When the Telegraph dubbed 10-year-old Aron Anderson “Britain’s loneliest schoolboy”, online community Reddit pulled together to send Christmas cards to Aron from around the world.
Aron lives on the tiny island of Out Skerries, part of the Shetland Islands in Scotland and home to just 70 people.
When his older brothers and their friends left for the secondary school on a neighbouring island, returning only on weekends, Aron became the only kid at his school and befriended his dog and local ducks for company.
The moderator of subreddit /r/Scotland, BesottedScot, posted on the forum urging everyone to offer the lonely youngster some festive cheer.
“We should do something to make him feel less lonely [and] let him know that he has friends on /r/Scotland who are thinking of him this Christmas,” the post suggested.
“I thought it would be very nice if we as a subreddit sent him some Christmas cards!”
“We have 20,000 subscribers here and even if 1% of you send a card, that’s 200 cards to a lonely boy to cheer his Christmas right up,” the post added.
The idea took off, with Redditors from around the world promising to post Aron a festive greeting.
Aron’s mom, Denise, told the Telegraph, “This is going to be his first winter as the only pupil so it’s hard to tell how it will be for him.”
“I do feel sorry for Aron being all by himself at school — but he really is happy. Spending a lot of time with adults has made him quite grown up, but he does enjoy trips to the mainland to meet other children.”
She added, “I just wish we could go back 10 years. It would be lovely to have some more families here, and if any did decide to come there is already a 10-year-old here for their children to play with.”
If you’d like to send Aron a Christmas card, you can find the address and some guidelines on the original Reddit post.