My First Pomp and Circumstance

(Wow. I'm surprised I just remembered my login password.)

I'm going through pictures tonight (what else is new) and looked at Grant's graduation pictures for the first time.

He starts kindergarten in the fall, and graduated from preschool a week (or two-ish?) ago.

We went to dinner before the ceremony, and Grant knew that there was a nicer change of clothes in the van waiting for him; that his shorts and t-shirt would not be acceptable.

He looked Cannon up and down and asked, "Is he going to wear that Wolverine shirt to my graduation? He IS NOT going to look very handsome. I want him to change."

Right.

Anyway, I was very excited for him and happy and "maybe I'll cry maybe I won't". Everyone was dressed a little nicer than usual and we fought to get Cannon to stay in a metal folding chair and not embarrass us too badly with his horrendous two/three year old behavior. Josh and I had determined who would man the video camera (him) and who would man the camera (me) and who would man-handle Cannon (him).

I could hear shuffling behind the big white screen that separated the parents from the kids.

And then someone hit play on (what I can imagine was) a boom box and THE processional march echoed throughout the room via a microphone. Cameras were aimed high and I could hear the buzzing start of nine thousand over-priced video cameras above the music.

I stayed in my seat.

I didn't squirm up and raise my camera.

I froze for a second. I watched the teacher motion a signal for about 40 four year olds to start the walk they all practiced.

It hit me so unexpectedly.

My throat tightened up, my lip quivered, my eyes welled, and I could feel the silent cry coming hard.

It was so unexpected.

It was the first time in my life that I sat in a room for a graduation ceremony that played Pomp and Circumstance.


It was the first time I had ever HEARD that song.

Of course I am familiar with the song. From movies and, hell, I don't know. General knowledge I guess.

But as I sat there listening to the crappy recorded rendition of that piece and anxiously watching a white curtain for my first born son to round it (complete with a blue Made in China felt "mortarboard"), I couldn't hold back tears.

I was embarrassed. That it appeared I was crying over a preschool graduation. But it was more than that to me. It was monumental.

We didn't have graduation ceremonies when I was in preschool and kindergarten. I graduated high school when I was 17, joined the Army, and was at my second training school by the time my high school class took the stage.

I chipped away at college courses and professional development courses over the last twelve years but I will probably never participate in an actual ceremony-ish graduation ceremony, even after I finish what I started.

I'm not sad about what I haven't experienced. I was just, in that moment, shocked at what I haven't experienced.

And overwhelmed that my first time sitting in a metal folding chair and hearing the march was for Grant.

My son.

Who worked so hard at school and is so proud of himself for completing something.

And now, I can't hear that damn song without being immediately brought to tears.




Grant- I am really so very proud of you.

{paragraph deleted because I can't publish it through my mushy gushy tears}

And YOU so are amazing. I just love you.

PS: Pictures with me not included because A) I was manning the camera, remember and B) I didn't realize then exactly how busted up my face looked with stitches and green bruising. Cannon actually took a pretty well-composed picture of Josh, Grant and I, but I seriously look scary. So I won't post it.

PPS: The stitches were from me slipping in the shower at my mom's house, falling sideways OUT of the shower and cracking my head on the toilet. Glamorous, no? Our first Colorado vacation in three years resulted in another trip to the ER.