I fell
in love with Benjamin in the first grade. He was a pale, quiet boy with dark
hair and light eyes. He rode the bus to school, which I suppose made him
exotic. Everyone I knew walked to school. This is probably because ‘everyone I
knew’ consisted of the children who lived on my block and comprised most of my
class.
Benjamin
would get off the bus each morning with the other country kids and
follow them over to the part of the playground that had been unofficially
designated for their own particular use. It wasn’t that they stood awkwardly in
a group like discarded toy soldiers, but they kept to their side of the
playground and we kept to ours. To me, their games always seemed more subdued
and orderly (and therefore less fun) than ours, so I never bothered to explore
the mystery of our segregation. I would usually be running pell-mell through
the townie turf, playing a variant of tag or just wreaking havoc, too busy to
notice.
Once
class started and Benjamin was separated from his brothers, sisters and
fellow farm kids, he seemed to grow even quieter. Mrs Flett, our first-grade
teacher tended to dote gently on him, always asking him in her softest voice if
he wanted to say something.
“Benjamin
Grey, do you have a question?”
“Benjamin
Grey, do you know the answer?”
A bright
and perfectly polite kid, he never failed to answer a direct address but I don’t
think he ever volunteered anything. Our teacher always had to prompt him. Maybe
he was shy, I never knew. And Mrs Flett preferred to use his full name. There
was no other Benjamin in our class. Still, she never once called him Benjamin
or Ben, always Benjamin Grey. I don’t know why.
But his
name was why I loved him-something about the way it sounded;
I loved saying it. There was magic in his name.
Every
morning as we left behind our designated peer groups and lined up (single-file)
to be let inside I’d ask, “How are you today, Benjamin Grey?”
At
recess I would call, “Time to go play, Benjamin Grey!”
When
asking for his opinion, “What do you say, Benjamin Grey?”
Perhaps
it’s odd to love someone because his name is easy to rhyme. It helped that he
smiled at me every time I used his name, in spite of the fact that it was silly
and doubtlessly more than a little tiresome, Benjamin smiled every single time.
Let us always meet each other with a smile, for the smile is the beginning of love. (Mother Teresa)
Let us always meet each other with a smile, for the smile is the beginning of love. (Mother Teresa)
