Graduation, or, It's Complicated.

Yesterday, I went to a friend's graduation.
I was singing in the choir. Despite the worst rehearsal I've ever had, we did well when it counted.
Of course, because a few dozen people can't leave and enter large rooms stealthily, we stayed in there the entire time. Mostly it was people I didn't know. But I am friends with one of them, and watching her and her parents cry on stage made my eyes well up. Partly because I am empathetic, partly because I love her, and partly because I knew what was coming the next day.
When I got on stage with her I squeezed her so tight.
When I got home, it felt like Christmas Eve. This nervous anticipation, only bigger because I hadn't been waiting a year for Christmas. I had been waiting my life to graduate.
Today, I attended my own graduation.
A friend and I sang a song. For Good, from the musical Wicked. Esther was Galinda, and I was Elphaba, if you care. Before we even started singing, I cried.
I started crying at home on Thursday. Because I was so happy and so sad and so scared.
I made the mistake of saying that I would say goodbye to my friends and I cried. I had to correct it to "signing their yearbooks" to avoid further tears.

I was happy and excited, yet calm, as I waited in the aisle to  limp my way to the stage. We pledged our allegiance to the American flag. And as I sat down, I saw Lisa. She has been a mother figure to me for over ten years. She is one of the dearest people in my heart, and there she was in the audience beaming at me as only she can beam. I was so happy that she was there that I started tearing up and waving at my face how girls wearing mascara always do. I put my hand over my lips and chin, the way I do when i'm almost crying.
The principal gave a lovely speech and I realized that of all the graduation speeches I've heard, this one was meant for me. I was the recipient. I was old enough that these words were literally written for the girls I was sitting with, and myself.
I looked and I saw my friends sitting down. So proud of me. And Lisa, so proud of me. And Julie and Susie and Nathan and Dan....so proud of me. And I was so happy I cried.
Then I had to sing.
Because I had the second half of the song, I had Esther's verse to get myself together. I closed my eyes and breathed deeply and tried to stare at a wall. I felt this peace wash over me (I now wonder if someone prayed when they saw me struggling) and was able to open my eyes. Before I knew it, I heard "...changed...for good." and the six notes that cued me. First I sang staring at a wall, mostly for vocal reasons. That is, "pretend you're just singing to practice" reasons. But as I got comfortable, I started to look around. I saw Lisa again, and Brittany, and of course, Esther. I started to think about how Kelly had introduced the song. "As Laura and Esther were thinking of a song to sing, they felt that the lyrics of this one really applied to how they feel about each other and the School Program". I started to think about how these people I had met had affected me. And so, I was able to sing, "I do believe I have been changed for the better" with a full, strong meaning, but not a full strong voice. Around the word better, I had to actually stop singing because I was crying. I have never meant words more.

Throughout the ceremony, I cried. On and off, of course. When, in Mariko's speech, she talked about the meaning of my name, my character, and the fact that I am a champion on her heart. When in Mrs. Mann's speech she mentioned how I talked to her about my insecurities (last year in choir, I spoke to her about how terrified I was about singing in front of people). Often when I just thought of my friends out there. Making hearts at me with their hands.

I  have never, in my entire life, felt something so bittersweet. I never knew what that truly felt like until today. So strongly bitter, yet so strongly sweet.

After the ceremony, talking about leaving made and makes me cry. I can't just leave Annie and Brittany and Corri and Hannah and the other Hannah and Scott and Rachel and...and...and...everyone behind. They are what made this day so bittersweet. Finishing high school? Good riddance, learning. (that was a joke). But leaving behind my friends? That's something else.

I didn't get a chance to put my handprint on the wall. Now I feel like I'm going to be forgotten. That is all I have to say about that.

Guys, what do you do after high school? I think I'm an adult now. I think I'm supposed to move on, but I don't know where I'm going. I have goals for this year. Maybe I will just follow those and try to stay in touch as much as I can. What do you do?

Another reason for tears was fear. Fear of forgetting. Fear of being forgotten. I'm afraid everything will be the same without me, and I'm afraid that it won't be. I'm worried that I won't be able to be there for my ducklings, and I'm worried that they don't need me anyway. It's weird.

Tonight, talking outside about today, I felt so strange. It feels like it didn't even happen, but of course it did. There are pictures, there is video.

I'm an adult now. Not just a "technically 18" adult, but a "not in high school" adult.

I feel like being an adult pushed me out of the box that is my school and cut me off. I know I'm not any more grown up than I was a week ago, but I still feel this way. I know my friends have open arms, but I still feel this way.

Dan says it takes a few days for it to stop feeling so confusing and sad. He used a word in his sentence. It rhymes with Goose and it made me cry. Because Annie's name rhymes with goose. And Annie isn't graduating.

To be able to look offstage and see this whole horde of people that I am totally convinced love me was incredible. The spatterings throughout the audience, the Lisa's, were something. But when I looked to my left, I saw an army of my dearest friends. Beaming at me. It was so beautiful.

Leaving makes me sad.
Being done with school makes me happy.
Growing up makes me scared.
Being showered in love makes me cry.

Guys, I am not even kidding, I love you so much. You are what made me cry. I feel so strongly about each of you individually. From Elsa to Esther. You are all so special to me. You mean the whole world to me. I love you individually, and collectively you all make me so happy and so proud. I just love you all so much.

Response Paper 3: Deviance

I am a goody-two-shoes. There's a part of me that feels very rebellious, but the rest of me knows better. My “rebellion” extends to listening to 90's punk bands and thinking about doing things. If I break a rule, it's because I think that a) I have a good reason to, and/or b) I won't upset an authority figure. I have always been that kid. I feel that if I get less than the highest possible grade on any assignment I have personally failed my teachers. They are authority figures, I did something bad, and I should feel bad. I also feel incapable of being deviant. If I have no respect for someone in authority, I will argue with and possibly disobey them, but that is the exception to who I am. I am not deviant. I have difficulty believing that a car can move without my seatbelt being buckled. It's kind of a strange kink of who I am. I will talk about doing rebellious things, but unless I am given the green light by someone in authority, I will rarely do those things. My kind of thrilling deviancy is walking on the grass. You aren't supposed to do that, you know.

When I got this assignment, I actually gasped. Out loud. I would never dream of taking anyone's seat, and I knew that I was having ankle surgery during the time we would be working on these papers, which complicates tall building escapades. This left me with imagining it, or using my hands to eat something. I chose the latter. I found it so devilishly exciting, because I am so profoundly vanilla. It is worth noting that I hate having things on my hands. I love me some french fries, but eating them means rubbing my fingers on my jeans to get the salt off. It drives me crazy. When I was very young I would tentatively play in the mud, and then run inside, frowning, to my mom, hold my hands out, say “dirty!”, and wait for her to clean them. All this added to my excitement to eat something with my hands. Most people don't do that, you know.

The night before I had talked to my sister about my plans, “I'm going to eat pancakes or something with my HANDS! Isn't that crazy?” as I grinned and told her of my planned deviancy, I started to realize how silly it was to get worked up about eating with my hands. How silly it is that someone my age considers syrupy fingers deviant and exciting.

So Easter Sunday, post-surgery, I wheeled into an IHOP with some devilish smirk on my face. Everyone was looking at me, because I was in a wheelchair. Some people kept looking as I very excitedly discussed Portal 2. But slowly, most of them started to look away, onto their own breakfasts or a child making noise. After our food arrived, I almost immediately had to explain myself to my breakfast date. I am completely transparent when I'm up to something. “Ok! So, I....nevermind.” I wanted to keep it a secret and get his response, but of course I suck at that. Some skeptical prodding led to me finally admitting that I had to be deviant for a class and was going to eat my french toast with my hands and wasn't that so crazy? The official response from my companion was a laugh and an eye roll. I tore my french toast into small pieces and dipped them into syrup. The whipped cream and berries caused me wide eyes and giggles because I had to directly touch things that were “messy”. Again, I received smirks from the other side of the table.

We continued talking as we ate, and I tried to surreptitiously observe anyone's reactions to me. Before I did this experiment, I assumed that everyone in the entire world would stare at me. Because who does something so crazy? Eating with your hands. Ridiculous. I looked around for evidence of that, and found the woman seated at the booth next to our table was giving me a disgusted look. Because I have poor impulse control, I loudly and immediately said, “I think that chick hates me.” in order to freak her out and/or make her stop looking. However, further investigation proved that that was just her face, and she was probably looking at me because I kept looking at her.

At the time, our server also seemed a little off-put by my shenanigans. However, looking back on it, I think I was just projecting my own feelings of doing something strange and being afraid of people confronting me.

Other than the wheelchair, I did one other thing that got me many more strange looks than eating without utensils. I stared out the window for a couple of minutes. People started to glare at me. No one was even sitting where I was looking. Why they cared about this, and not my attempt to be deviant, I will never know.

I had expected this assignment to be a great lesson in human behavior, and why innocuous things are considered deviant. For example, there is no law enforcing silverware use, but it is extremely strange for an adult to eat many food items with their hands. I was quite surprised that no one cared, but I think that had a lot to do with the fact that out at an IHOP on Easter Sunday, everyone had bigger things on their mind. Another thing that is frowned upon in society is staring at people who are behaving oddly, and so it is possible that some people noticed and discussed my behavior, but were just stealthy about it. I think that this would have turned out to be a little bit more enlightening if I hadn't told people beforehand that I would be doing this. But in my defense, I assumed everyone on earth would care, judge, and give me things to write about. I was also super excited about being “bad”, if only for an hour or so.

Despite the lack of response by my my fellow restaurant patrons, I did find this very eye-opening. Talking in elevators and eating without “proper” utensils are not inherently bad. They aren't wrong. They're just different. This means that the fact that my sister's boyfriend eats pizza with a knife and fork isn't bad, just different. I think it's weird. But why? It can be a messy food. I have just been socialized differently, and that isn't bad. Another implication of this assignment that I found was that I have no reason to not do some things. So why not talk to cashiers, or change seats? Being deviant is not always the same as being “bad”. If I'm not breaking any laws or moral code, then it is only my self-conscious, goody-two-shoes attitude that is stopping me from walking on grass and climbing trees and having adventures. Because when you are that strange way that I am, adventures can be found in things like french toast.