July 18, 2005

The End of the Beginning

January 4, 1988. Reagan was President, Gorbachev was General Secretary of the Communist Party, the stock market was recovering from Black Monday, and Michael Jackson's Bad was less than four months old. That very same day, in a small, nondescript town in southern Orange County known for its clean streets, wide roads, and cookie-cutter houses, a small boy just turned four, and relatively shy, emerged from comforts of his home to confront the world of academia—a world that would occupy his life for the next eighteen years to follow.