LU Commencement

Lehigh’s commencement was on Monday morning. I thought it was really important for Kyle, Owen, and Meera to be there. They’ve been living on campus, they’ve formed real relationships with lots of students — including many graduating seniors — and I felt strongly that they should see the year through and have the closure of attending commencement. I also thought that — given their immersion in a college campus — they should see firsthand what a graduation is all about. This would be the first time attending for all three of them. So, I kept them home from school for the day, and we went (Braydon was away on a work trip).

They were pretty impressed with the football field transformed into a graduation site. They were pretty impressed with the thousands of people in attendance, swarming the stadium.

They were pretty impressed with the 2,000 graduates, the robes and hoods, the music, the procession, the pomp and circumstance. They were pretty impressed with the thick program listing the names and degrees and awards and honors.

They spent quite a nice long chunk of time searching the program for names they knew.

And then…

But we saw it through. And I’m glad we did. Because then they got to see the best part: the graduates as they first walk out… so happy, so emotional, so sure and unsteady at the same time. A once-in-a-lifetime moment for a person — that we get to be a part of just simply because we are their friends.

And Kyle, Owen, and Meera learned that a big part of commencement is the post-graduation-celebrating.

The hugging and “congratulations”-ing, and the meeting-the-families, and the photo taking with the graduates. Those parts were pretty cool.

That afternoon we attended Sarah’s graduation party at her parents’ home in North Bethlehem. We had been so honored to be invited. We were even more honored to be there, to share in her family’s celebration, and to enjoy a sweet and lovely afternoon with the Thomsons. (Sarah is a student we became especially close with this year — she lived in the apartment diagonally across from us; was our head Gryphon; President of Lehigh’s Student Senate; brought Meera to visit her sorority house more than once; and was/is an all-around really good friend of our family. And she is one of the rare Lehigh students who grew up locally — so her family party was something we could logistically very easily do.)

So, Kyle, Owen, and Meera got the whole experience– attending commencement, and attending a graduation party. Now they know what that whole thing is all about. And it did what I hoped — it brought some closure for us. We were able to end the year of full immersion, with a full immersion in a very important book-end day.

P.S. Thank you to Shalinee for Meera’s dress and matching doll dress. Shalinee saw this in a store a few weeks ago and just had to get it for Meera (knowing she’d love it). She was right– Meera loved it (as did what felt like — literally — many hundred graduation-goers who commented repeatedly on how cute the matching outfits were). xo to Shalinee for knowing my girl so well.