Got a Happy Story is a community gathering every Monday night where we share stories large and small that have put a smile on our face. It is a time to acknowledge the joy and wonder we experience. The Happy Story diary exists as a way to anchor the community in hope and comfort while we do the hard work of taking back our country. Everyone and all sorts of stories and pictures are welcome. May we find joy and strength here.
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Earlier this week, I took great joy in attending a small graduation ceremony.
Really, really small.
My youngest godson graduated from Pre-K this week.
This is a small town. It was a small class. The gathering was small.
The ceremony took place in a side room of the local Presbyterian Church, which provides the secular Pre-K program to the community. And even with parents, grandparents, a few friends (and godparents), the room wasn't half-full with warm bodies. What it was filled to overflowing with was heart, hope, and... potential.
Ten four-year-olds entered -- in wee little caps and gowns, to the stately "Pomp and Circumstance" -- and lined up in front of a string of life-size cut-outs of themselves. They had made these by lying on paper while their classmates traced their outlines. The teacher then cut them out, and each kid painted his or her own outline. The ten cut-outs were as different as the ten kids standing in front of them.
I had a hard time picking out (let's call him) Ian. I finally located him by process of elimination.
The day before the ceremony, Ian was discovered taking a pair of scissors to his hair. He had wonderful, long blond hair. Well, it's still wonderful and blond. Long? Not so much. When his folks quickly asked just what he thought he was doing with those scissors, Ian stood there with his hands on his hips and announced that he had to have "a very handsome haircut" because he'd be wearing a gown. Ian has never been concerned about his hair, even when he's occasionally been mistaken for a girl (he just writes off those who make that mistake as daft), but I suppose having to wear a gown took things one step farther than he was willing to tolerate.
So both he and his brother, Ethan, got Very Handsome Haircuts and Ian was very proud to get all dressed up... which to him meant a tucked-in shirt and a belt. This is a kid who lives in baggy jeans or shorts and hand-me-down shirts, so it was a really big deal to get all fancy.
The unexpected result of the haircut was that when he got to school, the teacher didn't recognize him. Nor did his schoolmates. Even his grandparents, who'd driven up from Florida, arriving a scant fifteen minutes before the ceremony, didn't recognize him. It wasn't just the haircut: it's how much Ian has grown since they left for the winter in September.
Ian learned a great deal this year: to write and recognize most of his letters and numbers; the days of the week (he just informed his folks last week that there are seven days in a week); what his phone number is; and how to write and recognize his own name.
But the most impressive thing Ian's brilliant and remarkably dedicated teacher (despite working for the paltry salary that is all the church can afford) taught all the kids is how to be independent. Her goal each year is to put responsibility foremost in the kids' minds. It's up to them to hang up their own coats, go to the bathroom on their own (if they're ready for it), wash their hands when they're dirty, set the table, and clean up afterward. This way when they move across the street to the "Big School" (K through 12, and only around a hundred and twenty students), they're well prepared to handle themselves in this new, more mature environment.
With tears in her eyes, she said she knew she'd accomplished her goal, because "these kids don't need me any more."
Ian is a dreamy kid, one who's eyes constantly search, seek, find, and file away information. Robert Benchley once wrote, "My attention can be held only by strapping me down to a cot and sitting on my chest. Even then my eyes wander." That's Ian all over. It can give the impression that he's not paying attention -- especially when he's not paying attention -- but often he's just doing his version of multi-tasking. When the kids sang "I Don't Want to Live on the Moon," Ian simply dropped out at the bridge and yawned: definitely a kid who has his own unselfconscious rhythm, and a mind that's always working on something mechanical. When his mind takes flight, he lets it go where it wants. And while some might find that annoying or a cause for concern, I've seen him in action: a budding mechanical genius always looking at details around him and (I'm sure) making notes.
The teacher wrote a poem for each of the kids, and read them as she presented each with their diploma. In the middle of reciting her poem for Ian -- how he's always curious and looking around at other things -- the Short Subject in question interrupted her, pointed to something nearby, and announced that there was a Lego piece on the floor over there. (In fact, it had fallen out of his brother Ethan's pocket. Some day these kids will build a working space station out of Lego, and launch it into orbit.) The teacher had a good laugh over Ian suiting his action to her word, and continued unfazed.
The kids finished up by singing "This Little Light of Mine" -- accompanied by all those in attendance -- and then, on cue, the young graduates put on star-shaped sunglasses and were told to move their tassels to the other side of their mortarboards. Everyone complied, except Ian, who was distracted by something else that had him fascinated. The teacher grinned, and moved it over for him.
As a final blow to all of us who were just barely holding on to our emotions, the teacher played a slide show of the year in class, interspersed with photos of the kids from infancy to the present. Well... that was it for everyone there. Some woman yelled out, "This is like a wedding -- where are the darned tissues?!" As we all laughed, and I was busy wiping my eyes on my sleeves, someone tapped me on the back and handed me a tissue. It was a great friend of mine, there for her granddaughter's graduation. She's a real tough cookie, this one: all gruff talk and sarcasm, funny as hell and hard as granite. But there she was, all red eyes and runny nose. We had a good laugh and cry together.
What surprised and impressed me most was when the kids came back out, sans gowns and mortarboards, Ian went not to his parents but to his big (eight-year-old) brother. He hugged him and began seriously telling Ethan everything that had just gone on, even though Ethan had attentively witnessed it all, he listened carefully, as though he hadn't seen a thing. He let his younger brother enjoy reliving it in the telling of it, occasionally adding a point or asking a question, with all the calm patience of a grown man. They're a heck of a pair, those two.
There's a double-edged poignancy to these events. Reminds you of all the cliches -- how fragile life is, how quickly time passes, how many things can go wrong in a good kid's life. And how we were all that age once, and the attendant memories, good or bad.
As I said at the beginning, this is a tiny town. In all likelihood, if I am lucky, I will see these kids grow into adults. And I hope they will carry the lessons of this year with them every step of the way, and not stray into trouble or darkness.
And I can't help being impressed by their teacher's most powerful and persistent lesson of this year:
"You get what you get,
and you're not upset."
This simple statement is the antithesis of the phrases I loathe hearing: "But I deserve it." "It's not fair." "I earned it." It's the healthy counterpoint to the pervasive sense of entitlement that is so prevalent these days.
We all get what we get. What we do with it, now that we're our own people... well, it's a bit difficult to adhere to that last part about not being upset sometimes. But then, most of us didn't learn that inestimable lesson as early in life as Ian and his classmates.
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Have you got a happy story to share with us tonight? We'd love to hear about it.