For once, I've successfully stayed up 24 hours consecutively. On Saturday, I woke up at 6:30AM, and managed to stay awake until the same time Sunday morning, at which point I crashed. More importantly, the day was one of the pivotal days (and nights) of my life.
When the sun greeted me early Saturday morning, it still felt like an average day. Relatives were in town who I hadn't seen in years, gathered to support my mom in case she completely broke down at graduation. To me, though, the occasion was no longer even surreal: it was just there. I was unable to feel anything for it. May as well get it over with, then.
We all dressed ourselves appropriately, headed to school, and as our class arranged ourselves in formation to march into the gym, we all walked down the lower school hallway - where I had spent first through fourth grades - and I saw the entire faculty of the school assembled in another single-file line, and each one of them applauded us as we passed. Every single one of them with a proud smile on his or her face. Nice gesture, I thought, but there's no possible way that in thirty minutes I'll be done with high school forever.
There was only one thing I understood at graduation in the morning: it was my last performance with the choir. It was my last opportunity to stand on the stage and be directed by Mr. Ice, a fella who helped me point my life in one of the best directions possible. The last song turned out to take the greatest emotional toll on me of any single event in the entire graduation process. But I survived, and graduation went along as planned. It still didn't even feel surreal when I took the stage, heard my accolades, and received a diploma and a dictionary, per custom. It felt like just another ceremony, just another event where I dressed funny and received some awards and things and the parents congratulated Syed and me countless times.
We went outside to the largest oak tree on campus and took a final class picture, and threw the caps. It still didn't sink in that I'm never going to see these people again. Even as I said goodbyes to students and teachers, I didn't feel like I was leaving but rather experiencing some kind of reunion. I wasn't seeing Edgemon and my lower school teachers for the last time ever - it was just a happy occasion where I got to run into them again. The only thing that made it anything like a goodbye was a letter hand-delivered to me from Coach Andersen who thanked me for being in his classes, sticking with him, and being a good student and a nice guy etc. etc. For a heartless Republican, he can be a really good genuinely heartfelt guy.
Oh, and Syed picked me up and slung me over his shoulder like a caveman carrying his bitch. I'm quite sure it was caught on film.
Celebratory lunch was unimportant. We had a party of four instead of the parties of ten and fourteen like the other Oakridge families at the same place.
The rest of the afternoon was spent in preparation for the greatest graduation celebration I could imagine: Lamar's prom. I successfully dressed and went to Erin's to pick her up. At this point it was 6PM, halfway through my big day. The learning, ironically, was only about to begin as I popped a Metabolife just to see if that would help my energy level.
8:00. Lone Star Park ballroom. Prom was a very good experience. I ran into virtually everyone I've known at Lamar who still goes there and it was my second happy reunion of the day. I happily met all of the numerous people Erin knows, and had the unique pleasure of dinner with a person who Erin hates and the always amusing Jordan Pratt and his girlfriend. On the dance floor, I finally ran into the amigos, and we spent the rest of the evening together dancing. Alex and Thomas looked awkwardly separate from their dates, as usual, and I felt relieved that I had found a different group to take me to prom. I had spent that much of the evening halfway scared to death of an encounter with Stephanie. When I found myself right next to her on the dance floor, my fear disappared. I just waved and said hi and life went on as if she just weren't there. Nothing about her appearance surprised me - she looked exactly like I would have thought. But when she looked at me, her eyes gave me a completely different impression from what they used to give me. When six months ago I saw all kinds of wonderful things in her eyes, last night they looked the most empty of any human soul I've ever seen. As we made eye contact and waved, it felt like she blankly stared straight through me. But at least I felt better about the whole chance encounter thing. Everyone, myself included, ended up having a wonderful time. It had probably been at least a year since I had been on a dance floor.
11:30. Prom is over. My energy level is still high as we make our way to Josh Rizzo's house to change clothes. After some lounging, and watching Josh play Postal 2, which is easily the most wacked-out game ever, we make the trip over to Lamar for 'Project Celebration,' their very swankily done after-prom party. I was surprised at the production value of the whole affair. The decoration was really pretty neat, there was a ton of stuff going on across 3 or 4 different rooms, and everyone still came. After mingling and a little bit of walking around with Sophia, I settled down at a blackjack table and turned $10,000 into $87,000. Maybe I should go to Vegas sometime soon.
4:00. Casino shuts down. Still, I feel completely awake and alert. God bless Metabolife. As the night came to a close with the prize raffle, I felt great. I sat with a group and was only one of about twelve people in the group that didn't come out a winner. Still, I thought the whole group was pretty damn cool. This was the first lesson of the night: this was why I shunned Oakridge in favor of Lamar. It's not that it's 'cooler.' It's not that the people are better. It's that I finally got the chance to assert my own identity and make myself. There, I felt like I was naturally myself and I was appreciated for it, and I didn't have to fake it anymore. What a graduation celebration this is.
6:00. Home bound. I always do my best thinking in the car. I looked back on my whole night and day as "Goodbye to You" appropriately played in the background. This was the night not of celebration but of goodbyes and coming of age. Last night, I said goodbye to my past life as I knew it and had to start completely over.
Oh, and it positively creeps me out when the sun starts to rise. Since I live by night, the lightening of the sky has always been the one sign I've been able to understand from nature: go to bed, idiot.
They often say that change is gradual, that it never happens overnight. My last big lesson of the night is that it does happen overnight. When the sun set on Saturday, I felt like the same person I had been for the last 18 years. When I saw the sun come up Sunday morning, I became someone new. I shed my entire past, the good and the bad, and this summer I have nothing to do but enjoy the moment and become stronger, quicker, more prepared for anything and everything. Granted, my friends aren't gone, but they are about to be. Oakridge is over and done, and so are the people associated with it, for all intents and purposes. Lamar's prom was probably the last time I'll see a good number of the wonderful people I know. As the sun continued to rise, I thought more and more about what it meant that graduation and celebration were over. I felt like I had arrived at my own future. I'm completely self-sufficient. I'm completely alone.
I learned last night that good friends are the universal key to happiness. I learned that self-reliance is the key to survival. I learned that you can never let go of a first love, but it can't destroy you. I already knew that music is one of the most powerful and versatile things in existence, but last night cemented it in my mind beyond any doubt. Lastly, I learned that true friends, the ones who survive from one chapter of someone's life to the next, are exactly what you'll think they are.
Oh, and Aroon/Nathalie: I did sing. In the gym with the prizes. John Mayer. You guys missed it. :)
I just can't wait for my ten-year reunion
I'm gonna bust down the double doors
And when I stand on these tables before you
You will see what all this time was for
I'm gonna bust down the double doors
And when I stand on these tables before you
You will see what all this time was for