A chill, bright December morning, Thursday the 7th to be exact, and the Tandem Friends Community gathers at the heart of the campus, facing our beloved main Building, waiting for a promised "surprise."

Several weeks before Thanksgiving, Head of School Paul Perkinson shared an idea with the Spiritual Life Committee: at his former school, students and faculty members each received a two-three foot length of ribbon and a permanent marker, and wrote down the things in life for which they were most thankful. Then, the dozens of ribbons were attached to a pole and placed in a carefully chosen spot on the campus grounds.

Would we like to continue this tradition at Tandem? Instant consensus... And in true Tandem style, co-visionaries were born. On the morning of our last Meeting for Worship before Thanksgiving Break, I gathered the ribbons from English teachers who had orchestrated the writing in their respective classes, and asked the members of this year's cenior class to place them on the center table during our Silence. (What a gracefully draped and colorful tangle!) Following the meeting's afterthoughts, a number of students, faculty, and Friends stayed afterwards to read the ribbons: family and friends (the most prominent items), snow, girls, pizza, soccer, the stars, my dog (or cat or rabbit), fresh baked bread, music, just being alive...

It was David Slezak who first imagined the ribboned pole hoisted high on the balcony of the main building. So clear and true was David's vision, that his fellow Spiritual Life Committee members could not help but embrace it when next we met. Friends Joanne Dalley and Frances Schutz offered to secure the ribbons to nylon line and find us a mighty length of bamboo.

Wishing for everyone who had made a ribbon to see the raising of the pole, we planned a simple ceremony to take place toward the end of our daily Morning Meeting. Rick Larue, our music master, agreed to play Aaron Copeland's Fanfare for the Common Man and a member of Spiritual Life would speak.

At 10:20, middle and upper school meetings dispersed as everyone poured into the quad. As Rick's violin opened its ceremonial melody, two hundred-plus pairs of eyes lifted to the sight of two hundred-plus fluttering streamers waving against the bluest of skies as David, with help from Michael Eareckson and juniors Joel Slezak and Simon Smith, raised the pole from the high center window. Larry Goldstein stepped up to speak from the heart, offering words of thanks. And then he silence we are learning to rest within, and raise ourselves toward, settled upon our gathered community for a clear and true moment.

Our first Ceremony of Gratitude was complete.

Nura Yingling (electronic mail, December 9, 2000).