “You can’t choose your family.” I respectfully disagree. In fact, I think we each have a multitude of families in our lives, some chosen, some given, all unique and impactful on our growth and development.

 

My first family is my given family: my mother and my grandparents. It's small, but mighty. As a child, I was disappointed that my family didn’t look more akin to Norman Rockwell’s poster “Freedom from Want”: a happy, loving family gathered around the Thanksgiving table, eagerly awaiting the arrival of a gargantuan turkey. I harbored a deep envy of my friends who spent their holidays galavanting around with hoards of siblings and cousins and enjoying their dinners at the kids table, avoiding the watchful eye of their well-meaning adult relatives. This sense of wanting, of mourning for a life I never had, stayed with me for quite some time. Luckily, the older I got the more I realized how lucky I was to have the family I was given and encouraged me to develop my dream-family on my own.

 

My first chosen family is my best friend. I entered Bryn Mawr College as a wide-eyed, somewhat sheltered, and totally eager-to-please 18-year-old. Across the hall from me lived a girl named Tessa. She was from California, which was exotic and worldly to a girl who had lived her whole life in a small town in northern New Jersey. Tessa used unfamiliar slang, spent her summers surfing at the beach and hiking in Yosemite, liked yoga and nature, and just oozed cool. She was unlike anyone I had ever met. Tessa became my first adopted family member. She became my sister. We shared secrets, heartbreak and grew from those goofy, naive 18-year-olds to accomplished, intelligent and strong women who support each other every day. She is my first chosen family, and one that set a precedent for years to come.

 

I graduated college and moved to Connecticut to pursue graduate studies. Once again, I was alone in a new city with no family to call my own, entering a course of study that would rock my stable academic worldview. Early in my first semester, I joined a group of fellow New-Havenites for dinner at a local restaurant. I was hesitant to go, as I really didn’t know many people at the event, but I decided I needed to make some friends, so I took a risk. That night didn’t go exactly as I thought it would, and I never ended up hanging out with most of those people again, except for a warm, goofy and intensely intellectual man named Shane who decided that we were going to be best friends. He and his wife took me under their wing and showed me New Haven, invited me into their home for dinners and movie-nights, supported me in my academic endeavors and achievements, and introduced me to their best friends, a couple named Kinnon and Danielle. My family was growing. Together with my husband, this group of people became my second adopted family. We shared holidays together, went on vacation, experienced the joys and trials of marriage, and loved and fought like all good families do. They are the siblings and the cousins I always dreamed of, and the family that keeps me steady in the roughest of seas.

 

In 2015 I moved to Delaware to join the faculty at Tower Hill School. Those first few days were rough. I was constantly getting lost in the building, I had no idea how the Upper School schedule worked, I kept calling people by the wrong name, and I felt overwhelmed by the changes happening in my life. I needed family to fall back on. Thankfully, I found a cohort of new teachers who experienced the first year with me and became my support. I also found a group of seasoned teachers who guided me through the challenges of the first year, and continue to act as insightful and gentle mentors to this fledgling teacher.

 

On Saturday night, I sat freezing cold in the driving wind, watching our boys soccer team win the State Championship. There are many things that impressed me about that performance- their grit, refusal to back down even when the wind was blowing so hard that the ball wouldn’t remain stationary long enough for a goal kick, the outstanding attendance and sportsmanship of their fellow students in the stands... but what has stayed with me is one brief moment. Before the game even began, I watched as the players convened on the far side of the field, huddled against the gale-force winds, arms intertwined in a show of togetherness. From my vantage-point in the stands, I couldn’t hear what words of encouragement they were sharing with each other, but I absolutely heard their departing shout — a resounding chant of “FAMILY”. These young men chose each other, not just as teammates and classmates, but as a family that endures defeat and rises to victory as a unit.

 

As I look around this room today, I see every member of my most recent chosen family. By virtue of being a member of the Tower Hill Community, you are now a member of my family and I am a member of yours. Family is not defined by birth or shared genetics, but by a shared vision of what is important to the you and the world. Here at Tower Hill, we love and we fight, we agree and disagree, get on each other’s nerves and support our friends during their toughest of trials and the greatest of their successes. Tower Hill is many things and many things done well. Tower Hill is my family and this Thanksgiving, I’m thankful for my families, all of them.

So it is time. It is time to gather together — to gather together as one community. Before we all take a well-deserved break to be with family and friends, I’d like us to consider the words of Charles Dickens: “Reflect upon your present blessings, of which every one of us has many — no on your past misfortunes, of which all of us have some.”

Before we hear some words from our very own Dr. Brown, our Upper School chemistry teacher, and messages from our Lower, Middle and Upper School students — Pasha, Charles and Matthew — I want to offer my words of Thanksgiving to the entire Tower Hill community. We are a strong community and we care about each other. I want to make sure we all thank Mr. Buckworth and his team for feeding us so well this fall. I want to thank Mrs. Palmer for her support of me and for getting used to a new office. I want to thank Mr. Tchinnis and his team, and Mr. Marvin for greeting us each day. I want to thank our board chair, Mrs. Shepherd, and our trustees for all the ways they hold our school in trust.

 

I want you to join me in thanking your teachers, coaches and advisors. So do me a favor over your break: get some sleep, be nice to your parents, thanks them for giving you the chance to attend Tower Hill.