Thank you, Rudolfo Anaya

SOPHOMORE YEAR, ANAHEIM High School, fall of 1994. School administrators had just kicked me out of honor’s English for being too lippy to Mrs. Patsel, and kicked me over to Mrs. Lafler. My classmates switched from overachieving nerds to stoners, cholos and other misfits.

Mrs. Lafler was the petite, bespectacled white woman in charge of saving us. She should’ve stood no chance. We frequently talked back, didn’t bother with homework, and basically checked off every box in the