Years of your life have been building to this moment and you’re about to screw it all up. Sorry, that’s not true, you’re about to have a wonderful time. I did when I graduated, and I’ve always been that kid that trips up, or breaks the fly on his trousers before standing in front of a crowd. The only thing that went wrong for me at my graduation is the walk on stage. When I got up there, the stage seemed to last for eternity and I suddenly became very conscious of the way I walk, suddenly forgetting how to do it. I looked like an idiot, but I didn’t care because I was proud.
A year has passed since then, and many of my younger friends are now themselves preparing to graduate. I’m now a working man, out there in the big world, and it’s a whole world away from what I expected. At university I felt like an adult: I was living with my friends, paying bills, buying food, and going out when I wanted. I was the typical (Art) student. I thought I had it all figured out. When tutors dispensed advice to me, I would stick up my nose, and think:
“You don’t know, YOU DON’T KNOW!”
I was a fool.
Baz Luhrmann once said (In his 1998 hit song ‘Everybody’s Free (To Wear Sunscreen)’) that “advice is a form of nostalgia; dispensing it is a way of fishing the past from the disposal, wiping it off, painting over the ugly parts and recycling it for more than it’s worth” and he was right. Every word spoken to you by an elder is advice that they have gained from living life, something you probably haven’t done yet. You might think you have an idea, but when you live at University you haven’t lived through the hard-times that life throws at you before you reach the good times. You don’t know how bad it can get.
I see young people wishing away their days as students so that they can hurry up and be an adult. I see adults longing for their youth. Don’t ever try to grow up too quickly because you’ll forever long for it. Enjoy life and be fond of your times at University. You might think it wasn’t all that, but after a few years you’ll have changed your mind.
So buy that yearbook and get it signed by everyone you know, buy those leavers hoodies (or whatever they sell), and if you don’t wear it, keep it in a box for safe keeping. The day will come where you want to look at it.
And enjoy your graduation. It’s not the last day of your youth; it’s the first day of your life.
Oh, and watch this: Baz Luhrmann - Everybody's Free (To Wear Sunscreen)
