Rudy

Rudy is a freshman, and he's quite the character. He has the lowest voice I've ever heard coming out of a freshmen, and that voice tends to get him in trouble. It's so low that I can always tell if he's talking in class. Every time I called him out for talking, he was always so repentant and shocked that he had been disruptive. He's also the largest student in the freshmen class, and seems to be equally unaware of his size as he is of his voice. He has managed to single handedly break the most expensive piece of equipment in the biology lab, a picture frame in the library, and many a chair. He might be disruptive, clumsy, loud, and completely unaware of his own size, but I love that big guy. He makes me smile.

Rudy was late coming back from two week break. I'd been excusing his lab work, but otherwise expecting him to come bumbling back into my classroom in less than a week. That's what I thought until I got this email:

Knowing that Rudy isn't coming back is kind of like knowing that Joshua isn't coming back, but it's somehow worse. He's been in my class longer, but that's not really it. He was such a huge presence in my classroom (literally and figuratively) that it's really hard to imagine the rest of the year without him. His leaving has started a whole bunch of conversations about when we all leave Maxwell and head back to the States, and I don't feel ready for that yet. Had I known he wouldn't be coming back, I would have told him that I love his big heart, how I know that when he puts his mind to something he can accomplish anything, and how much I will miss him.   

"I suppose in the end, the whole of life becomes an act of letting go, but what always hurts the most is not taking a moment to say goodbye." - Life of Pi