It’s that time of year where graduations are everywhere. High schools and colleges, even pre-schools have graduations now. Actually, pretty much any level of education these days owns the opportunity to recognize individuals making it through another compulsory year of academic trials and tribulations.

Which brings me to my high school graduation. It wasn’t some momentous life-altering occasion where I waxed nostalgic and feared the future. I welcomed my graduation with open arms because of the need to explore what was beyond the confines of my one cop town, not because I actually hated high school.

See, High School and I were fast friends. We had a wonderful relationship. It treated me pretty well and I didn’t complain too much. No real attachment on either side. It was what every casual relationship should be: hassle-free with as little emotional investment as possible.

Me being in a casual relationship with High School. Little emotional investment.

A hassle-free moment… me teaching line dancing to our High School Spanish teacher (even though I took German)

It also helped that two of my siblings had blazed a trail of success in their wake. And though that set a rather high academic and behavioral bar that I had no intention of hitting,  it also greased my teachers’ expectations enough to allow me infinite hall passes and a bit more lenience when  I inevitably did or said something stupid. (Thanks, Siblings!) I also kind of had an “in” with the Vice Principal thanks to Darewood (you totally know that’s why we became friends, right?).

Oh Darewood!!! Thank God your dad was the VP – the catalyst of our enduring friendship.

But even though we had a pretty great relationship, when it was time for High School and I to part ways, there were no tears to shed or hints of regret eaking in. There was no wallowing in “but these are the best years of my life” moments.  Hell, if the best years of my life were going to be at the ages of 16, 17 or 18, then life has an exceptionally cruel sense of humor.

The bottom line about graduating was that I was ready and elated. It was time to move on and that was exciting to me, not scary and sad. Like I said, I didn’t hate high school. I just used it to my advantage and left it in bed without so much as a phone call the next day. I wasn’t going to miss it like some people (i.e. those still showing up at every home football game in their letter jackets at the age of 23 — you know who you are). And though I thoroughly enjoyed most of the people I went to school with, and firmly believe to this day that I was part of one of the best classes to ever grace the hallowed halls of Fairfield Jr.-Sr. High School, I was totally ready to say good-bye and start the next chapter.

I wanted to love graduation and not be saddened by it. So when it came to prepare for our final bow, I was all in. You only live once. I joined the senior or rather the graduation choir. That’s a big deal for me because I’m tone deaf (which can probably be confirmed by the lucky few who got stuck next to me on the risers at the ceremony). I think the tile in my shower hates me for belting solo renditions of anything Madonna produced in the latter part of the 1980s. But hey, I wanted to partake. I wanted to be a joiner in those last few weeks of school. I tried to have conversations with people that I normally didn’t get to have a conversation with. I thanked my teachers. I put my affairs in order and participated to the best of my ability.

I don’t remember too much about the actual event. I do remember sitting on uncomfortable folding chairs in the middle of the gym floor for a really long time while whoever spouted whatever cliché insights should be spouted to 18 year olds about to attack the big White Whale we call adulthood.

I remember the senior choir getting to sing some Green Day, which was a pretty big feat in 1998 in the rural uber conservative parts of Northern Indiana. Kudos to whichever classmates got approval for that one.

I do remember shaking our principal’s hand for the last time.

So this was totally rehearsed btw.

The most memorable and laughable moment by far was when our entire class was forced to stand and face our friends and families, taking the lyrics of Friends Are Friends Forever that had been carefully placed on our seats, to croon the sickly schmaltzy song whilst holding onto our neighbor like it was a Hands Across America repeat performance.

Yep, singing to the very friends and family who had already sat through a rather painful hour and a half of pomp and circumstance only to be serenaded by eighty-odd off-key teens taking the sentimental diddy to a whole other level of unacceptable. People cried. No, they ugly cried. It’s like our school and Michael W. Smith conspired to move the audience and graduates to feel the feels they had at the end of Schindler’s List all over again. So wrong on so many levels.

However, I didn’t cry. I smiled wider than ever before as I sang each cheesy word knowing this was the last thing the institution was ever going to be able to make me do. I found our nice casual relationship was suddenly bordering on Clingy Ex territory. It just didn’t seem like it was going to let go, and then finally, it did. It was over and people were still ugly crying but they were hugging and wishing each other well.

That was the last day I saw a fair amount of my classmates. Some of them I’d been to school with since Kindergarten, but it was ok. I enjoyed them while they were there, while we shared classes together, hit puberty together, failed miserably at magazine sales together and we were all going to take that next big step onto something greater than high school together.

All 80 something of us in our cap and gown glory. The Fairfield Jr.-Sr. class of 1998

Experiences like graduation shouldn’t make us sad about what’s ending. They should make us thrilled about what’s to come. 17 years later hasn’t changed my view on that whatsoever. Enjoy it while you’ve got it and happily move on when it’s time to go.

So, what was your high school graduation experience like?