To: newsletter
From: "Peter M. Rivard" <privard@mac.com>
Subject: brief note
Cc:
Bcc: chris
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Hi, all,
Not much to say, just in a good mood--something cute happened as I was leaving. I had played tennis with some of the kids, so instead of my slip-ons, I had my lace-up sneakers to change into as I left. This took a minute or so, so several first year girls sitting just outside the door could see well ahead of time that I would be coming through. I overheard them discussing and then practicing how to say "good-bye" to me. Very sweet.
Oh, I mentioned the glut of twins in my last letter; the next day, I discussed it with one of the English teachers at Manyo. He told me that there is also a set of triplets in the first year, "very small girls." I immediately thought of one conspicuously tiny and young-looking girl I had often seen, and of course once I was paying attention to her, I noticed that she showed up in two of my first year classes today. I asked the second of her if she had two sisters in the first year. I haven't found the third one yet, but the two I've found if not technically identical are close enough that I'd thought they were one person until today. I've embarked on a project to memorize the first kanji of some of the twins' given names, as students wear their family names and the first kanji of their given names on name tags pinned to their blazers and sewn onto the chests and butts of their gym uniforms ("and what's the other cheek called?"). I've never had a doppelganger, but I imagine it must be frustrating to have people calling you by your sibling's name all the time.