The Trinity Voice’s Zach Watson met with Byron Lawson, the new Head of School, to help get students get to know the new man in charge a little bit better.
If you could compete in any Olympic sport, what would you do?
The single scull. That would be fantastic. [For] my second sport, I would probably want to play guard on the basketball team. When I look at rowing, it’s simple. You get out what you put in. And when I look at that, I just say to myself, “I could get better at this. I could get better at this when I’m 60 years old.”
What is your favorite sports team?
Football wise, it would be the Baltimore Ravens. Outside of that, it would be the 2014 St. Mark’s Boys Volleyball team. My son’s team won a championship that year. I couldn’t have asked for a better fall with my youngest son watching my oldest son, sitting next to my wife, watching him play the sport that he loves.
What is your favorite superhero?
It’s the Flash. I don’t have a good answer for why it’s the Flash, but as soon as I started reading Flash as a kid, I could always read [it]. I think I bought a Flash comic book in my twenties. And then there is a three-part Elektra series of graphic novels that I thought was really well done, so I like her character as well.
What is your favorite place to travel?
My favorite place is Seville, Spain. It’s gorgeous. It is seemingly trapped in the 17th century in a very odd way. If you wake your way to Granada, you are an hour or two from north Africa. You can see the Moorish, Jewish and Catholic influences in the architecture. It is like standing in a historical time bomb from start to finish, and I absolutely love it.
What are your favorite and least favorite foods?
Crab cakes would be my favorite food. I’m not really sure I have a second favorite food! Broccoli is my favorite vegetable, and I have a favorite dessert, which is sweet potato pie. Least favorite foods—I don’t eat them. Beets, let’s put it that way. My favorite drink is lemonade…it has to be hand squeezed, and it should be sugar, water and lemons. Whenever I travel throughout the world, I seek out a good glass of lemonade.
What is your strangest habit?
It’s probably writing with fountain pens. I can’t not do it, and it’s a device that was created hundreds of years ago. I carry one with me almost everywhere, and it makes me cringe to write with anything else. The pen thing is pretty big for me. I’ve got a quill pen from England, glass pens from Italy, one handmade pen from a rare tree in South Africa. I’ve got all sorts of fountain pens. It’s my bad habit.
What motto do you live by?
The only real thing I have to share with you is time, and the only real thing you have to share with me is time, so let’s both be different after our time together. Let’s make it worthwhile.
