A sea of mortarboard caps . . . seniors with tear-soaked tissues . . . parents dabbing at moist eyes.  Pomp.  Circumstance.  Ah . . . graduation.

When I graduated from high school, I was overcome by the end of life as I knew it.  It was not only the end of school but also the end of my residence in Texas and the end of living with my parents.  When I graduated from college, I was likewise cognizant of the ‘death’ of everything familiar.

I remember thinking that the term ‘Commencement’ hardly seemed fitting.  The life I knew was over, and my attention was so focused backwards that I barely noticed what lay ahead.  Grief dominated my emotional landscape, mixed with small amounts of fear and a dash of excitement. 

My daughter Elizabeth, a year away from her own Commencement, tears up when she talks about her friends accepting their diplomas in a few days.  She knows that their lives will never intersect again, at least not in the same way.  I tell her that I understand her sorrow and that all endings eventually lead to beginnings.  As one special chapter ends, a new one does commence.  

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