I’ve always wanted to be the kid who falls during graduation. The one who has enough courage to say, “Hey, look at me. I can’t even walk across the stage … can you believe I’m graduating?” I have a friend here who did actually fall when crossing the stage, and my admiration for her grows in leaps and bounds each day.
Clara Morris, a 2003 graduate of Walt Whitman High School, had been planning for her graduation since 10th grade. “I pretended to jump in the air in celebration, and on the second jump, instead of landing on my feet, I turned towards my right and landed on my side. Then I pretended to be hurt and [lay] on the ground for a while,” she remembered.
In this time of exchanging heartfelt graduation cards and copies of “Oh, the Places You’ll Go!,” the month of May on college campuses is a time to impart wisdom. There are many beneficial life lessons we can learn from the story of the girl who took the plunge on graduation day.
In the thick graduation packet given to all members of Morris’ senior class, it said in big black capital letters, “DO NOT TRY TO BE AN INDIVIDUAL ON GRADUATION DAY. YOU MUST CONFORM.” “I was like, yeah right,” Morris remembers. Throughout life there will constantly be societal pressure to conform to the norm. It’s up to you to stand up to that pressure, to maintain your individuality. Wear those ugly plaid sweater vests if that’s what you like, rock out a mohawk, forget the pressure to get a “real job” right away, and go bartend around the world for a year.
“I almost didn’t do it,” Morris said of her big fall, “even though I had told all my friends and family I was going to. Right up to the point, I wasn’t sure if I was going to do it or not. I was nervous and had a lot of conflicting feelings.” Being nervous and second-guessing yourself is an important part of making big decisions. You should always listen to the little voice on your shoulder advocating reason and intelligence. But just as quickly, ignore that little voice, because most of the best stories will come from the times when you ignored the intelligent reasons and just did it.
Practice and preparation lead to glory. Morris prepared for her big day by securing her mortarboard with a Nike sweatband so it wouldn’t come off in the height of action. Morris also practiced her move several times before she strode across the stage.
At the moment of the actual fall, “There wasn’t much going through my mind,” Morris said. “I was concerned about space because I had less space than I though I was going to. But mostly I just thought, ‘There’s no going back now.'” Once you commit to a decision, there comes that moment when you have to just go for it with all of your body and soul. It’s that point on the high diving board when your weight is too far over the edge to come back, and you can either do a graceful swan dive into the pool while the hot lifeguard is watching, or a loud, painful belly flop because you chickened out at the last second and couldn’t salvage anything. So there’s no going back now – just go for it with everything you’ve got.
“After the initial fall, I was just on the ground holding my knee, and my plan was to stay down till the count of five. But it was so silent and awkward that I stayed down only until three,” Morris remembers. Flexibility is another key to success. Morris realized that staying down for the extra two seconds would push her stunt across the line from funny to obnoxious. She subsequently adapted to the situation rapidly. Wherever you find yourselves in the coming years, this flexibility will be essential.
Lastly, it’s always important to look ahead toward the next horizon, no matter how beautiful the last one was. “I’m a little bit anxious about what I’m going to do when I graduate college,” Morris said. “I feel it has to be a step above, something funnier, and I don’t have any ideas.”
Best of luck to all seniors, students, faculty and staff. In the words of the last Calvin and Hobbes, “It’s a magical world, Hobbes ol’ buddy … Let’s go exploring!”
Melanie Lidman is a junior journalism and Spanish double major. She can be reached at mlidman@umd.edu.
