Thursday, February 18, 2010

Yo-Yo Ma


In fifth grade Nancy Ingham (or Mrs. Ingham for those of you that are still stuck in fifth grade at Englewood Elementary... who happen to be reading this) so anyways Mrs. Ingham had each child in our class write a letter to a celebrity of our choice. Weird assignment, right? So everybody in the class is taking this opportunity to write a gushing letter of fan-dom to I don't know, Arnold Schwarzenegger, or whatever. To this they would receive a generic letter of appreciation from a fan club, and a glossy autographed head shot to boot.Call me dorky, or out of whack with 5Th grade pop culture in 1995, but I chose to write to none other then cello genius himself, Yo Yo Ma. My penmanship attempting its best rendition of delicate cursive was as followed (pretend the following is cursive..thanks):

Dear Yo-Yo Ma,
I am a fifth grader at Englewood elementary School in Salem, Oregon. I wanted to write to you and tell you that your version of the Bach Cello suite #1 in G is my favorite one there is. I think you are the best.
Sincerely,

Emily Dart-McLean

Back in room 308, all the other kids are getting there Arnolds, Selvesters, and Julias, meanwhile back on 20Th street, a package arrives addressed to yours truly. Inside the package was an autograph...TAPE... of the Bach cello suite #1 in G (cue a power word like "SHIZAM" or "BOOYA"). The message on the tape in Yo-Yo's best penmanship cursive (again pretend the following is cursive, for full effect):

Dear Emily,
Thank you for writing to me.Is this the song you were thinking of? Enjoy!

Sincerely,
Yo-Yo Ma.

True story. I hope I run into Yo-Yo Ma someday so I can yell
"YO-YO! HEY YO-YO!...REMEMBER ME?"



3 comments:

  1. just reading the letter 5th grade pauline fanny wrote warmed my heart. for reals.

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  2. A fabulous idea... Thank you for lesson planning my next language arts class.

    ReplyDelete