Jeffery Laikind visits

I had the pleasure of hosting Jeffery Laikind last week at my house! Originally, I planned the visit to catch up with Mr. Laikind post-graduation and show him RhodySquash, an organization which benefited immensely from his advice in our early, "I have no idea what I'm doing" stages. As Chip lovingly describes, he was a Choate Godfather to me, and his advice and wisdom consistently proved accurate. On Wednesday, I picked Mr. Laikind up from the Amtrak station, after which we had a nice lunch at a diner. We headed to TMS in what would prove a corroboration of Murphy's Law. First, the bus was 15 minutes late, prompting me to think that on the one day that we had a visitor, the transportation fell through. In addition, we ran into a student we rejected earlier this year. Though 25 minutes late, the actual program ran quite smoothly, and the kids responded extremely well to many of Mr. Laikind's stories of adversity from his childhood. That night, Mr. Laikind and I went to Thames Street Kitchen. RhodySquash and fundraising were the subjects of conversation, but we also had an opportunity to catch up on a more personal level. Mr. Laikind slept the night, and after an inspired breakfast of egg-sandwiches a la our alma mater -- Choate -- I drove Mr. Laikind back to Kingston and resumed the ever difficult task of fundraising!