the introduction

"My grandfather's name was Melvin,too."

His response, after a pause, is a surprised, "Really? That's cool," and I've a hunch that his hesitation was some unspoken variation of, "Was he from Puerto Rico?" Either that or he was just double-checking: his English is just on the verge. I affirm that he is, then, the second Melvin I've ever met, and I tell him that makes me happy because it does. I rarely have opportunity to say that name aloud; repeating it now almost feels like a talisman, and I'm pleased by the feeling it conjures.

But mostly I'm pleased for the student who has been but a name on a list to finally be coming to life. I've anticipated the arrival of this freshman class in a steeling-myself-way for months: they outnumber my sophomore through senior roster combined, they have a laundry list of special needs and issues, they've mostly been in a middle school program I call, for cause, Lord of the Flies. But, as always, "they" don't really exist, despite their preceding reputation. Instead of a group to confront I've got indivduals to meet and figure out how to teach; as they appear, I remember. So far there's this not-really-a-namesake whose helpfulnes is so-far endearing, an unfocused, outsize Junior; a Dominican ballplayer (football, too) who carries himself with that self-assured, big league ease at the age of 15; the smirking boy who will not speak. There is, heaven help her, a fourteen year-old gonna-be teen mother and her possible polar opposite, a wanna-be doctor who's been out of Ho Chi Minh City less than a week. There are dozens more, counting both the old and the new, and much learning to be done on both sides of my desk.