Graduation Hell

I'm back, for a while at least. Lots of info to spew forth.

I had to attend two graduations this weekend. I've got lots of cousins, and two of them graduated high school this weekend. I don't generally attend cousin-graduations because there's lots of them and I'm not their grandma, but these two are both special cases. I wish I could name the high schools, but I'm still awfully paranoid about my identity. So I'll play little headgames in this preamble.

Graduation #1 was in Smalltown, TX. It's in "Central Texas" twixt Houston and Waco, a short drive from College Station. Single-A school, graduating class of around 30. And for some reason lots of those kids end up going to Texas A&M (the real one). There is a heavy Polish presence in the area.

Graduation #2 was in Largetown, TX. It's outside of San Antonio, pretty big, but not monstrous. The kids there think they live in a small town because they've never been to Smalltown, TX. Kinda like how the Aggies from Houston (population millions) think they went to college in a small town (Bryan-College Station, population 200,000?) because they didn't go to WhereRupeIsFrom, TX (population 3000).

So Smalltown's a 4-hour drive for me, through Darkest Austin. While driving through Austin I imagine that every traffic slowdown is due to a protest. It keeps me grinning, but I never see a hint of tie-dyed t-shirt or red stars. More on the drive in a later post, possibly with pictures.

Both graduations took 1.5 hours. Do that math.
Largetown was quick, quick, quick. The Summa Cum Laude (heh) students actually sit up on the dais with the school board! That shocked me the first time (this cousin's sister's graduation; she was up on the dais). And man they roll those kids through. The class song (more on these in a later post--Yes, all the traveling gave me much writing fodder!) was actually sung, well, by two students. The Star Spangled banner was sung by graduating members of the choir! Well! One guy did a cartwheel! But more on graduation antics later.

Smalltown was like pulling teeth. Smalltown carefully records, with speeches from awarding organizations, each scholarship. Graduation speaker, in this heavily Republican, heavily Aggie town, is some sort of UT Regent Emeritus, a devoted Democrat. More on that speech in a later post. No graduation antics. Lots of talking. On their walk, the students receive their diploma and a bouquet of flowers. The parents (remember, there's not that many of them) are also seated on the football field, and the students deliver the bouquet to the parents, then take their seats. So there's a system, and it really only makes the Walk slightly longer, and it's sweet.

But like my grandpa said, "well, all those people came a long way to see that graduation--gotta stretch it out somehow."