a twinkle in his eye he also told me that he was still using the same old “tricks” back then when he introduced us to Hemingway and Shakespeare. I told him I was glad he had gone back to teaching and how lucky his students were in Corpus Christi. Then I didn’t hear from him or about him again for the longest time. Until I learned that he was battling with lung cancer from the Internet which bristled with prayers and requests for prayers for him. Mr. Ralph Cecilio died on December 2, 2009. E-mail messages, Friendster, Multiply and Facebook postings by his former students and friends all around the country and beyond rendered heartfelt tributes and expressed words of gratitude for this extraordinary teacher who had changed many lives, including my own. I posted: “In my 27 years of studies, he was inarguably the best teacher I’ve ever had.”
He appeared tough but deep down inside he cared for his students. Many of us feared him, but before long we came to revere him.
His students from the Xavier University High School and Corpus Christi, where he taught from 1993 until he retired, were proud to have had him as teacher, friend and father, whose memory they will keep close to their hearts. Writing about Mr. Cecilio in this book, I hope, will help to keep his humor, laughter, wisdom and singularity as a classroom teacher vibrant and alive.
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