Dormitories

The children listed who they’d like to have in a dormitory with them during our week in Cornwall today. It was a secret affair, my big promise being that I’d put them with at least one of the five names they wrote down. Several frustrating hours and chocolate biscuits later, I’ve finally managed to work it all out. I wish there were a computer program to do this sort of thing for me! If you are into building programs, get in touch and we can make our millions out of this idea!

Every year, I see the same old story though... a few timid children being unrealistic with their choices and listing who they see as the most popular and confident girls in the class, although they don’t really ever talk with them. I wonder why they do it. I wonder if these little ones reckon that being with Miss Popular would give them a free ticket to the best week in their entire lives and that things would change forever.

We’ve all done it, I suppose. I remember wanting to be ‘in with the cool crowd’ who knew how to dance and had fluorescent leg-warmers at school discos. I tried being a ‘cool dude’ at parties for a while (in my Laura Ashley dress, woolly white tights and buckled sandals), but I secretly always breathed a sigh of relief to find myself back in the slightly offbeat and square corner. I may now own the world’s best pair of fluorescent pink leg-warmers, but nothing much has changed otherwise!

I hope the little ones like their dormitories.