The truth is that it doesn't really feel like an end. These things are not distinctly black and white. It's not like one day I'm in college and the next day I'm not. I've been gearing up for this all semester, and I still have a final to study for and all these commencement ceremonies and then moving out of the apartment. It'll be several weeks more before I leave Champaign-Urbana, and even so, I'll be back. In reality, life is more accurately respresented as a continual process of change. Where school really ends and summer really begins is pretty much a blur.
Still, they make a big ceremonial deal out of this time of life. What do they call these sorts of landmarks? "Coming-of-age" or something. I guess everybody needs their symbolism to feel like they are making some kind of progress through life.
I recently attended an awards reception for people who will be graduating with honors. They are going to engrave all of our names on a bronze tablet that hangs in the hallway of the main library. It means that our GPAs were in the top 3% of our graduating class, which I gather is determined by college. While standing there trying to balance glasses of lemonade and plates of appetizers, I couldn't help wondering what it is that all of us have in common to have gotten such consistently high grades, because I can guarantee you that it's not hard work and dedication or even intelligence. I mean, that's not to say that we aren't smart or don't work hard, because we do, but I'm sure we're not the hardest working or the smartest. The hardest working are the ones who get B's, because they care but they're not smart enough to get high grades without trying, so they develop a great work ethic. The smartest ones realize the truth that grades don't matter, so they refuse to let the grades run their lives. The bronze tablet winners are more likely just the most perfectionist, obedient, and obsessed. The speech the Chancelor made did not pick up on this, and was mainly trying to impress upon us, by evidence from past statistics, that we would be the ones to go out and change the world. It was meant to be inspirational, I guess, but it felt empty to me. I wonder what I would come up with to say at a graduation speech... Could I do a better job? I wonder if that Chancelor got good grades when he was in college. What do chancelors of universities do anyway?
Ahh,
