Status: Updates every other day.
Keeping On
Graduate
A lot of things happened in my senior year of high school. I won’t go off on tangents here, but I’ll just say that it was a breath of fresh air to get my diploma that spring.
I stood in an alphabetically-ordered line backstage in the school auditorium, draped in a black gown. The cap, adorned with a green and white tassel to match my school’s colors, kept falling off thanks to my thick hair that I constantly had to push out of my eyes. Underneath the gown, I was stuck in a button-up shirt and tie and slacks, as if I couldn’t suffocate any further.
It would be worth it, though. Even though the prospect of college was terrifying, it would be so satisfying to walk across that stage and hold the fruit of my mandatory labor over the years.
Tegan was further down the line than I was, since her last name was Thompson. I turned back and waved to get her attention, and she gave me two thumbs up.
The University of Chicago would be calling our names when summer ended, and we were already on the lookout for summer jobs. A few more months stuck in the outskirts of Chicago wouldn’t kill us, and God knows I wasn’t looking forward to being alone in a crowd again, but I think I always sort of knew that it would play out like that.
And after waiting for half of my class to walk across the stage, I got my slice of the pie. It was a tiny little placard in a black leather-bound frame, fitting perfectly into my big hands.
When they called my name, I heard the same voice that cheered me on at little league games years ago, and across the auditorium, I saw my dad standing up from his seat. He had his hands cupped around his mouth to amplify the tiny voice that only rose in trying times. Tegan’s mom was standing too, along with Andy and Mick, a few of the friends we had made recently.
I guess I didn’t always need reassurance that Dad was proud of me. Somehow he did that all on his own, without even using words sometimes. It was the little things and the big things all tying together that let me know that I was doing alright.
I stood in an alphabetically-ordered line backstage in the school auditorium, draped in a black gown. The cap, adorned with a green and white tassel to match my school’s colors, kept falling off thanks to my thick hair that I constantly had to push out of my eyes. Underneath the gown, I was stuck in a button-up shirt and tie and slacks, as if I couldn’t suffocate any further.
It would be worth it, though. Even though the prospect of college was terrifying, it would be so satisfying to walk across that stage and hold the fruit of my mandatory labor over the years.
Tegan was further down the line than I was, since her last name was Thompson. I turned back and waved to get her attention, and she gave me two thumbs up.
The University of Chicago would be calling our names when summer ended, and we were already on the lookout for summer jobs. A few more months stuck in the outskirts of Chicago wouldn’t kill us, and God knows I wasn’t looking forward to being alone in a crowd again, but I think I always sort of knew that it would play out like that.
And after waiting for half of my class to walk across the stage, I got my slice of the pie. It was a tiny little placard in a black leather-bound frame, fitting perfectly into my big hands.
When they called my name, I heard the same voice that cheered me on at little league games years ago, and across the auditorium, I saw my dad standing up from his seat. He had his hands cupped around his mouth to amplify the tiny voice that only rose in trying times. Tegan’s mom was standing too, along with Andy and Mick, a few of the friends we had made recently.
I guess I didn’t always need reassurance that Dad was proud of me. Somehow he did that all on his own, without even using words sometimes. It was the little things and the big things all tying together that let me know that I was doing alright.
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And that's a wrap! Thanks for reading! :D