F E A T U R E
S T O R Y
By David Perry
The Education of
Gordon
Halm A HOW A 51-YEAR-OLD FROM GHANA FOUND HIMSELF ONSTAGE AT THE TSONGAS CENTER
t 4 a.m. on a Saturday in late May, Gordon Halm gives up on sleep. He slips from bed and leaves his West Sixth Street home in Lowell’s Centralville neighborhood to walk his dog and buy the morning paper. He returns home to help his wife, Beatrice, ready his sons for the big day. Gordon slips on his cap and gown. He looks in the mirror. Yes, he thinks, this is real now, my dream made flesh. He arrives at the Tsongas Center with his family at 7:50 a.m. At 8:30, he joins his classmates. Gordon’s smile is beatific. Draped in robes and capped with mortarboards, the students appear indistinguishable. Some wear sneakers, others heels. Some wear suits, some cutoffs. The drape of the black graduation gowns hides individual style. For nearly three hours, they are simply the Class of 2012. But there is something different about this man in his early 50s with the big smile. He is a father of three boys, 5,000 miles from his birthplace—Winneba, Ghana, a coastal West African fishing town. Gordon’s line nudges forward. Students hand name cards forth. The reading of each name sets off a micro-eruption among family and friends seated in the arena’s bowl. Some of the graduates show little emotion. The line shortens. Gordon shifts from foot to foot, anxiously. He closes his eyes, to freeze the moment. In the seats up front, one graduate blows bubbles. The soapy orbs tumble a few feet through the air before they pop, plop onto another gown or plummet to the arena floor. Others bellow recognition as classmates they know cross the threshold and grasp their diplomas. Continued F A L L 2 0 1 2 UMASS LOWELL MAGAZINE
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