From Beginning to End

            During the course of life, a person encounters many events which they consider to be stepping-stones, milestone achievements of which the details they will never forget. For me, my first day of kindergarten and my final day of high school fit into this category. I will never forget those days and will cherish them forever. The two seemed to complete one circle and begin a new one while evoking completely different feelings from the people involved. Ironically, graduation put me right back in kindergarten, unsure of what was next for me in the world.
           
            The first day of kindergarten is viewed as a new beginning, a day for timid young people to embark on their new path to adulthood. In the weeks preceding my first day of kindergarten, my family bubbled with anticipation while I cowered with terror, not knowing anything about the world I was being asked to enter. They viewed this as a turning point in my life, but I was left unconvinced and believed they were doing this because of something I’d done wrong. A week before school was scheduled to start, I became desperate and attempted to make deals; I offered to do anything and everything if only my parents would allow me to stay home. I emerged from the weeklong negotiation unsuccessful, and I realize now that I never had much to bargain with.

            As I exited my mother’s car, ready for the trek down the large front steps of Congdon Elementary, my eyes became teary and I clutched my mom in one last hug. My age didn’t allow for full understanding of what this day truly meant, but I was old enough to know that things were changing. It was a change that pushed me to the edge of my comfort level, one that forced me to leave everything I’d held close to my heart for my entire life, but it was a change that eventually would lead me to be the person I am today.

            Once inside the school, things began to take shape. Familiar faces from the neighborhood began to emerge, interaction between peers began to happen, and the learning environment began to become a welcome one. As I sat at a table with other students I knew from various play dates and childhood adventures, the tears in my eyes left and gave way to a smile. It was the smile of a child who had just taken his first step towards adolescence and left his old world behind, the smile of a boy who was only just discovering what lay before him in life. The angst and fear I had felt before was gone and I was on my way to a new world; my circle had begun.

            Years later, and graduation day was the culmination of it all, the day everything I worked for became tangible, and the day I stood with my peers on stage as a high school graduate. The morning of graduation day was one of celebration, but this celebration was bittersweet for many people involved. My family, the same people who had smiled and cheered as I began kindergarten some thirteen years earlier, looked as though something was being taken away from them, and in a way something was. They embraced me and cried, asking where the time had gone and cursing me for growing up too fast. Try as I might, my mind would not let me be anything but jubilant on this day, for it was the day that marked the start of adulthood and sent me on my path to a new world.

            As the ceremonies progressed in my high school’s small yet elegant auditorium, pride rushed through the veins in my body. I looked around at the other students in my graduating class and wondered where each of them would be in five, ten, and twenty years. I recalled that epic first day of kindergarten, when I wondered why it was necessary, and was euphoric to finally know. My eyes scanned the audience until they landed upon my family, and I was forced to hold back a chuckle as I watched tears stream down their face. It was a change for them, seeing their eldest child receive a document that set him free into the world, but it was a change that was as necessary as that first day of kindergarten.

            With a cigar in my right hand and diploma in my left, I celebrated with my classmates in the front courtyard of the school. We took pictures, we reminisced, and we discussed plans for the future. No one wanted to leave on that beautiful spring day, no one wanted to stop the celebration, and no one wanted to admit to themselves it was over, because no one knew what lay beyond that day. For four years, we had been together; we had shared our triumphant successes along with our ego-damaging failures, we had exchanged homework assignments and rough drafts, and we had forged friendships that would never be lost. Now, as I left the school that day, I would be left to those memories. As Marshall School became distant behind me, the smile on my face gave way to a single tear. It was the tear of a man this time, a man who was filled with the same angst and fear from that first day of kindergarten and a man who was left to wonder what would come next. The circle that started with kindergarten was at last completed, and all I could do was start to create another.

            “We must view kindergarten as the first of many firsts and we must view graduation as the last of many lasts,” said my grandfather when speaking of the two memorable days. “They are different yet the same,” he continued, “as they force you to sacrifice for the unknown.” To me, there is no way of putting it in a better light than that. The first day of kindergarten was filled with nervousness and fear while the last day of high school was filled with exhilaration and uncertainty. The two days were different in so many ways, and yet they remained the same.