Graduation
Well, today was graduation. It took about three times for my mom to get me up. I had planned on getting up at 7:45, but I actually ended up getting ready at almost 9.
I got dresses and pulled my hair back into one of those half ponytail thingies and got in the car.
I realized later that I had forgotten to eat breakfast. Not like it mattered; I was too nervous to really eat anything anyway, plus I wasn't hungry.

We got to school and I slipped on the graduation gown when I got out of the car and rushed over to homeroom. There weren't really any seats close to anybody so I stood and fussed with some stuff. I was hoping to practice before we actually sang the big graduation song at the awards ceremony, so I was looking for Jessie and Rose, who were singing it with me. Miss Doherty was busy passing out awards, but I asked her anyway if she knew where they were. She wasn't much of a help, but eventually I found them.
Of course by the time I got to talk with them we were lining up for the awards ceremony. I was a nervous wreck. I practically attacked miss doherty asking if we were going to have any time to practice the song and she said no.
Oh boy wasn't that just great.

We lined up outside and waited for our names to be called to go up on the sanctuary in our perfectly-practiced-lovely-ninety-degree-angle-turn way. Awards were given out in front of the whole school - I received a certificate for principal's list all trimesters, a golden cord and certificate for first honors for all three trimesters, and (This was a surprise to me, but I was so happy I got it) the presidential award for educational excellence, which means you have to have maintained at least a B+ average on all trimesters from the seventh grade, had standardized testing scores of over 85 at least, and some other stuff. It was a nice surprise indeedio.

The time for singing came, and Jessie and Rose and I went over near the baby grand piano by the microphones. We were singing "i hope you dance" by Leanne Wolmack. Jessie sang the first verse and did well and then it was my turn for the second verse. I think I did okay but I wish I had been louder. I wasn't exactly quiet, but I could have been louder. Rose sang the last part. She's a good singer, but I don't think this was her type of song. Her style just doesn't fit it very well.
During the song our first grade buddies were supposed to come up and give us flowers. The singers' buddies were supposed to come at the end but sure enough while Jessie was singing my buddy came with her little flower in hand. I was confused and was wondering if she should go around again but I went forward and gave her a big hug and thanked her for the flower. She is so cute! I love my buddy. It makes me sad to think I will never see her again.

After the awards ceremony everyone went outside to the front of the church and took pictures and all that. My aunt and my grandma had come to see me.
My aunt ceal ever since I have told her what a dragonfly represents, has had an obsession with them. She's the one who lost Nick, her son. When she came out she gave me a hug and smiled and said "You know, when I first saw you standing out here I saw a dragonfly go over your head. He's here, Jessie," and she laughed a bit. It made for a little bit of an awkward moment. I mean what are you supposed to say to that? But I thought about it a bit and I think it's kind of cool that she saw that. Call me stupid, but yeah.

My aunt left after many a picture was taken and my mom dad, grandma, and I went to go eat lunch at Flames (my sister had to go back to class because it was a regular school day for her). After that we went over to Mema's (grandma's) and attempted to take a nap. Didn't work very well when Mrs. Dove called and said that we had to be there at 4:15 for the actual graduation ceremony. We still had to go pick up Denise, and since my mom forgot Denise's outfit we had to drive all the way back to my house, change, and come back. Luckily we made it only about five minutes late, which wasn't bad considering we had to meet in Kelley Hall and sit there for a while anyway.

We received pictures of our school years from kindergarten to eighth grade and everyone enjoyed exchanging them and looking at them. Stephanie looked like the Pepsi girl in kindergarten, which I thought was funny, and Marilyn was so cute in her kindergarten and first grade pictures. Louise looked exactly the same in kindergarten and first grade. lol. Miss Doherty handed out some extra awards and then we all got in line and were each given a rose and a program. We headed over to the front of the church and had to stand there for what seemed like forever because Maria wasn’t there. She came just as we were about to head in, and even then we were still missing Jennifer Chau.

The mass started, and Jennifer didn’t show up until after the Our Father, which was also when we took our roses and went and gave them to our parents. After the mass, a certain award that had been given out during the morning ceremony would be called and if you had received that award you would stand and face the congregation until the clapping stopped. Then you would sit down again. After that - at least I think it was after that - we would all nice and prettily and very organize-ed-ly go and get our diplomas. Then we stood and faced the congregation for what seemed like almost a minute of clapping.

I’m not sure if it was before or after receiving our diplomas that Rose, the valedictorian, went up to speak. Her speech was awesome, not like you could have expected anything less, but I really enjoyed it. I want to see if I can get her to give me a copy of it.

Then came the big awards. First were the awards for special achievements in individual subjects. Let’s see what I can remember...
Eric Stanton got the algebra award
Weston Buglewictz got the math award
Corey got the Spanish award
Brad got the Science award (when Mrs. Gurries gave him the award and hugged him, Gavin gave a big fat “Awww” which was really funny.) It was expected he’d get it anyway. He’s Mrs. Gurries’ favorite student to pick on.
Nick Dazzi got the religion award for 8D (my class) which was funny because whenever he has to answer questions in the religion book they are all sarcastic. ^_^
Kelly Mc Carthy got the Literature award
There were a few others too..
And then I got a nice surprise and got the English award. YAAAAAAY! I was happy.

Scholarships were handed out with bigger awards, for example, like the Terry Vane award. For those of you who don’t know, Mr. Vane was our seventh grade teacher who was sick with cancer. Though he started wasting away and was in severe pain, he still came to teach us every day that he could. he was the coolest teacher I think I have had in a long time. He’s cuss in front of us, not too badly, but he would, and on Fridays sometimes he’d have a religion period where we could spend it all complaining, or if there was a holiday we would spend all of it walking around on tables hanging decorations on the ceiling. After every school day instead of saying “Time to go” or “you are dismissed”, he’d yell at us: “Get outta here!”. Last year I remember we had received word that he wasn’t going to live, and we all started crying. Some people, including me, went into the church where Mrs. Borges talked and tried to console the group. After that there was word that he might actually get better, there was hope. On the last day of school he sent us a video.

“You have to keep up the fight. When you get out of bed every morning, when you step out of the car every day, you have to say ‘I’m doing the best that I can’, and if you do that, the rest of the day will be a piece of cake. God loves you, I love you, and my family loves you. Now get outta here!”

He really was an admirable person, and still one of the bravest people I know. Lucas won the award. At first I was disappointed it wasn’t Gavin (Gavin’s mom is in a coma and they might lose their apartment), But I saw Lucas’s mom meet Mrs. vane in the aisle and, crying, gave her a big hug. Luc’s dad died when he was six, and the mom is still single, not to mention they needed support from a different family to allow him to go to this school. Gavin won a different award and scholarship, which made everything okay with me.

There was a Knight’s of Columbus award thingy and the award was a big fat Bible. I said to Lynn, who was sitting next to me “Hey lookit! Big fat Bibles!” and she replied, sarcastically, “Oh yeah I really want one of those.” Then the name was called out “Lynn Nguyen” and she got it. lol it was funny.

Another award I could just guess who would win it. It was for a lot of religious service to the school. Since Marilyn’s mom taught CCD for many years every week, and Marilyn helped out there a lot, I guessed it would be Marilyn. When they called out “Marilyn Mac Lellan” I went “yes!” and everybody stared at me.

My dog is being really cute right now. But that is beside the point.

All-together, it was a really nice ceremony. Yush yush it was. Afterwards we went and turned in our gowns (that’s right, no keeping the gowns) and went off to eat dinner at California Cafe in Los Gatos. I saw Tyler M. there, though he didn’t see me there at first, and my grandma was wondering if I liked him or something. lol. She’s funny like that. Always on the lookout for me. I luff my grandma.
The dinner wasn’t as good as expected. The food was good, but the service not too great. I had a virgin strawberry daiquiri! Yummy!
Mom and Dad gave me my graduation gift there. It was so cool! I will be able to take Marilyn and Louise out to spend a night in San Francisco at the Hyatt hotel, which is close to Pier 49, and I got a mini iPod! yaaay! My dad sent it away to have it engraved or something. I wouldn’t have thought of something like that but it is still cool. So I actually haven’t seen my iPod yet, I only have the dock. but I can’t wait until it gets here.
During the dinner,we were chit-chatting nicely when a guy from the table behind us yelled “.... FUCKING CLOWNS!” Scared the crap out of me. The people at his table tried to calm down, but he sat down and continued to say stuff like “fuck you people! Fuck you!” and then he said something about “...with all these people dying in Iraq.” Damn liberal. he ruined my dinner. It was scary. I thought he was drunk, but he appeared completely sober afterwards. People like that creep me out.

So yush, that is the jist of my graduation. There you go.

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