to my nephew Sean

A quote from the movie "Spider-Man:"

"This is the time when you become the person you'll be for the rest of your life."

Okay, that's probably not 100% true. That is, I think people are always capable of change. It's just that changes after the teen years are harder and harder. It's kind of like, the short guy can still beat the tall guy at a game of basketball, but for every inch that tall guy gets taller -- that short guy is gonna have to practice an hour a day more. And what happens if that tall guy is two feet bigger, 24 inches ... there's not enough hours in the day! The point: Don't let life grow bigger than you. Grow yourself. I know that sounds funny, I know you're not a plant. But each day you're alive -- your personality, your habits (good & bad) take stronger root.

Yes, I know that's not what's usually on your mind at graduation. Usually you're thinking about the gown, the hat, the pimple on your nose, who you're going to stand next to, whether or not Victoria is going to ask you to sign her book or if you'll have the nerve to ask her out. Then there's those of you who graduated by the seat of your pants -- you might be thinking that the hard part's over. You look at graduation as the bell at the end of the ninth round. While other students were hitting the books ... the books were hitting you. I know it hurts. I know you're probably relieved just to be standing. You're happy to look those books and facts and numbers and countless division problems in the face and proclaim: "I made it! Algebra, Chemistry, History, you tried, but you didn't kick my *ss! And now it's my time in the sun. My time to sit back and listen to the applause of the crowds. It's my turn to hear MY NAME announced on the PA, my turn for the principal to smile at ME (for a change) shake MY Hand, tip his/her head to ME and give ME that damned piece of paper. I've done it! I didn't ask to go through this bear of a hoop, you made me, all the grownup people from my mom and dad right down to the teachers even the bum on the street got on my back to finish HS. I didn't choose it, but I did it anyway. I'm da Man, I rock. Bow to me. I will sit back and give you the privilege of basking me with glory and bearing gifts in my direction. Hmmm, let's see, I'll take money, concert tickets, a hot sound system and if my parents can afford it ... a new car."

Or maybe you didn't graduate by the seat of your pants -- maybe instead you are smarty-pantses (is that a word?) taking all the hardest classes (after all, you're the toughest and the smartest). AP this, AP that, all band, taking the SAT's over and over to improve your score. Making sure you're checking off every requirement to hit that big U ... there ain't no way they ain't gonna take you. And you never use the word "ain't."

Either way, it's easy to forget the point. Stop a second and ask yourself, "What the heck was the point of high school?" You know something? I finished high school, I graduated with honors, I finished University, I graduated with honors, I even mastered in secondary education (uhm, that's high school stuff) and I swear to you, I'm still not sure the purpose of high school.

But this is my speech and so I'm gonna tell you my best guess:

All the older people who are working real hard to earn money to buy food and shelter and (if they're lucky) fun stuff like TVs, radios, cars, trips to Hawaii. Those people want you to have a step up. Those people want to equip you with tools so that the future won't grow taller than you. Like a good commander wouldn't send you into battle without a knife, a gun, and a chest full of muscles from innumerable push-ups. They decided to send you to school to make you super-citizens. Better than they were. Although they probably had some selfish reasons too: political gain, religious proliferation, national security -- after all the smartest nations make the most of their resource and win in the world economics game. But ignore that for the moment. For the most part, these people really had good intentions, they gave their taxes up (money they worked hard for without the benefit of an education to leverage great wages) to start this thing called high school from which you just graduated.

Well, then uhm, I guess they got busy ... they got busy and left the school system to the teachers and ultimately to administrators and heck now, I think those folks who write the tests -- they've got some power. Then us older folks (looks like I'm one of them now) we just sort of forgot why we sent you there. Oh sure, we know it has something to do with making you smarter etc. etc. etc. But we've kinda lost the exact purpose now that it's become a bit of machine.

Oh the irony, "ironic" you know, like the Alanis Morissette song. While your peers are dropping out of school here, kids in Kenya, they're pissed off because they can't go to school. That's right, you got to PAY to go to school over there and their folks just don't have the dough. Actually, sometimes in a little village, none of the older folks have the bucks to send any kid to school. So as a village, they sell a few sheep, harvest the corn and pool their money to send just one kid from the village to school. Can you believe that? You think you felt pressure in HS. You thought you were always worried about your parents asking how you were doing, lookin' over your report card hassling you. Imagine everyone in your neighborhood having a financial interest in your progress. But you just can't imagine that because you grew up here. That kid, that kid in Kenya ... he loves it, he's happy, all his friends who don't go to school, who walk around all day looking for some way to make money, maybe selling tomatoes, maybe selling cassettes to drivers at stoplights ... those guys envy him. They want to be him, maybe they even hate him for being able to go to school. For being the one chosen for the privilege. I'm not making this stuff up or repeating what my own parents told me. I was there, in the classroom, teaching these folks how to factor polynomials and solve triangles.

Oops, now look at me, I've really strayed from my own point, probably just like you, I've worked hard to do something, and I know it's complete, because people are congratulating me, but what did I do? What was my point?

Trust me, the point I'm about to make is gonna be much easier than the point you need to make.

You are an astronaut with one foot hovering off the spacecraft, being drawn with some foreign gravity to some planet you have never stepped on before. The planet will spin differently, your own body will react to it different, but your head, your thoughts your own lust for life ... that's what will guide you. All that you've learned and your own natural curiosity -- that's what will define your success in the new world. Maybe you've learned a thing or two from school, like which president had the most consecutive terms, or all the prime numbers up to 200 or some other excruciatingly useless piece of trivia. Great, but what we really want is for you to think! Think on your own. As if we were to throw enough facts like sticks into a pit hoping they'd bump into each other and ignite a flame. You're the academic equivalent of Frankenstein. We've collected bits of dead knowledge from around the school grounds we've stitched it together in your brain and we pray that graduation -- like a bolt of lightning -- will somehow bring all those parts to life. Somehow spark the sticks to make fire, somehow energize pointless facts into meaningful thought. Did it work?

Can you think for yourself?

Let's see.

I've taught high school, you know, in three countries. I've got a master's degree! I command you to give all your money to the next person you see.

I'll wait.

Did you do it? Did you give all your money away? Would you do it just because I told you (I'm not just an author you know, but an "author'-ity figure). How about these words of wisdom that I've scribbled down for you? Will you take my advice, just because I told you to? God, I hope not. I hope you don't just do it because I said so. You're getting too old for that. Little children, they behave sometimes for the simple reason that their mothers told them to. They don't pick that gum-ball up off the floor because their mothers told them not to. They come straight home after school because their mothers told them to. And that's good, because their experience is too limited to protect them from dangers that their mothers know about. And their thinking abilities are not yet mature enough to protect them when they encounter those dangers. But look at you. You're not a kid. You're a young adult. It's time to step up. Don't just behave because you're told. And God, please don't misbehave just to prove you have the power to ignore authority (that is like ... so immature). Listen carefully to the advice of all us old fogies, think it through, add in all your own insights, your own experiences, your own angles that even us old wise ones don't have ... and make the choice like a mature young adult.

Did you get me? I'm not telling you to disregard your parents. In fact, if you're enjoying the benefits of living at home ... you'll have to add in certain elements of obligation to your thought process. For example, "Even though I think my parents are being overprotective about not letting me stay out till midnight -- dad IS letting me use his car and mom IS cooking me dinner and washing my clothes ... so I'll choose to be home by 11, like she wants me to."

Btw, if that element of "obligation" is draggin' you down, there's an easy fix (okay it's not so easy). Here it is... wash your own clothes, cook your mom dinner once in a while, get a job and buy your own damned car ... then believe me, you'll feel the power of that obligation wane.

Oops, but again, I've strayed from my point. That's okay, you've just graduated, you've got all summer to read this speech. Hey, for those of you who always cheated with HS novels and only read the cliff notes ... pat yourselves on the back for getting this far for real. See, not all speeches/books are boring. You're released now from us old folks picking and choosing books for you to read. Go to the library, poke around, you'd be surprised what people put in print these days (this text for example). Heck, if you don't find what you're looking for -- write it yourself.

Anyway, my point again -- the one that keeps slipping around like puss on a pimple not quite ripe to pop (sorry, about that greasy analogy). Don't take my advice just because I'm older (and probably smarter -- but only because of experience). Think it through, question it. Take what works for you and toss what doesn't. Make it yours. We're doing our best to raise you ... all of us. Really, us grownups, parents, teachers, I've worked side by side with them ... we all want the best for you (aside from a few grownup butt-heads). But we don't want you to be just like us (especially not like those butt-heads), we don't want you to be a mindless supercitizen. We probably forget to say it because we got so damned caught up in protecting you and equipping you -- but we so strongly want you to be you. In fact, we always say, "We want you to be successful." But what we really should say (and in fact mean in our hearts) is "We want you to be successful at being you."

SO are you gonna take my advice?

DON'T JUST SAY "YES" SO QUICKLY!

Did you give your money away to the next person that walked by?

If you didn't ... look, you're thinking for yourself. Well done.

Now lets try something a little harder. Imagine along with me ... A bunch of your friends are bored and decide to toss some water balloons on the highway. They've already filled the balloons with water and are just waiting for you to join them.

Did you go?

Yes? Hmmmm, that spark didn't work. All those facts in your head are still just like decaying body parts stitched together. There's nothing alive here.

Or ... You told your friends that they're a bunch of *ssholes. Well done. You're thinking not only for yourself, but also for others. You don't know them, but there are plenty of other people just like you driving on the highway and a water balloon to the windshield could possibly end up in a multi-car pile up causing Bill the computer guy and his son Jim who just graduated from high school like you (and your idiot friends) to swerve, without enough space to dodge the rail. Oh they went over, the car flipped unpleasantly on its topside crushing them both like ants. The life, the life that's just like yours, the one we hope to help you and them live stronger -- that life slips away from them. And Janet, BIll's wife of 20 years and Jim's mom -- Janet will never see them again even though she spent what seems like her whole life caring for, buying groceries for them, making them the best Bill & Jim possible. So you see your brilliant friends with the wet hands and giggly smiles, they ended her life too. Maybe she'll become an alcoholic and alienate any sympathetic relatives she might have.

(Copyright © 2002. Ross Anthony, RossAnthony.com/books)

So do you see ... you really have the power over life and death. You probably still think of yourself as a kid, but I swear to you the choices you make, affect all of those around you. I wish we could teach you this in high school, but it's infinitely important whether or not you pick up that water balloon. It's infinitely important that you think about drinking and putting that key in the ignition, it's infinitely important to the universe if you decide to love yourself enough, respect yourself enough that you begin to understand that other people, even strangers, deserve that same kind of love and respect. Especially respect.

Oops, now I've lost you. I went off the edge, didn't I? Sorry. I know, you wish you were just a kid ... all of that love and respect... that sounds suspiciously like responsibility. Oh yeah, you remember that word -- from the first day your third grade teacher put it up on the overhead projector, you knew the fun was over. All those syllables, you knew there was going to be a price to pay for a word that long. But you skated a bit and you danced on the edge of that word. You curled it up like a smile, like a half-pipe. You got your skateboard out and you skated, even mastered tricks on its edge and if you ever got caught, busted in the dead center of a crime. You had the perfect remedy, the "Get out of Jail Free Card." Yeah, The puppy-dog smile, the wide eyes, the quick phrase, "I'm sorry, I won't do it again." Yep, you said that phrase so many times that it became a knee-jerk reaction. Like a cat raises it's back when you pet it. You don't even know why you say it except that it'll hopefully calm the punishment and if you're lucky eliminate it all together. Ah yes, the quick apology -- it's like the boy with his finger in the hole of a dam. But you've graduated now. You've used up your last finger. No one wants to hear your selfish apologies anymore. Look at you -- you're hairy -- that means responsibility. Puberty means you have the power to create life. Are you going to play with that ability like your idiot friends with the water balloons? God, I hope not.

SO there you are ... did I work you into a frenzy just with my words? You've got the diploma and the rest of your life in front of you. Standing there with all your teenage hormones, thinking about the opposite sex in ways you'd never tell your parents, looking at your future like some fantasy land that just seems so impossible to travel to. But I swear to you right now you have the power to create life and to end it and everything in-between. You are important to the balance of the universe. Just like in "Star Wars," the decisions you make right now today -- they affect the power of the force. Will you create an imbalance in favor of the darkside? Or will you stand up like a man and use your power for the greater good. Oh go ahead, use it for yourself too. No one's asking you to give up your dreams. No, that's the beauty of it all; when one of us excels, others benefit. Like that schoolboy in Kenya, when he does well, the village benefits. Do well, but never laugh at those who haven't. Instead, find a way to help them on their path without straying from your own. I know, I know, you haven't figured out what yours is just yet. Relax, it'll find you. Just keep an eye open for it and don't be so damned lazy.

Or better said, work hard so that you deserve to be lazy. And if you don't know what that means then you're not working hard enough.

Be ready. And as for that future ... it's tonight. It's when you finish reading this. It's the next chapter. It's tomorrow morning while you're sleeping, while you're dreaming, when you wake. The future is resting on your present. It's waiting on the porch, waiting for you. It's a dragon you can tame and put to work for you. A wild horse -- breakable. A movie awaiting it's action hero. Don't let it grow taller than you.

Have fun, live, live strong, play the music loud, bunjie from a crane -- just don't be an idiot. There's quite enough of those already -- you'd just be redundant. And don't worry about fitting in either. You have the power within you to make others want to be around you. Don't give up the game to drugs and alcohol, their temporary fixes subtract inches from your height in your match of basketball against your future (and inches from your you-know-what -- I've been told). Don't treat other people badly. They're you too. We're all you. And we're all I. Isn't that incredible, millions of people running around like ants, but we've each got a heart and dreams and little feelings just like you. Be careful with us... because you are powerful.

Pay attention, not like in first period where your head bobbed like a Mexican dog and the blackboard looked blurry as a snowstorm. Pay attention, and I'm not talking about now with this speech. Don't worry about drawing inside the lines, but pay attention to what's inside other people because you have the power to make them smile or make them cry. Do you want to make them smile? Then simply pay attention.

What would you want if you were them. If you were them?

Let's practice... you be me, I'll be you. There you are sitting at my computer typing this speech. Only you're not so sure what to say ... come on think... you can do it ...type... what would you say? (Pretend you can type.) What bit of knowledge would you like to leave me (now you) so that I (you) could lead a happier more full life. Think! Do you have the words to summon the power to change a man? A young man? A boy? An embryo?

And me? If I were you. Well, I'd bring me along into you. I'd look at your future totally differently than I looked at mine at your age. At your age my future was formidable ... it was unrecognizable and definitely not much like the past and present it's actually become. But if I were you, I'd look at your future like a shimmering block of ice, I'd take a deep breath, pull together my sharp tools and begin to sculpt something beautiful. Something magnificent, something that shimmered when the light of the sun shown through it, something I'd be proud of even before others could make out the shape, even before anyone even knew what I was doing -- I'd be happy just carving -- If I were you (bringing me along). If I were you, I'd carve my future with greater care and love than I have my own, and when the heat of existence was more than the ice could bear, when my sculpture melted to a puddle and evaporated into the air, I'd be happy for the time it shimmered. I'd smile knowing my future (now past) would over and over again rain on the earth, filling the bellies of infinitely thirsty blades of grass all around the world. If I were you (bringing me along) I'd look at my future as some magnificent gift, a bull worth harnessing, a motorcycle with which to traverse the planet. I'd learn how to tune it, bore the cylinder, and then take off. If I were you looking at your future, I wouldn't be afraid as I was when I looked at mine (terrified really), but that's only because I know the future isn't so tough, it's just bluffing. You can take it. Stand up and take it.

I'm not you. Only you are you. That's an amazing indisputable fact. Only you are you. And you have the power to create or destroy life including your own. Here's another quote from "Spider-Man:"

"With great power comes great responsibility" (Sorry about that.)

But this is my speech so here's a quote from me:

"Enjoy the hell out of your life! You've already lost an hour with this speech (unless you're a smarty-pants -- in that case -- 10 minutes) and soon today will be gone too. Go live. Go be you!"

Copyright © 2002. Ross Anthony, RossAnthony.com/books

...and yes, this is a film review site.