Embrace It

Yesterday's Star Exponent Article :

My mom has a lot to do with Highland School’s graduation, so I’ve been reluctantly listening to her ideas and plans for months. Our conversations never cease to remind me of my own graduation day.

I remember not being able to differentiate the feeling of nerves and excitement and I remember walking carefully across the stage praying intently that my wedges would guide me towards my diploma without a haunting face plant.

I wrote a “pretend” graduation speech on a bored afternoon post- graduation. After a quick search through old notebooks, I came across a few messy words dated June 23^rd, 2008.

I wrote, “You are dancing on freedom’s ledge. In just three short summer months you can jump — of course not into familiarity, but into everything you haven’t learned in the past 17 or 18 years.

If high school has only been useful to pass the time, well then it was put to good use. But one day, if it hasn’t yet happened, you will experience education’s power. It may be after that first good book, when you witness the value of words. It may be a math problem you didn’t think you could do: but you did. It may simply be a morning where you walk into class thinking ‘Today I will learn something new.’

You can seek education’s power — or you can wait for it to seek you. You may be 30, 40 or 77 before you even realize that life’s clock is actually ticking, but of course by then you will at least understand not the power of education, but the loveliness of being young.

Yes the power of youth is something you may have learned in high school, its beauty, good metabolism, strong elbows and knees, courage and fearlessness. But of course we probably won’t grasp a complete respect for youth until we are staring into the bathroom mirror at our first gray hairs.

The gray hairs will bring a few moments of reminiscing: Summer days sitting poolside, the loss of a good friend, the excitement of Friday night football games, finding first loves, feeling that first breakup.

And then hopefully you’ll say, ‘Life wasn’t too bad’ or maybe, just maybe, you’ll venture to say it was beautiful, perfect or flawless.

So College Advice: At 21, I still consider myself young, but after two foot surgeries and a few extra pounds, I’m reconsidering the line about “good metabolism, strong elbows and knees.” If I could offer one piece of advice to those graduating high school, I would insist you keep a journal. Jump … fearlessly, and write it all down. You will amaze yourself when you reread what you once knew compared to what you now know.