The Graduation
Her brother’s girlfriend is a diligent student. She has just graduated with honours. We celebrate with her and are proud of the achievement, a reward for years of hard work!
And so did our Kirsty, graduate with honors. Honors because she is always happy to see familiar faces; because her enthusiasm brings smiles to those around; because she is able to ‘read’ the atmosphere and pick up on any happiness or sadness, then joins in, either laughing loudly or crying silently in empathy.
We were invited to the graduation celebration on a Tuesday afternoon. The room with yellow plastic table cloths were packed with lively people, a few wheelchairs, some walkers, teachers, assistants, therapists and a handful of parents. We had champagne, the parents.
Six of the pupils were to move on to other special facilities. The school season had come to an end. The young man, neatly dressed with jacket and all, started his speech but couldn’t get past ‘being part of this family…’ when his head dropped and he cried. The teenager across from us had a difficult time trying to be brave, her mouth pulling in all directions and finally she gave in to the stream of tears as teachers came to hug the brave young man and a few more of us cried too!
Teachers came around, talked about when Kirsty first came to the school and how she’s evolved and how much she will be missed, especially her enthusiasm and joyfulness. She received hugs, and gave some. We took pictures. Kirsty enjoyed the attention but the noise and many people made her a bit nervous, loud. Her teacher placed a decorated book-like box in her hands and she opened it up to many laminated pictures of herself during her time in the school. She enjoyed taking the laminated cards out and putting it back into the box. Another teacher gave her a little gift with girly elastics, fun clips and pink (her favourite color) earrings. Some more pictures. Each of the six received an individualised gift from their class teacher. More pictures and then the black handmade paper caps with red woolen tassels were placed on the heads and they got assisted out of the room with cheering and clapping. The teachers threw the caps in the air for those who could not do it themselves and an explosion of cheer and clapping followed. They know how to celebrate!
And then it was all over. Very simple but they were celebrated! We collected the school bag, coat and walked to the car with a very tired graduate, carrying her book-box of memories. Printed in our memories are the times we walked across the playground at break time, ducking the ball of the boys playing football and others racing on wheel chairs; a school with more wheelchairs than normal chairs; all kinds of walking frames, walkers, crutches, helmets; most of all, curious little faces – big eyes, often behind specs and even the outstretched hand from under a blanket to greet us, smiling when we stopped for a chat. We were always welcome.
We will remember how joy and happiness are the pot of gold of the outstretched rainbow over this world of seemingly broken little people.
