Welcome to Money Talks, a series in which we interview people about their relationship with money, their relationship with each other, and how those relationships inform one another.

Eric Love, 47, is an artist and educator in Haverhill, Massachusetts. After spending the first half of his career working as an educator and consultant, he became the founder of LARP Adventure Program (LAP), an after-school and summer camp program. LAP’s curriculum focuses on building community and teaching creative problem-solving through live-action role-playing — a type of structured, interactive game in which players, often rooted in the worlds of science fiction or fantasy, work together to overcome a specific challenge.

Elle Dunne, 22, is a recent graduate of Wellesley College who began working for LAP as a counselor and is now the marketing coordinator. LAP currently serves over 100 youth, adults, and their families with programs including classes, weekend events, and residential overnight camps up to four weeks.

The following conversation is lightly condensed and edited.

ERIC: I’m Eric Love, and I founded LARP Adventure Program. It came into being as an LLC in 2012, but the idea existed far before that. The earliest rendition of what it is today was from about 2000 — but I wasn’t exposed to live-action role-playing as a medium yet.

I was using Dungeons and Dragons as a platform for education, and frustrated about trying to bring it to life. Two of my students were like, “This already exists! It’s called LARPing! You should come to an event!” I was like, “Oh, this is great!” I didn’t even go to another LARP; I just went to the drawing board and executed the curriculum design.

It’s been a committed journey, for sure. I have a fine arts background, a fine and performing arts BA, and a masters of education from Lesley. When I went to Lesley University, I had the LARP program already in mind and I used the masters program to polish it and make it what it is today.

“Everyone still had this idea that if kids pretend any type of combat, that they will become harmful people. That’s not how this works, right?”

ELLE: I came on board last June. I ambitiously googled “LARP camp Massachusetts jobs near me,” because I wanted to work at a LARP camp!

I joined as a counselor, and they........

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