NO MORE TEACHER'S DIRTY LOOKS

Last Thursday, my wife & I attended our sixth family graduation -- but we have only one child.

Sounds like one of those "logic" riddles, like A father and son are rushed to a hospital after a car crash. The boy is about to be treated first, when the surgeon says, "Oh my God, this is my son!" How can this be?

If you have school-age offspring, especially in New York, that's probably harder to figure out than our situation. Because these days, when any achievement is cause for celebration lest children spiral into the Zoloft diet, graduation ceremonies are held at the end of pre-school, kindergarten, grade school, middle-school, high school, and -- finally! -- college. 

A candid shot backstage at graduation.

Unlike the previous five, however, last week's event wasn't mandatory. Our daughter even wanted to skip the event in favor of a nice lunch with us. We let her know that her sacrifice was unnecessary. Or, closer to our actual reply, Look, kid, we shelled out a shitload of dough for your education -- you're walking across that goddamn stage whether you like it or not. Her tenacity, however, was admirable.

We arrived 15 minutes before showtime, but it appeared that 90% of the audience had camped out the night before, giving them the best seats, and us a literally birds-eye view. We wouldn't even know if that was really our kid crossing the stage, or if she paid someone to take her place. 

Since our last name is in the first half of the alphabet, I figured my wife and I -- or at least I -- could clear out early on for a mimosa, and catch our daughter as she exited the ceremonies. But since that kind of rational thinking is probably condemned as "alphabetical privilege" now, there was, instead, no rhyme or reason as to how the graduates were called to stage.

My choice of commencement speakers.

By the time they got to the half-way point -- 350 grads by then, with no sign of daughter -- I was regretting that we didn't take her up on her original offer. To make things worse, they didn't even have a celebrity give the commencement address. Other schools this season had Michael Keaton, Tim Cook, Oprah Winfrey, Queen Latifah, Josh Groban, and, of course, Hillary Clinton, who will probably complain to the Yale grads how she was denied her rightful place in the White House for the zillionth time: "My only piece of advice going forward is to blame everybody else for your own obvious failures."

Ninety per-cent through the ceremony, I was still daydreaming about the mimosa when my wife elbowed me and whispered, "There she is!" Unlike me, she had been attentive enough to hear the first syllable of our daughter's name called out; I woke up in time to hear her last name mispronounced. And we could only hope that figure walking across the stage really was the same girl we raised for all these years.

Pay no attention to that monstrous hand resting
atop our daughter's shoulder.

People asked me if I was going to be emotional when this time arrived. And my answer was always, "No. This is what's supposed to happen. If it didn't, then I'd cry." 

Not that I didn't feel something inside. Some things -- love, pride, happiness, relief. She made it. We made it. College paid off, no loans to worry about. What's to cry about? I didn't even get choked up at hearing "Pomp & Circumstance", probably because it was so difficult to hear over the din from the audience. Graduation ceremonies these days, at least at our school, are more rally than solemn.

My wife, too, held up quite admirably. It was only after lunch, when we waited at the local bus stop so we could return to our Airbnb, did her emotional side appear. As we said our goodbyes, her tears, which had been held in check throughout the day, at last arrived. And, if my memory isn't playing tricks on me, she had the same reaction at the pre-school graduation 18 years ago. You think she'd have gotten used to this by now.

At least back then, she had the comfort of knowing that our daughter would return home with us afterwards. This time, we were going in opposite directions. Next week, she embarks on a cross-country drive with a friend, before working and travelling up the West coast before coming back East in November -- the longest we will have gone without seeing her. 

Hey, that's life. Her life. And with a little luck, it'll only get better from there.

And if you're still wondering about that "logic" riddle about the auto accident... unlike his son, the surgeon was wearing his seatbelt, and thus survived the accident without a scratch, making him able to report to work per usual. It doesn't take a college education to figure that out, right?

                                                    ***************