ShyShay Graduates from High School

Written on 6-5-25.

     I am in Seat 30D on our United flight back to Albuquerque.  They just delivered drinks and snacks, but I have set them aside for later.  This flight is less crowded than the one coming.  B has moved to the window seat, and we are using the seat between us to hold our snacks, phones, and trash.  I am drowsy after all the hubbub from the last few days.  We were very well fed and taken care of by the VA Swopes.  It was an organized whirlwind, but here are some highlights.  

We went to the O Street Museum with Guy’s in-laws Garth and Anne.  ShyShay and her boyfriend, Adam, joined us there, too.  It was an eclectic place with a room where Rosa Parks lived for ten years.  They had all sorts of

collectibles and all were for sale.  It was very close to a hoarder’s fantasy, but there was enough room to walk through it all.

We, of course, went to ShyShay’s graduation, the purpose for this whole trip, and it was so wonderful to see her so happy and accomplished.  She is such a sweet, hardworking, student-athlete, and we know she will do well at William and Mary this coming year.  Guy and Annmarie have done very well raising her.  It was emotional at times, because we have known her since she was a wee baby.  I was a bit weepy, because Mom and Dad weren’t there to see it, and I know they would have been just as proud as I was.  Sniff, sniff.

Yesterday, we went to The Wharf and rented an electric boat.  That was different.  Garth and Anne came, too, but ShyShay rested after an all night post-graduation party.  It was the perfect size for six adults, and it had a shade cover (or a biminy as Anne kept calling it).  It was slow, but it was quiet, and we were able to listen to the Tolofson Boy Goes to College bit from Lake Wobegon on my iPhone, a very fitting thing to listen to since Shy had just graduated.  We were out for nearly two hours, and we were able to make it to the Potomac and watch airplanes taking off and landing at Reagan International Airport.  That was cool to see, since we were at ground/water level.  Since the boat was electric, we didn’t consume any of the fumes that we normally would have with a gas-powered boat.  I would do it again, but it was a little too slow.  We weren’t in any hurry, though, so it was all good.  The weather was stunning.

After that, we had lunch at the Pink Tiger, and Belinda and I shared fried rice with chicken.  That was yummy.  Then we went down the wharf a bit and had dessert, a shared cinnamon roll and an iced latte for me.  More yum.  Yesterday was the worst day for eating, though, because we ate out at four different places.  Not so yummy after all.  I feel very bloated today.

Guy, Belinda, and I met Keith and Adrienne at our third restaurant after an hour’s drive to Baltimore.  We figured out it had been ten years since the last time B and I had seen them.  We had just “rewired” at that point, and I had come to Maryland for my First Tee training.  Once again, I was reminded of Mom and Dad, and especially Dad, because Adrienne had searched and found him/us many years ago.  This time, she showed us some pictures of some of her half-siblings and her biological father.  I had never seen any of them before.  She told us that he (her father) was the last piece of the puzzle for her.  I hope she feels she can rest now knowing she has found her family, some good and some not so good. 

She asked how we were doing since our parents had passed, and that brought out the tears from Guy and me.  Seeing her reminded me of Dad, and it made me sad to know that she had loved him so much.  He had unconditional love for her, and that reminded her of her adoptive mother, she said.  It was very difficult for me to deliver the news of Dad’s death to her.  She reminds me of her mother, Cynthia, and we talked about how Bev looks, laughs, and acts like her sometimes, too.

*Baskin Robbins on the way back was the fourth restaurant.

We played some games last night, and we saw the new Mission Impossible movie early on in the visit, too.  Like I wrote already, it was an organized whirlwind.  We spent a lot of time with Garth and Anne, and we got to know them better because of it.  Garth Jr. came briefly, and we also got visit with Bill, Maureen, and Billie, their son.  Billie is going into teaching, so I gave him some of my Time to Teach brochures and asked him to call me if he ever had any trouble with classroom management.  He seemed very grateful for that.

I have attended many graduations in the past ten years, and I have seen some patterns.  Nearly everywhere I go, people are looking at their phones while someone is speaking.  That can be said of things outside of graduations, too, but I saw many people doing that.  I know Garth Jr. watched the Yankees game when the graduates’ names were being called.

Continuing with the “rather be somewhere else” theme, I saw a graduate and a teacher both looking bored out of their minds.  He looked like Napoleon Dynamite/Weird Al, and she was older with some gray hair showing.  They sat next to each other and their body language was shouting, “I am bored, and I want to leave!”

I saw that some students got more cheers and shouts when their names were announced, and some received very little fanfare.  Many students danced.  Some raised their diplomas above their heads like trophies.  Many said ‘thank you’ to the principal, and almost all were smiling large, natural smiles.

It was two hours long, just like the boat ride, but it went pretty fast.  The first hour had all of the speeches, and they recognized and honored teachers who were retiring during that time.  Belinda and I liked that touch.  The second hour was filled with announcing the names and giving out diplomas.  Then they had a countdown to throw their caps in the air and it was over.  We met ShyShay outside for a brief moment before I was given the task of driving both Garths and Anne home with Belinda acting as my navigator.

All in all, a wonderful trip.