For my high school graduation, I was blessed with the gift of delivering my class’ salutation. While this message was & is addressed to the Class of 2022, my prayer is that it inspires parents and students alike, serving as an encourager from the past, and for the students struggling in the younger grades to know that there is ALWAYS light at the end of the tunnel. You are loved and you are needed in this world.
Heart-stuttering, I stood outside the football field gates, soccer bag in one hand, neon spikes in the other while trying to figure out a way to convince my dad that the padlock on the big black fence meant that we couldn’t enter its domain and play. It wasn’t that I didn’t want to kick a ball around with my best friend, to play the sport I loved more than life, to feel a rare burst of confidence behind every header, every pass, and every shot. It was the fact that unlike my mole-hole ridden backyard, out here on the high school lot everyone could see me. Everyone could see every wild shot, every God-help-me dribble, and every off-by-a-mile pass I made, and as a thirteen-year-old girl who paled at the thought of being the center of attention, I was determined to keep, what felt like the world, from seeing all of my failures, imperfections, and most importantly, insecurities. However, before I could convince my dad to stop his scheme of jumping over the fence, a car pulled up and a man with a large key chain came walking towards us, as my dad introduced him as Columbia’s athletic director, to which I silently cursed him for foiling my nearly won attempt of turning around and going home.
Yet now, five years later, I smile and shake my head at the memory, for I didn’t know that that man’s daughter would become one of my best friends, taking me under her wing freshman year and continuing to grow closer and closer through all of life’s transformations. I didn’t know that when I met the two football coaches the following summer that they would be the ones who helped me make the painful transitions from adolescence to adulthood, first my freshman year as I adjusted to high school, then sophomore year as I suffered and rehabbed through a career-ending injury. I didn’t know that when Covid hit and kept me from seeing my tribeswomen that the field would become my safe space, my meditation center, the place where my pen and journal sparked to life and my tears fell from watching our nation crack and crumble due to the hatred and political divisions wide as canyons and steep as cliffs. This place became my home, not because of the dawn’s warm rays on my skin or the way the turf tickled my toes but because of the people here who helped me find my worth. The weights coaches who made me blush from such praise, unaccustomed to acknowledgement for my grit and intensity in such a male dominated field. The friends who’ve sent me snorting until my sides ached, chasing balls and running around as long as the summer sun stayed in the sky. The teachers who helped me feel comfortable out here again after someone took away my safe space as I finally learned how to wield my voice and channel all I’ve learned from these into who I am today.
And now, class of 2022, I offer the same gift that the stars above blessed me with when they brought me here – an eternal state of home. A place to rest and recover, a platform to leap from as we enter life’s next great chapter. Leaving behind our familiar environment is frightening, to say the least, especially since our high school years have been nothing but chaotic given the past two years. We have lost so much, so many memories never made, so many experiences never had, and so many relationships never built. But in spite of all that, we did it. We graduated high school. We bounced back in a tidal wave of adrenaline, courage, and heart to reclaim what was once ours. And that is something no one on this earth or in the heavens can ever take away from us. Therefore, my fellow classmates, my prayer for y’all is this – that we may carry the confidence, love, and support we’ve been given over the past four years forever in our souls, that we may use the sweet memories of the past as catalysts for our future to be the change we wish to see, and that we may hold true to the callings in our hearts to fulfill the universe’s dream of us. We are the future, and no matter whether we’re two miles from our hometown or halfway across the country, may we remember that we are loved, unapologetically in each and every moment, and that the lights of home will always guide us to where we’re meant to be.
Last Love 