Graduation Theme Continued.....

At least this time I'm not bitching about how many ceremonies I did or did not attend. This is a story from when my niece graduated 21 years ago.

I am sure I will get some of the details wrong. It has, after all, been 21 years. And I probably never had them right even back then.

My niece graduated from the same high school I did, which has almost nothing to do with this story.

It rained the night of her graduation, and everyone huddled in the gym waiting for the weather to break or some announcement to be made. Apparently the powers that be hadn't really planned for weather so bad that it would actually CANCEL an OUTSIDE graduation. Everyone just stood inside, milling around and filling the gym with hot air and body odor. I don't think there was an official Plan B.

After what seemed like an extremely long time but may have only been minutes, the superintendent finally decided the weather was too bad for an outside graduation and that it would be postponed until Saturday night. I heard but do not have direct knowledge that he told the principal to make the announcement, and then he (the superintendent) went home.

The poor principal did as he was told and announced that graduation would be held on Saturday night. There were loud groans of protests, probably a few boos, and a general uproar.

Then we noticed something strange. The graduating seniors had lined themselves up anyway and were MARCHING ONTO THE FIELD. They proceeded just as they had practiced, forming smart lines and going to their assigned rows. It was patently clear they weren't going anywhere without their diplomas.

The poor principal hesitated for a few minutes, unsure what to do in response to this unprecedented event. He had no one to consult, as the superintendent had (allegedly) gone home.

He didn't know what to do.

But the seniors weren't going anywhere.

So he went out there in the pouring rain and handed out diplomas. I don't even remember if the speeches were made or not. We sat through the whole ceremony in the pouring rain, laughing hysterically and having a grand old time. The seniors had ended their high school careers in epic fashion, with a ceremony that would be talked about for years.

Uh oh. Then the trouble started.

Apparently the problem arose due to the fact that 13 (or so) seniors heard the announcement to go home and come back tomorrow, and THAT'S WHAT THEY DID. They weren't in the mutinous alphabetical line of graduates who marched proudly into the downpour. They were home and dry. And diploma-less.

There was nothing else to do but have graduation AGAIN the next night for those 13 students. And the random ones who weren't headed to the beach whose parents made them come graduate again.

My niece did NOT go back the next night for the second graduation. Many of my family members did, however, just because we thought it was a hoot.

That ceremony lasted about 15 minutes. It was my favorite one ever.

The principal almost lost his job over the whole affair, which I thought was a travesty. He had no support, no superior to advise him, and he did what was probably the safest thing that night by handing those students their diplomas. He was sorely outnumbered by seniors who already had reservations in Daytona Beach and Panama City, and I didn't blame him for doing what he did. The community rallied around him, and eventually it was just something to laugh about.

I think about those two graduations every year at this time.

Sisters and niece, if I have erroneously reported any of this, please leave me a comment and let me know.

Graduation Night.....Times Two.....

This is the one night out of the year when I hate teaching at an alternative-type high school. Before this year there were two nights I hated it.

Our students come from two high schools in the same county, so we feel obligated to attend both graduation ceremonies. One year we even came up with the brilliant idea to have our OWN graduation ceremony TOO, so that year we got to go to THREE of them. Yeah.....no. (That's my new favorite expression, sent by text message to Spravenwriter.)

Previously we have also participated in both graduation ceremonies as if we were teachers there, which was awkward. We knew a few teachers at both schools, because all five of us have some connections to both schools. But the rest of the teachers would be looking at us and at each other, wondering, "Who are these impostors and why are they wearing real teacher-type graduation robes?" It got a little tedious.

After eight years of having separate graduations, someone in the state DOE discovered that......ohmigosh........one of those high schools is only having 179 DAYS OF SCHOOL INSTEAD OF THE REQUISITE 180.

HORRORS!

Never mind that in every high school I've ever known about, seniors generally wrap things up about a week ahead of everyone else. It's not like teachers were grading exams right up to 3:35 today and then sending them out on the field to graduate.

Give me a large personal break.

So the order came down that we had to hold both graduations on the same night. I think one of them COULD have graduated on Saturday, but there would have been an uproar over which school had to wait an extra day, and THOSE parents would have been marching to the board office in loud protest.

Hence two graduations in one night. All the way across town from each other.

We decided our course of action would be to go to the early graduation, see our students before they marched out on the field, give hugs and take pictures, and leave. We met for dinner in between and then went to the OTHER graduation location, where we saw our students before they marched out on the field, gave hugs and took pictures, and left.

Why didn't we think of this sooner?

The students know we were there, we have the pictures to prove it, and we didn't have to sit through one boring ceremony, much less two.

I am very proud of (most of) our graduates, and I truly am delighted in their achievement. But we had approximately 30 graduates at one school and 19 at the other. Why, then, should we have to sit through the entire ceremony, listening to speeches from students we don't know (ours aren't typically the speech-making type....we're just glad they get robes and diplomas), and waiting while 350 students we don't know get their diplomas?

Besides that, graduation ceremonies in our county are NOT dignified. Not by any stretch of the imagination. It's embarrassing the way some of these families act. This year there was even a plane with an advertising banner behind it congratulating one of the graduates.

Seriously?

Maybe some day our county will be able to afford a nice auditorium where both schools can hold graduation on the same night, inside, out of the weather. It poured rain as the students at the early graduation were lining up, but I think the skies cleared just as it was time for them to march out. So that meant the second graduation was merely hot, humid, sticky, and oh yeah...the chairs were wet.

Lord help us if our county ever opens a third high school.

Three of these things to go to?

Yeah........no.

Graduation(s)......

Two graduation ceremonies in two nights............

After 23 years of teaching, all the speeches sound pretty much the same.

Ironically, I also graduated on this date, 31 years ago. If you're trying to calculate my age, you'll come up a year more than I am. I skipped a grade in elementary school, so I had just turned 17 when I graduated.

Instead of a trip to the beach, my BFF Jason and I left at midnight, along with my mother, my eldest sister, and her two children to move her to Dallas, Texas. We drove for 19 hours or forever or something like that. Jason had family in Fort Worth, so we visited there for a couple of days. I think I've told the story before about how we went to his grandmother's house to spend the night. We really were best friends. Fought like brother and sister. His deaf great-grandmother lived there too, and when his grandmother asked Jason which sofa bed to make up for him, he said, "Neither one. We'll sleep together." Jason was fond of the shock factor. When we left the next morning, Jason's great-grandmother gave us a wedding present. I'm sure she assumed that was the only reason two young people of opposite sex would be sleeping in the same bed.

Also on this date, twenty-seven years ago, I got married to Sweet Girl's daddy. We went to Daytona Beach for our honeymoon. Daytona Beach is NOT a good place for a honeymoon.

Hubby also got married once on this date. We had to figure out the date because he didn't know it. He knew the year, and he knew it was a Wednesday, because back then he was off on Wednesdays, and he knew that after the ceremony (?) at the courthouse, he went to the golf course. Is it any wonder THAT marriage didn't last?

Another Sign the Apocalypse is Upon Us.....

Maybe that's a little strong.

I've been known to exaggerate. Once. About a hundred years ago.

You know how at this time of year you see cars all over town with "Senior '09" (or whatever the appropriate year might be) written in them with shoe polish or some stuff made specially for writing on car windows, along with a person's name, perhaps the name or initials of the high school, maybe a dog or cat paw print depending upon which school?

I've seen a few cars like that in the parking lot at our school. A few of them might want to reconsider what year they paint on their cars. I'm just sayin'. I guess they can dream if they want to, but the truth is going to be painfully obvious to them in........oh, about seven days.

I don't know if this is happening everywhere, but among the girls at our tiny little school there is an epidemic of writing their "s's" tipped over on their sides. Sort of like half an infinity sign. Only they're not all the way tipped over. They just look a little drunk. And stupid. The letters, not the girls. Most of the time.

Anyway, the cars of those particular girls just look retarded. It looks like they are proclaiming themselves to be "eniors" with some ridiculous nonsensical decoration in front of that non-word. I've seen people stop and look at their cars, tilt their heads over to see if they can make sense of it, and then just shake their heads and walk away.

When I stopped at the grocery store Monday afternoon, however, I saw a car similarly painted, and it just took the cake.

I don't know when I'll learn to have a camera on hand at all times, like Pioneer Woman, because you just never know when a blog topic might break out. I would love to be able to document this story, because it may sound to some of you like it's too ridiculous NOT to be made up. I promise, I could not make this stuff up.

There was a car painted with the words "graduation" and "09" and "congratulations" and the little princess's name.........and the words "pre-school."

Come on, people.

Seriously?

I really don't remember what the kid's name was, but I am certain that little Kaitlyn/Katelin/Caitlin/Kaitlin/Caitlyn/Catelyn/Catelin/Katelen/Kaitlen/Caitlen/Catelen/Kaytlin/Caytlin does not give a rip about her own graduation from pre-school. And you know it's a girl, because no self-respecting guy paints words on his car windows. At least not his graduation year. There is one guy whom I meet some mornings with the word "FUBAR" painted on his vehicle window. And it is, so you really can't blame him for that. And there was the car I saw at the park today that had the word "Chevy" painted on the back window. I'm guessing he lost the emblem about the same time he acquired one of the many dents and lost a fender in front and the bumper on back and he wants to make sure everyone knows what particular brand his POS car is.

Last spring I caught two of our seniors in the act of writing something on MY car windows with white paint. I have no idea what they were planning to write, since I graduated for the last time five years ago, but they went back inside with their tails tucked between their legs and their ears singed around the edges.

Back to the pre-school graduate. Does she even have a concept of what graduating from pre-school means?

All she cares about is getting out of the damn carseat.

She wants strawberry soda so she can have a red mustache.

She wants Dora the Explorer underwear. (I may be slightly behind on whatever small female children are wearing in underwear these days. Whatever.)

She wants that little brat in her PRE-SCHOOL class to stop pulling her pigtails.

She wants macaroni and cheese for dinner and chocolate pudding for dessert.

I'm guessing the parents are sending out invitations to this graduation. What on earth does one get a four-year-old for graduation? She can only play with so many dolls. She probably already has a laptop that she uses to keep up with her classmates on MySpace. Clearly she already has a car of her own, because NO ONE would proclaim to be the proud parent of a pre-school graduate.

I wonder if she and some of her four-year-old playmates will head on out to Florida following their graduation ceremony. Maybe a cruise to the Bahamas?

I'm trying to picture the post-graduation party. Juice and cookies and gummy bears and a lot of crying. But not the tearful, "I'm gonna miss you I can't believe it's over you've always been my best friend even when I was sleeping with your boyfriend" kind of crying. I'm talking the "I'm coming down from a sugar high and I'm not getting my way and watch me kick my feet and scream and make my face turn beet red and have mucus running down my face" kind of crying.

Poor little pre-schoolers. They have to be prepared to move on to the real world of kindergarten. It's tough out there. Competition for the blue crayon will be fierce. Kindergarten teachers don't always let the right kid lead the line to the cafeteria. Walking down the hall with your finger over your lips is stressful. And they're going to be GRADED. On things like tying their shoes and using scissors. Shudder.

Come on, people. It's pre-school.