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Professor Schelling was the advisor assigned to me for the major project that the MPP class of 1975 was supposed to complete at the end of our first year.  My project -- helping the Massachusetts State Police write an Equal Opportunity Plan that would increase the participation of women and people of color in the force -- had little to do with economics or statistics as it had been taught at the Kennedy School, but it was enormous fun.  The State Police were a garrulous, charming bunch and I was having a grand old time interviewing them and arguing with them.  But when it came time for my first progress report to the formidable Professor Schelling I was suddenly terror-struck.  He had rendered me practically mute with fear all year long, with his quiet, dead-pan classroom brilliance.  I had never been in a room alone with him.  I was petrified that he would tear me to pieces when I went into that first meeting with no more than a string of anecdotes.  And yet no sooner than I began recounting what I'd been up to than his eyes started twinkling and that funny little smile of his started beaming and I realized that this was a man with a fierce sense of humor and a great appreciation for human foibles.  We met several times as I researched and wrote --  and I had even more fun with him than with the policemen -- sharing strategies and getting tips on how to shape my own arguments.  Ultimately, it all led to a document that was very well-appreciated by the Lieutenant for whom I produced it -- and may even have led to the hiring of a few women and people of color.  And I've been producing "Voices from the Field" reports like that ever since.  It became my metier - one that I would never have discovered found had Professor Schelling not been so receptive, so encouraging, and so willing to show the wonderful man lurking under that steely exterior.