Three: The number of times I’ve graduated so far in my life. When I transitioned from elementary to middle school, there was pizza party. Middle school to high — also a pizza party. High school to college was pizza party with slightly higher expectations.
Two: The number of weeks I have until graduating from college. There is no more pizza. I repeat, there is no more pizza.
Despite the pomp and circumstance surrounding college graduation, there is not enough pizza in the world to make me feel like I did when I graduated all those times before, to recall some semblance of that familiarity and comfort. It used to be that graduating was about partying — celebrating a significant change, but change that would be accompanied by some sort of relative familiarity regarding whatever was coming next.
I don’t think anything can create that feeling this time around.
Because when I am prompted to toss a cap off my head into the air on a sure-to-be-chilly December day, I will not be doing so with an air of pronounced levity, but one of weighted contemplation about whatever’s coming next.
For the first time in my life, my options no longer include any modicum of “more of the same.” Depending on how my graduate school applications turn out, this might be the very last time I ever graduate again. Since graduation is supposed to herald some kind of new stage in life, I guess I've been thinking more and more about what it all means, the process of graduation. I mean, the average graduation ceremony isn’t exactly a rite of passage signaling some sort of personal growth. So far, graduating has been a customary process of putting off an acceptance of an uncertain future through congratulations and celebration.
In two weeks, there won't be anything to assuage mine and hundreds of other students' uncertainty of what comes next. No more cheese and pepperoni, just mortgages and health insurance. No tests or parties, just work. This graduation will mark my first real milestone, a singular moment that will mark the stage of my life where all responsibilities of my life will sit squarely on my shoulders. And as much as I would rather chill and eat pizza all day, life needs living, and nobody's going to do it for me.
Things will be decidedly different from here on out. Odds are that everyone I know will begin new lives, lives that will lead them on trajectories far away from the commonalities we have now. And I will do my best to cope, but I will still be confused by all the change.
Faced with the uncertainty, I only wish I had more pizza.
Reach the columnist at arjun.chopra@asu.edu
Want to join the conversation? Send an email to opiniondesk.statepress@gmail.com. Keep letters under 300 words and be sure to include your university affiliation. Anonymity will not be granted.
