Chapter 1

I grew up in a dairy farming community of 2836 people and 3500 cows. When I graduated from high school I went to college in the big city to get my teaching degree. I loved the college experience. Hated the big city. As soon as I graduated with my teaching credentials I ran back home and begged Mrs. Sullivan the high school principal to hire me.

As luck would have it, they needed a substitute teacher and I was hired. For the first year, I lived at home and helped my folks on the farm when I was not needed to substitute teach at the high school. The next year Mrs. Demopolis retired and I was hired full time to teach math and American history. Like most small towns I taught all four grades from freshman to seniors.

The second year as a full-time teacher I married Peter the high school coach and assistant principal and became Mrs. Lorrie Jenkins. Peter is a wonderful husband and mentor. One night I confided in Peter that I was concerned that my math students were not reaching their potential and I was unsure on how to motivate them. We discussed the problem and came to the conclusion that we needed a carrot to dangle in front of them to get their heads back in the game as Peter would say.

Peter and I own a cabin by a lake and after throwing around a number of ideas I suggested that we offer to take the boy and girl with the most improved math scores to the lake for a week at the end of the school year.

Peter looked skeptical and said, “I think it’s a great idea and it would not cut into the school budget. But I will be damned if I am going to keep tabs on four teenage boys and four teenage girls for twenty-four hours a day in the woods. And besides the cabin will not accommodate 10 people and we certainly can’t make some of them sleep outside in a tent. The most we could take is four.”

I agreed with Peter that taking eight teenagers to the cabin was unworkable. Although I loved it at the cabin it was a little rustic so I suggested that we take the boys and we try to think of something that is more fitting for the girls and find someone to chaperone them.

The next day at lunch break we asked Mrs. Sullivan if we could meet with her after classes ended to discuss my concerns with the math students and a proposal we had to improve their performance. She readily agreed. At the end of our last class, Peter and I went to Mrs. Sullivan’s office where I confessed that I was not getting what I thought was the full potential of my math students. Then we proposed our plan to reward the boys with a trip to our cabin by the lake at the end of the school year. However, we were not sure what to reward the girls with.