Graduation Day

It was a bright, beautiful spring day the day I graduated from the home of the Comets. Not your typical damp spring day, but one with abnormally high temperatures with the sun beating down on the senior class as we scampered around outside for our special picnic. It was a day most of us had been anticipating for years and years. I woke up late just to be sure I could get my last few minutes of extra sleeping-in time on my last day of high school. I believe Tom picked me up that day and drove us into the student parking lot for one of my last times.

The senior class put on a slide show of our memories from middle and high school. Some of the pictures were atrocious, not realizing Emma Kelley took initiative to send some from our friend group, haha. The laugh was nice, and for the rest of the day I don't particularly remember what the senior class was up to. We may have attended our last few classes, but eventually we were summoned to the gymnasium which was transformed into a ceremonial celebration.

There were exact amounts of chairs to seat the class of 2013 as we figured out where our specific chair was posted. All my life I was bound to sit between Korina Fehrman and Jake Foss, the teen mom and the class nerd. And who was to guess I was to walk down the aisle with Jordan Grenlie, the guy everyone proclaimed as my soul mate in middle school. I looked around me and noticed how different everyone was since the last time I was surrounded by them. I wasn't sitting next to any of my friends, but rather next to people I grew up with, became used to, and built a sort of connection with that is indefinitely irreplaceable. These people were my life whether I had sleepovers with them or didn't see their face for four years of high school, we were all connected in that single moment in time.

Our rather new principal was babbling to us in a microphone about how graduation would progress. For the first time in history we were having graduation at night in the middle of the work week. Not many of us were happy about this decision since it resulted in many of our family members not being able to attend, but we went along with it anyway, because what choice did we have really? So we sat and listened to our lame principal speak to us and tell us not to pull on the strings that connected the ceiling full of blue and white balloons. A few people in my class decided it was extremely silly of us not to have preformed a traditional senior prank, so they secretly told everyone to set their alarms on sound for 2 o'clock. The joke didn't have any effect at all on what was going on. We are lame.

We were let out of school early to attend a picnic by the track concession stand. My friends and I thought it was lame so we walked out to the concessions to grab a hamburger and cookie for on our way to a new adventure. Sarah, Marisa, Bruno, and I headed back towards Sarah's car to go to my house to find some swim suits and towels; we were on our way to Whispering Pines. We found Christie in the parking lot and managed to pack all of us into Sarah's car like sardines in the back seat. Bruno was basically sitting on top of me and Christie was squishing him closer if it was even possible. We jammed out to some intense UK Dubstep I gave Sarah on a burned CD a while ago.

We piled into my house and I think it was the first time Bruno was there. It was funny because we were all changing in different bathrooms/rooms and my parents had no idea what was going on! We left quickly and headed to Marl Lake to catch the first dip of freedom. We were skeptical of the cold, blue water but jumped in anyway, what did we have to lose? With the sun beating down, we felt invincible. No one wanted to get their hair wet before graduation except Bruno and I. It was his first time there so I obviously made him swim across the lake with me to the other dock. We sat on the dock together and dried off, not wanting to go back in. We made bird calls to the others and tried to catch fish and dragonflies. We prolonged getting back into the freezing water, and made everyone else pissed at us. I was just so happy and content to lay on the dock forever in the sun and not even go to graduation, but we needed to head back soon to get ready.

I took a quick shower when  I was at home, but didn't wash my hair. My hair dried from being in the lake and it was shiny and as blonde as ever. I brushed through it a few times and straightened it so my mortar board didn't look funky on top of my head. I threw on the sundress I wore to school and slipped on my class ring and comfortable black flats. I was ready to walk down the aisle and get out of the place where so many things were changing.

For the last time in my life, up to this very day, I drove into the student parking lot feeling like a badass senior, claiming my rightful spot. Walking up to the school for the last time in the student parking lot entrance, seeing the sea of blue gowns running around the library in panic of fly-away hairs and crooked caps. Everyone was taking pictures and talking to each other in a frantic sort of way which made it a very stressful situation. We were bored and wanted to get the show moving. We waited in the library for a little over an hour while Ms. Gorges fixed our caps and gowns.

Eventually we lined up on Main Street in the school and figured out who we would walk down the aisle with. Jordan gave me a high five and we talked with nearby Taylor Fabricius. I became bored because they had more in common to talk about, so I walked over to Jess and talked with her, Jakub Kliestik embraced me and said something I can't remember-that seems to happen a lot- and then went back to sitting with Korina in one of the little inlet things between the lockers. We sat there for what felt like a lifetime. Once people began to get organized into lines in the beginning we knew it was time. Jordan kept whispering things to me and when we took our first two steps into the gym, it felt like we were Katniss and Peeta enter the Hunger Games ceremony with their flaming attire in the back of carts.

My wind ensemble was playing the entrance song I've played so many times before. The stands were completely filled with family, friends, and random people I've never even seen, all there to celebrate our graduation into a new life. Some look at it as an end to a terrible past, others look at it as a beginning to a wonderful life they can create. We made our way to our designated seats and stood in line watching the rest of our class make the walk to the end of a finished chapter. Korina and I were looking around at all the people while she muttered complaints about having to stand for so long.

Once we were allowed to sit, a series of speeches were read and I watched one of my best friends give a heartfelt speech as valedictorian. I was proud and excited for her to be able to have all of the generous receivings that come with being valedictorian, she and her family definitely deserved the break from all the work of having to pay off student loans in the future. I was happy in that moment and an unimaginable amount of thoughts were racing through my head about what the future would bring, how the past played out, and how we all felt in that hot, stuffy gym. I can't say I remember much of who said what in the speeches. I was able to play in my band and sing in my choir one last time, which almost jerked a batch of tears. Singing in the choir again made everything much harder to bare. We were all sad to begin with and Wolfgram is such a sob which left us all heartbroken, but eventually the boring name-calling began. We watched all of our classmates walk across the platform and grab a blue flower on the ramp down.

Of course our school always has to mess something up, the names and pictures on the slideshow were mixed up with the person walking across the stage. At the time we were shaking our heads in disappointment and thinking how stupid it all seemed, but looking back, it makes you realize it was almost perfect. Life isn't perfect, we weren't the perfect class, Waupaca wasn't the perfect little town, and the slideshow-mess-up contributed to our ever so prevailing imperfection.

My row stood up way too early which resulted in us waiting forever to walk up to the stage. The people in the stands were crammed so far down they got in the way of us walking. Becker pronounced my name correctly and I walked across the stage shaking hands with school board people, Haley Johnson, Caleb Kiesow, Kacey Sporel, and hugging Nichole Thorne and Marisa. No one seemed to care that we weren't organized and orderly because the humidity set in on foreshadowing a magnificent thunderstorm. Everyone was too hot and becoming impatient. I was glad I was one of the first row to receive our prize. I could sit the rest of the time and close my eyes or be entertained by everyone's baby pictures flashing across the screen.

When it was time for us to throw our caps in the air, only a few people did in confusion that we weren't allowed to throw our caps anymore. It was just a mess. Balloons fell around us and the senior class of 2013 stomped on them which created a thunderous noise throughout the echoing gymnasium! At least we could improvise our final mark, since no one came up with an ending skit. Jordan and I happily processed out of the gym waving at various people in the crowd. It was our moment in life to feel a bit famous.

Afterwards in the sea of people we took as many pictures as possible to capture some of our last memories with school friends we may not see for a while. I gave a lot of people hugs, and there's no way I can remember them all, I remember I did give Kempfert a hug cuz I owed him thanks though. I took pictures with all of my best friends from high school, because boy did we go through one hell of a trip together. From the band trip to Florida and the choir trip to NYC to the not-so-pleasant speech class to preforming, laughing, crying, and helping each other out...we all went through it together.  So I owe some sort of special thanks to my four best friends, Marisa Landsverk, Sarah Bauer, and Jess Krawczyk, and Tom Garbe. Also to Emma Kelley, Christie Shaw, Jessy Barrows, Dakotah Revai,  Izzi Mielke, Marcus Engle, Jakub Kliestik, Luke Harger, Eric Harrington, Isaac Baumgart, Missy Heschke, Chris Smith, Charlie Larson, Ben Olson, Nicole Mullet, Anthony Olmeda, Jake Pomerenke, Bruno Pessoa, Kenna Orr, Joe Pegorsch, and Logan Ader...that's all I can think of right now. They all shaped me into who I am today, and that's a great thing :)

My parents left right away after taking pictures but Tom and I stayed back to take more and more pictures. It was dark outside by that point and a huge thunderstorm was on it's way to Waupaca. There was red and pink and yellow everywhere on the radar, and they wanted to get home. We were making plans with Emma, Luke, Marisa, and Isaac to either go swimming again or to Isaac's grandparent's hot tub. Emma and Luke were persistent to jump into Shadow Lake while the rest of us opted out. Tom drove me back to my house to get a swim suit for A night with Isaac and Marisa. While we were driving on 10 back to my house it just down poured like nothing else. He had to drive really slow and we couldn't even see out of the windshield at all. The thunder was extremely loud and there was a lot of lightning. Once we got to my house my parents wouldn't let us leave again until it was over. Once it slowed down we met Isaac and Marisa for some relaxation time. Funny things happen when Marisa has a confusing bikini top on- and we'll leave it at that! (Boys are dumb)

The whole experience was just stressful and exciting at the same. We didn't realize it at the time, but now it's something I don't ever want to forget.

Class of 2013 

5/29/13