Goodbyes, Part Two

It seems like graduation should feel different, exceptional. I mostly felt normal.

It was just like everything else our school ever did. It was slightly chaotic and unorganized, but ended in something beautiful, even if it was only beautiful to us. School board officials gave slightly forced speeches, the superintendent gave a genuine one, and students demonstrated why we deserved rented ferns at our graduation. It did represent our school as best as a few short hours could.

But I felt pretty normal. I didn't feel like I was moving from a high school (and college) student to a high school (and college) graduate. I just felt like I was sitting in a gym floor wearing a silly outfit with some friends. Even walking across the stage still seemed like a rehearsal; I couldn't possibly be doing it for real. Maybe we spent too much nostalgia throughout the years to really summon up the emotion on this typically monumental day.

There were really only small, isolated moments where I felt something greater than what I feel every day.

The first came when we walked in and I first saw how many people were occupying the gym's bleachers, packed in like sardines, snapping pictures like paparazzi (fanatical, proud parents are probably the only photographers in the world scarier than paparazzi). I thought how wonderful it was to see all of the people I'd never have to explain what my school was or how I came to this place in my education to in one room. They all just understood; they knew the magnitude of our accomplishments without belabored explanation and questions. They just clapped. I felt happy, but I didn't feel graduated.

The second came while I was reading my short, inconsequential speech. Most of the time, I was just terrified. I didn't look up into the crowd because I had to read and concentrate on keeping my voice from breaking. But then I got to a feeble joke all my classmates would understand and I heard a few tiny laughs from them. Before, it felt like I was just speaking to the wall out of obligation, but then I realized people were actually listening. That sort of sums up all of my high school graduation--sometimes it didn't seem like it, but people were listening. I felt proud, but I didn't feel graduated.

Next, skip to the end of the ceremony. The principal "by the power bestowed upon her by Surry County Schools" or something like that pronounced us graduated, and we turned our tassels. Excitement bubbled up inside me, the kind of excitement that is rare and raw and can't be replicated. I looked around at the cardboard topped faces smiling in rows and knew they felt much the same.

In that one singular moment did I feel truly graduated.

I could post forever about all the little moments and exceptional people that made my school so wonderful, but it just seems unnecessary. I may be graduated, but a little part of me will always be sitting in the T-building waiting for school to start.