Dear HONY,
Jon Cruz is not a millionaire, nor a politician, and outside the little niche he has carved for himself and filled with many others he is not famous at all; yet, he is one of the one of the most important men in New York City. He is the coach of the Bronx Science HS Debate Team.
Every day he gives up his time to help his students form their own opinions, grow as citizens and as people. He runs the largest debate team in the country, spending countless hours raising funds for it so that everybody at our diverse public school is able to compete across the nation. He memorizes everybody’s first name after he meets them and will remember them for the rest of his life.
What makes him so memorable? He is a fabulous, unapologetic, Jewish gay man; a model for so many students who came out to him first for help. His style is inspired with equal parts of George Lucas, Walter Mondale, and Liberace. He can tell you the best place for sushi in Soho, pizza in Midtown, and gumbo in Georgia. But most of all, no person could ever do what he does, at least not with the same enthusiasm and care which he does it.
Sincerely,
The Bronx Science HS Debate TeamI love debate, I love Bronx Science, and I love Humans of New York.
So this was about like three days ago, on Saturday. My parents were throwing a graduation party for my brother at our club house and all our relatives were in town. I had to sleep on the couch in the basement and it wasn’t really fun, but that has nothing to do with the story.
Basically, I was downstairs finishing up the slideshow for my brother’s graduation with all his baby pictures and everything. After I was done, I went upstairs and realized that no one was in the house. When I called my mom she said, “Oh sorry, we forgot about you.”
…..
LIKE WHAT? I pretty much just sat there waiting for my brother to pick me up. I seriously just wanted to go all Home Alone on the house and create booby traps for when they came home.
OMG THEY LITERALLY FORGOT ME. WTF.
(Source: quote-book)
