“Miss Park. There’s one name left.” I look up to see Timmy standing in front of my desk with a piece of paper caught between two fingers. His blond shaggy hair hangs over his eyes, in dire need of a haircut, but this seems to be the style nowadays. I can never keep up with the trends of high-school students.

“Are you sure everyone got one?” I look around the room to see everyone else already starting to write their letters. I signed my class up for Adopt-a-Marine as part of their Civics project. Everyone was excited to do it, mostly because I don’t think any of them had ever written an actual letter before. I’ve been with this group of students as their seminar teacher for two years now and still have another two years to go before a new batch will be assigned to me. Hopefully by that point, most of these kids will be off to college.

When the idea of doing Adopt-a-Marine was mentioned, the whole class seemed super excited, which is showing now with everyone already eagerly writing their letters. I wasn’t sure how they would respond to this project, but so far, so good.

“Cindy,” I sigh, forgetting that she transferred out two weeks ago. “I’ll take it.” I hold my hand out to take the paper from Timmy. I hadn’t planned on doing one myself, thinking I’d have my hands full keeping everyone else’s letters straight, but I wasn’t going to let one of the names we got assigned go unanswered. The thought of someone not getting a letter makes my heart ache.

Our letters may not be life changing for the Marines, but I think they’d help. I don’t like the idea of some of the men from the unit not getting their letter when everyone else did, so taking a name is the least I can do.

Looking down at the scrap of paper, a warm feeling rushes through my system as I realize then just how hard this might actually be. I’m not really sure what to write, but if twenty of my students can do it, surely I can, too.

“Looks like you’re stuck with me, Sergeant Major Jiyong Kwon,” I mumble to myself. Sheesh. I hope I don’t bore the poor guy to death with stories about my cat or what I’ll be baking over the weekend.

Pulling out a notepad from my desk drawer, I decide to keep it simple. Start things off light and it should be easy enough. I give myself a little encouraging pep talk and h