Graduation June 2012

Last daughter graduates today. I will hand her the diploma and then she will walk off the stage and out of the house. Well, not that immediately, but accurate enough. I become an empty nester. For the past twenty three years my schedule has been determined by the presence of children in the house who required nurture and care and regular meals. I have learned over the years to do things I did not imagine having to know, and I have become a person twenty three years ago I could not have imagined being. I know that much of what I learned I did not learn from my parents, and yet from them I did learn some of what I have needed to forget.

Today, I think of Malvina Reynold’s song Turn Around:

Turn around and you're two, 

Turn around and you're four,

Turn around and you're a young girl going out of my door

And I think of Harry Chapin’s plaintive lines,

"When ya comin' home son?"
"I don't know when, we'll get together then, Dad
Ya know we'll have a good time then."

But most and maybe first of all I send to my daughter Bob Dylan’s prayer:

May you grow up to be righteous,

May you grow up to be true,

May you always know the truth

And see the lights surrounding you.

May you always be courageous,

Stand upright and be strong,

May you stay forever young. 

I have always hated greeting cards: I considered why pay to let someone else say what I should be able to say. But what I have given my children always are the songs, and for now, they will have to suffice.

Who other than she graduates today? And from what?