There’s a concept in film and story-writing known as the Hero’s Journey. The idea is that in many popular stories the central character embarks on a quest that follows clearly defined stages – stages shared by many different tales. One of the most famous examples of this is Harry Potter and the Philosopher’s Stone. The first few stages of the Hero’s Journey are these:
- Ordinary world
- Call to adventure
- Refusal of call
- Meeting the mentor
- Crossing the threshold into a special or magical world
- Tests, Enemies, Allies
The first Harry Potter story follows this pattern with remarkable clarity. Harry lives in the grimly ordinary world of Privet Drive. The call to adventure comes in the form of the letters inviting him to Hogwarts – which are amusingly refused, with increasing desperation, by Uncle Vernon. Harry then meets his mentor, Hagrid, who takes him to what appears to be a blank brick wall, which is in fact the threshold to Diagon Alley, a very special and magical world. No sooner has he crossed the threshold than Harry starts to meet allies and enemies and begins to face his tests – ordeal by sorting hat first among them.
I thought of all this today standing in the Richards Hall and watching a world less obviously magical, perhaps, but certainly extraordinary. Two testing teams were operating four student test channels. Students were met at reception, whisked in short order to the swabbing station, from which their swabs were whisked in turn to the processing station, and then to the analysis and registration point. We conducted around 300 tests today. On Monday it will be around 800 across four teams and eight testing channels.
The scene was odd enough, especially when attempting the almost impossible feat of trying to imagine how inconceivable this would all have seemed a year ago. But what made it extraordinary was the people. Colleagues from every area of school operations had volunteered to learn this elaborate procedure and to don full PPE and to undertake it with quiet efficiency, camaraderie and good cheer. Students too endured the whole process with patience, calm and good grace, as did parents, making time amid all the other impossible demands to ferry their children to and fro.
Nasal swabs are no wands: but there was something both moving and in its own way magical about watching this human machine in harmonious operation. The resilience and adaptability and stoicism of young people and adults in a world where all the routines of school have been turned upside down coming together, finding a way through, surviving, getting it done.
The final stage of the Hero’s Journey is called Return with Elixir. In Harry’s case his elixir is his magical powers and the friendships that now illuminate his life. It seems increasingly hopeful that the vaccines will be our elixirs, allowing the ordinary world, or something very like it, to resume. There will come a day, in the not-too distant future, where we are sitting together, around a table, on a lawn, with friends and people we love, asking – do you remember? Do you remember when it seemed normal to set up and run an Asymptomatic Testing Centre in a school hall? To live behind masks and screens, punctuated by brief moments when sticking a swab up your nose was just part of the weekly routine? And the memory will be lit, perhaps, by that astonishing silent golden sun of the first lockdown, and gleam strangely as we remember it: bizarre and sad and quickly seeming almost unimaginable, the details fading and becoming forgotten. But I hope that for a long time we will not forget our gratitude: for everyone who helped us get through, and for the simple pleasures of companionship and freedom that now we long for. Next week marks a step on the road to that time. We so look forward to everyone being back in school: my goodness me you will be welcome!
Will le Fleming, Head