inkdick: may 30 2009 my supposed graduation
Seriously, I probably had one of the most awkward ways to end college ever. I graduated in the fall, I took only one class, that class was a one-on-one independent study instead of an actual class with other students, and I never got to walk in a graduation ceremony. So college ended with a fizzle instead of a huge bang. I got no congratulations, my parents didn’t send out notices to extended relatives, when I was in Norris other students looked at me and said, “Oh, you’re still here?” And on top of all of this, I COULD have walked in the ceremony, but SCAD didn’t tell me that until it was a week after the deadline.
I’m probably letting this get me more depressed than I should, but it just would have been nice to have a a final hoorah and a sense of closure. That way I could stop feeling like I’m still a student and get on with living in the real world. I think that’s one of the many things mentally holding me back lately.
June 29th, 2009 at 11:48 am
Congrats on getting that diploma! That is a big accomplishment, even without the perfect, perfect graduation.
I think you should take the picture in the third panel, blow it up to an approximate 8×10, and make it your official graduation photo. Hang it with your diploma!
June 29th, 2009 at 1:47 pm
pranas,
college graduation is a huge letdown anyway. you sit for three hours in the sun while they call 2000 people’s names and then you walk in a line next to people who have the same last name as you (or similar) and you don’t know them, and then you have 3 seconds where they shuffle you through, you grab what isn’t even your degree, and then they take a photo and you’re done.
then you and your family go out to a crappy restaurant because the other families all got the good reservations already. the only upside of having a real college graduation is maybe your family will give you grad presents (didn’t really happen for me).
i don’t think you’re missing out dude! you are living the dream - you have a job and a house and a loving girlfriend and you make art that people really enjoy. i think a lot of college grads would kill to be in your shoes :) i know i would.
June 29th, 2009 at 2:23 pm
The 2008 graduation was shitty and boring, and it just confirmed that the graduation ceremony is for the parents more than it is for us. Trust me, you didn’t miss anything. (unless you wanted to watch them call me “Sarah” in front of 2000 people)
Honestly, this may not be the dream you’re looking for, but holy crap: you’re part of a sequential podcast, you have your own webcomic, I’ve talked to webcomic and indy artists who know your name. And you’re what? 23? Don’t fret, man. You’re living the dream far beyond a lot of us anyway. Keep doing what you’re doing! You have something to show for all those years.
June 29th, 2009 at 3:31 pm
Yap. I’ve been to several other college graduations, and I have to say that SCAD’s by comparison is really more like a 5-hour A/V self-promo event. I had to walk because I received an award, but mostly I just felt like I wasted 200 bones on a silly outfit I’ll never wear again. At least my buddy sitting next to me had episodes of the Office on his iPod to kill the time…
June 29th, 2009 at 3:47 pm
Frankly, the need for that kind of ” closure” is a pointless ritual and kinda pathedic…
You don’t need it, it wont make having graduated any better
June 29th, 2009 at 4:04 pm
guys guys guys… I realize that the actual graduation ceremony itself is lame, but that is not what it’s about. It’s about what it would represent to ME: the closure and feeling like it is over and I’m no longer a student. If I had graduated on time in the spring with everyone else but not walked, I probably wouldn’t have this need to walk, because I probably would have gotten the closure just by ending school at the same time that my friends of four years did and being part of that collective sense of “Yeah, we did it, we are done!”.
BUT…because, as I said, I ended in the fall (seriously, NO ONE graduates in the fall), only had one class in the fall that wasn’t really a class (well, it was, but it wasn’t a class with other students), and there was no big event/celebration to mark my ending school, I just never got that sense of closure. And yeah, maybe sitting around for five hours just to walk across a stage is lame, but I still wish I had that experience due to how I ended school.
Seriously, what I had was such a fizzle of an ending I wouldn’t even call it an ending. At least a “stupid” ceremony would have been some sort of an end.
June 29th, 2009 at 4:34 pm
I understand all to well what you mean. I was homeschooled so my high school graduation consisted of getting a diploma in the mail and my parents saying they were proud. I wish so much I had some since of a normal high school graduation or experience but because I had just moved to Poland I knew no one (still don’t!).
So yeah I can understand the need for a “stupid” ceremony.
June 30th, 2009 at 10:09 am
The same thing happened to me. I was working one day and heard all this noise out the window, I took a peak and saw a lot of my friends all dressed in the gowns walking up the road. It hit me that there were no second chances or late entries, I had just missed it like a doofus!