The Graduate
Another Churchillian loose in the world.

June 15, 2001 8:50 a.m.

ednesday was the last day of school in our sweltering area, unleashing many thousands of children and sub-adults to summer jobs, summer school, and in many cases summer idleness, including the highly annoying game called "Marco! Polo!" (exclamation points in original). Most of the little buggers would be far better off spending summers the old way — dawn to dusk toiling beneath the blazing sun, beset by thirst, weariness, and feasting insects. Perhaps then they would honor the hand that holds the water ladle and cooks the evening meal. Or perhaps they would revolt and slit our throats in the dark of night.

Yet these are idle contemplations which obscure the fact that many students have truly toiled against great odds to get through school. It was my pleasure to know one such student over the past three years. His burden was heavy but he persevered and achieved his own measure of triumph.

We met due to what might be called an enharmonic convergence. He was 12 or 13 years old when his mother finally died of AIDS. During much of her illness, he had been her personal nurse. His father was nowhere around and presumed to be dead. Such was his inner circle of sadness.

There were outer circles as well. His girlfriend was abducted from their South Florida neighborhood and drowned in a culvert. As his family flew apart, his siblings were sent to distant points. He landed in a church-affiliated facility for displaced children — mostly boys. One day he was found crying at his desk — not over his cruel fate, but because he wanted to learn to read.

Around this time I was being feasted upon by low-level despair associated with too much reading about a rising generation of "super-predators," a warning we now know was overstated. But there were also regular headlines about the high number of local murders — often fatherless boys killing other fatherless boys. In addition, as a hack writer I had plenty of spare time on my hands and was looking for a reason to steer clear of afternoon barrooms, so one day called said facility to offer my services.

The two of us struck it off pretty well, perhaps because he discovered a love of "big words" and I had a book (as opposed to mind) full of them. An immediate favorite was borborygm — a rumbling in the bowels. He seems to have quizzed every teacher and administrator as to whether they knew the definition, and found great satisfaction in their ignorance. Suddenly, he had something they didn't. He was discovering that knowledge confers a degree of power.

Similarly, he took delight in addressing (and denouncing) his peers in terms that baffled them. He designated some as "stumpjumpers" — a term usually used to define lightly educated mountain people — and commented on the "callipygian" wonders of some of the females thereabouts. These comments were often delivered in a deep voice reminiscent of Paul Robeson's, though while he spoke low he did so from on high, as he is almost seven feet tall.

This love of words was not attended by an ease of learning. It all came very hard to him, and was no doubt made more difficult by the fact that his tutor had little instructional talent and even less insight into how to work with learning disabilities. While he was capable of pronouncing some complex words, he could have the worst time pronouncing simple ones. Week after week, for example, he would struggle with a word he insisted on pronouncing "sn-ilk." At times it seemed only a genie from a bottle could set things right.

But he was apparently working on all this in the quiet of his cottage room, even as he hid his efforts from the merciless ridicule of his fellow boarders. Then one day, first time out, he hit it: Silk.

Say it again.

Silk.

How the wine flowed that night.

But there were hard times as well. Like many of his peers, his life was complicated by enormous problems, in his case a flame-thrower of a temper which sometimes led to violence (though never directed my way). To no surprise, the problem was treated with ever-larger doses of drugs. There were no worse times than when he faced the choice of either being evicted or putting on those additional chains. He always chose the latter, for there was little else in the world for him. But his agony will never be forgotten.

Nor will his stories, which were especially entertaining after his occasional trips to Florida. There were tales of eating sacrificial goat meat and drinking sacrificial blood in cane-field rituals. There was a touch of voodoo in his life, perhaps reflecting his Haitian background. Yet in matters of religion he was a firm Christian believer, for, as he would occasionally point out, Jesus had never abandoned him. And just as Jesus loved him, Bill Clinton loved him too. He could never understand why people were out to get Bill, save for the fact that they must be evil.

Things turned brighter toward graduation, and more interesting. A few weeks ago he announced a startling discovery: His father had turned up alive — with a couple of girlfriends in tow. One, it appears, is quite ugly. He said little more on that subject. But he did speak with great hope about his post-graduate mission: To go through culinary arts vocational training, become a chef, and make enough money to reunite his siblings.

The big day fell this Wednesday. He had slept little since Sunday, perhaps due to the fact that he was scheduled to deliver a short "reflection" from the lectern. He donned a blue cap and gown (paid for out of the school principal's pocket), the former getting knocked to the back of his head as he stooped to pass through the doorway to Fellowship Hall. Prayers were prayed. Seven young gospel singers raised the roof. Awards were given. Speeches made. Diplomas dispensed. Then he rose to speak.

He thanked teachers and friends. He invoked the memory of his mother, "who cannot be here tonight," and advised those remaining behind to work hard and listen to their teachers. The highlight, at least from one perspective, was the quotation from a speech we had read together early on. "Never give up," he told his audience. Indeed, he said it twice. It is good to have another Churchillian loose in the world.