Graduation Memories

I was looking through an old year book from my middle school and it surprised me quite a bit. Picture after picture, row after row of boys and girls in whine colored gowns I realized we all had a lot more in common than we thought. Once we were all taken away from our circle of friends, our personal style and our attitudes we all were all the same. We were all slightly awkward; girls with our un plucked eyebrows or our failed attempts at putting on makeup and little boys trying to pretend they were way cooler than they really were. We were all clueless and would remain that way for quite a while, who knows maybe we still are. But looking back at all these people, boys who I wished would notice me and girls I wish I looked like, none of them were quite as great as I remembered them to be. Maybe it’s because anyone looks absolutely ridiculous in a cap and gown or maybe the fact that we all had to smile awkwardly into a camera that was held by a person we didn’t even know. But it was probably just uncertainty that registered across all of our faces that day. Wondering what we would all become. I remember thinking how strange it was that I had to take graduation pictures in February way before even knowing if I would graduate or not. It just seemed cruel for everyone to get suited up in caps and gowns but knowing that not all of us would be standing next to one another on graduation day. It was like a tiny taste of what everyone else would experience. I guess it was meant to motivate those who were falling behind but all it did to me so terrify me. I honestly believe we were all thinking such things that morning when the camera man captured our faces and fake smiles.

-Angela Garcia