Poteau High School senior and valedictorian Caius Thomas has had quite the interesting journey before landing here in Poteau, Oklahoma. “My dad played French horn in the air force band for nine years; he later became an airfield operations manager.”  Originally born in Oregon his dad’s Air Force career took him all over the country. “We lived in Alaska when I was in kindergarten.” Being so young the unique weather of the 49th state didn’t affect him. “It was a bit crazy because it would be like -20 degrees, during recess (so) we had to stay inside a lot of the time during Winter.” Extreme weather wasn’t the only phenomenon he experienced while in  Alaska, “At certain times we’d only have three hours of sunlight, (and to) contrast that sometimes in the summer the sun wouldn’t go down it (the sun) would be at an angle where it just stayed in the sky.” Thomas and his family used special blackout curtains to be able to sleep at night. Living in Alaska allowed Caius to expense the natural beauty of the sate from his own backyard. “We got to see the northern lights, usually we’d just see a bit of faint light, but one time we were driving and a friend called us, and we were able to meet them and we got to see all of the light twisting in the sky.” After Alaska Caius and his family would move to North Dakota, then Texas, and finally Poteau,Oklahoma. Reflecting on his living in small communities and large cities such as San Antonio Thomas shared this “I’m more of a small town guy but it depends on the community you cultivat, like in North Dakota it was hard to make friends with how small it was but in San Antonio there was a lot of people giving you more opportunities but most people don’t really interact like they do in small towns.” Lastly when asked the all-important question of what’s it like to be Cauis Thomas he simply stated this “It’s no different from being Eli Solomon.”