for Dr. Chaudron

"Life has a way of throwing you curveballs."

It was raining this morning. Actually, it has rained everyday so far, so if you like the rain and rainy climates you have yet another reason to move to Hawaii. It usually doesn't rain very heavily, but this morning it was raining pretty hard. Hard enough to make me stop to buy an umbrella on my way to my first day of class.

I was really excited about this class. Not only was it my first and only class today, it also was an upper level class taught by Dr. Chaudron who was also the graduate adviser and recommended I take it. It was called Early Childhood ESL and Bilingual Education. How much cooler can you get than that? Studying how to teach language minority immigrants at the preschool to early elementary level.

When I arrived to class, knowing I would be the only first year and male in the class and determined to be cool and collected, I found a different professor in the classroom and had to ask if I was in the right class. When I found out it was, I jokingly asked the other professor if he was our substitute for the day. He told me Dr. Chaudron died that morning.

I, of course, didn' t believe him at first. When I saw the tears welling up in his eyes, I changed my mind. Like that, I no longer had a class or an adviser and the only professor on campus that knew me was gone and the man who impressed me with how promptly he replied to all the emails I sent him and showed me such great compassion could no longer reply. He had two young children. I last saw him on Thursday.

No matter how crazy and stressful and busy your life can get, there are events that stop time, momentarily. I had one of those moments this morning. That is how I started my graduate career here at UH.