Dodo Eggs

Somewhere in the eastern half of South Dakota, planted among the cornfields and open pastures is a collection of modest school buildings, a gym, and a well-worn chapel.  The school’s name is Sunshine Bible Academy.  It boasts of being the oldest, private boarding school in South Dakota, which is like saying you’re the most respected toboggan manufacturer in Florida. 

With the nearest metropolitan area (oops, I mean a gas station) a full thirteen miles to the north; you needed to live there or be sure you had enough gasoline to make it back to town. 

My graduating class was ten.  We enjoyed an experience completely different from what many high schools are forced to provide.  Instead of a factory-like campus churning through students, we were Ezra, Wes, Dustin, Matt, Leon, Anna, Kayln, Kristen, Denise, and Cherri.  Hey, how many people can rattle off everyone in his or her graduating class?

I can’t properly remember our class motto.  It might have been “Where Every Student Is In The Top Ten”, “Our Parents Didn’t Want Us At Home”, or something like “Tampons Fugit.”  I keep forgetting. 

What I do remember was that our graduation ceremony was a perfect example of seeing the trees instead of the forest.  We were not a throbbing mass of black robes and cheap mortarboards.  Each well wisher recognized all of us.  If they didn’t know us personally, then they had listened to stories involving each of us. 

There were difficult parts to living at my school.  It wasn’t easy to intimidate other football teams when your name was Sunshine Bible Academy.  We made the best of a bad situation by cheering “S-B-A!”  Still…when your mascot is the Fighting Sunflower scare tactics are a little out the window.  (I jest.  We were the Crusaders).

I enjoy the shocked expressions that cross people’s faces when I describe the rules that governed the boarding students.  When you’re responsible for a group of sixty high school students who all have parents from different denominations, the rules must cater to the greatest common denominator.  Dates and music needed approval from the administration.  Lights were turned out at 9:45 there were no TVs allowed in anyone’s rooms. 

Each person also had a gratis or “work you do for free.”  There was no paid janitorial staff.  Why, when the administration had all this child labor right at its fingertips?  Not surprisingly, I ended up with pots and pans, campus garbage, and cleaning the boy’s bathroom.

People don’t believe me when I say this but “Sunshine Bible represented four of my best years.”  I wish it could have been fourty.”

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