A collaboration among Sixth Formers takes stress management strategies global.
March 31, 2023
Roommates Garrett Blake ’26 and Harlem Taylor ’26 reflect on getting to know one another and what they like most about living in Manville.
BY JACQUELINE PRIMO LEMMON
Garrett Blake ’26 and Harlem Taylor ’26 roll their chairs back and forth in unconscious tandem as they reflect on their experience as new Third Formers, both of them speaking in polite, reserved tones. Although both boys hail from New Hampshire, they didn’t know one another before they came to St. Paul’s, and on the first day of the Spring Term, their focus is on getting acquainted with their new schedules of classes and athletics: lacrosse tryouts for Blake; track and field for Taylor. During Winter Term, they were on the JV boys basketball team together, but this term their schedules don’t overlap. Still, at the end of the day, they always end up in the same place: their shared room in Manville.
“He used to go to bed at 7:30 p.m., wake up at 10 p.m. to do his homework, and then go back to bed,” Blake says, and Taylor laughs in confirmation. “I go to bed between 10:30 and 12 every night, and now he’s starting to do that more. We both get up around 6:45 unless we’re going to the gym in the morning.”
Taylor describes the feeling of arriving on School grounds in the fall as surreal, and stepping into the room he would share with Blake — Blake already moving his stuff in and getting set up — was a moment to remember. “It was kind of astonishing to think, I’m really here now. Like, this is my room,” Taylor says.
He also was surprised at how friendly everyone was, even students who didn’t know each other. “I thought people were going to be a lot more isolated and stay to themselves more,” he says of the preconceived notions he had regarding what boarding school would be like. “I thought people would just stay in their rooms and not talk to other people, but especially in Manville, we’re always together, always in somebody else’s room or in the common room. We have a really strong dorm.”
I thought people would just stay in their rooms and not talk to other people, but especially in Manville, we’re always together, always in somebody else’s room or in the common room. We have a really strong dorm.”
Harlem Taylor ’26
Blake — whose sister, Brianna, is an SPS Fourth Former — agrees with Taylor’s description of Manville, an all-boys dorm on the quad built in 1926. When he first moved in, he remembers feeling intimidated by the older residents, especially the Sixth Formers, but he ultimately found living with students of all forms — what St. Paul’s calls vertical housing — to be one of the best parts of the School experience. “I especially went to the [Sixth Formers] with schoolwork, and a couple of them for basketball,” Blake says. “Sixth Formers [already] struggled with what you’re struggling with your Third Form year. You can ask for help.”
The boys say their room is larger than some other Manville doubles, so it’s only natural that it has become a central hangout spot in the evenings, in addition to the common room. And as they look ahead to their Fourth Form year, they hope to room together in Manville again.
“Garrett is a good roommate because he’s fun to be around and nice to talk to,” Taylor says. “He knows when you have to be serious and start doing work.” As for having fun, Taylor adds, “He knows there’s a gear between those.”
“Same thing,” Blake says of Taylor. “And he’s not fully sports or fully academics, so we’re both similar in that way. It’s good to have someone like you.”
