Graduation (...is for other people)

It feels like I have been in training forever. It feels like I will continue to be in training forever. As such, graduation ceremonies--a time of pride and hope and moving forward--secretly make me a little jealous. Nevertheless, graduations are a good opportunity for certain things.

For example: taking pictures of the back of people's heads while they are taking pictures of the back of people's heads while they are taking pictures of the back of people's heads. It's very meta.

Someone had claimed that one of the Wash U deans looks like the father figure from a Disney cartoon. The graduation ceremony was a good chance to verify this fact for myself. 

Verdict: True, indeed.

Sleeping Beauty's King Hubert, to be exact.

It was also a nice chance to get a free bottled water, the custom-printed label of which included a lengthy disclaimer about why the forbidden water bottles were being allowed on campus again just this once.


 Finally, graduations are great because there can never be enough clichés about today being the first day of the rest of your life. Today being the first glimpse beyond the next horizon. Today being the first step on a new journey. Today being possible because the support of others has been the wind beneath your wings, the foundation beneath your dreams, the rocket beneath your shuttle, the red-eyed jaguar statue beneath your Mayan temple, the saucer beneath your tea cup, the whatever beneath your whatever, etc etc etc.

Today is the beginning of a winding path into the future.