HE GRADUATED WHAT?

I've run this I've run this I don't care how high you holding that dag on flat this is my juke joint this is my show It's My Party [Music] in The Last Story arguments against that right now and I want to see how it goes this next joint right here is our boy Vivek ramaswamy when he was 18 years old and I don't know why it's taking so long to pull up there you go right there he's 18 years old on this right here this is his high school graduation when he was the valley dictatorian of high school and then he went to Yale and Harvard and Stanford and all of the other big wig schools because he's just that guy he can hyper Focus he can work his ass off he can get things done all right and at first I didn't trust them because of that but that's hate just case y'all don't know that's called hating on somebody that's called so we're about to go check this out y'all let me know whatever y'all want me to know yeah that's not gonna happen so let's check this um bad boy out I've been racing my entire High School career but now when we're finally crossing the Finish Line I wish I could have stopped just a little earlier and caught a breath of the fresh air that it surrounded me the whole time teachers staff classmates counselors and friends I'd like to welcome you to the 2003 Saint X graduation ceremony was wild is he's 38 years old right now and he still look exactly the same other than his hairline man him and I both are victims of the hairline he had both are victims of the headline most of all to the fellow class of 2003 we are finally here yeah I I guess we finally are here but the last question facing us tonight is what this really means in one sense I feel that at long last after struggle and after success that tonight we have arrived yet in quite another sense I'm only reminded of a quote we recently read in our English class that it is better to travel than it is to arrive living the altogether confused as to how I'm supposed to feel right now the word commencement comes from the French word which means to begin and yet now we use that same word commencement to describe a ceremony marking the end to our four-year High School experience and I know the idea is a little trite for graduation ceremonies but then again it's only tried because it's true this brother man he's using word like trite I am 45 years old and I never in my life had a conversation with someone and used the word trite he was 18 here he's using words like traits have you ever used the word trite I mean it's a big deal to me but it might not be a big deal to you so tonight which is it really the climactic ending to it all or simply the launch pad from which we now Embark the only answer lies in looking at our experience and as I look back at our high school experience from the latest Sunday nights spent preparing for a week's worth of workload ahead to the lunchroom conversation spent debating the editorials and that day's issue of the blueprint to the after school hours spent sweating it out on the football field or on the soccer field or on the tennis courts or simply standing by to cheer another one of those teams on to the late night hours spent by the members of TX in the theater prepping just those last few lines for the big performance in front of the Full House and the night to follow to the eight o'clock Saturday mornings of the mock trial team spent practicing cross-examination after cross-examination just to perfect it one more time to the mission trips taken this past summer from anywhere from Over the Rhine Cincinnati to the rural areas of Peru just to make that little difference in the world in which we live yes as I look back at that High School experience I would undoubtedly forsake our arrival tonight for just another chance to travel that path once again but it's been said and correctly so that experience is like a knife its effect only determined by whether we hold it by the blade or by the handle oh my gracious that is Mars that is bars man you know how effective is that knife well it depends are you holding by the blade or by the handle baby that's how I would have said it my gracious this dude had bars at the age of 18 man look and he sound just he sound exactly the same all right so all side man this guy could potentially be the next president of the United States of America that's why we're checking this video out right now that's it's important that we check this video already here and if you don't like them so much then why don't you go in and send me your favorite president's commencement speech your favorite president's valedictorian speech you know what I mean and we would all do ourselves a grave Injustice if we were only to look at these Shining Moments for just as real as these experiences over the past four years have been our experiences of grieving end of mourning as individuals and as a community for the loss of Steve mcdevitt's mother last year and if Trevor Kramer's father this year and of Mr Mueller's father this year and of other loved ones along the way as well our experience of standing two years ago in disbelief as we watched the televisions in the library on the morning of September 11 2001 we've had these experiences and the knife of experience stabbed us at these moments as much as it did sharpen us at all the others and yet whether it was these brutal stabs or that precise sharpening that have both taken place over the past two years those experiences have already played crucial roles in shaping the people we have been and have become in high school in our senior year tonight and in the rest of our lives to come now his family was immigrants and I believe he is first generation because he was born here he is just showing the world that based off of his actions based off of him doing everything he set out to do that you can achieve anything as an American anything and he hasn't been denied yet so a lot of people look at him as being a trickster or has been potentially unsafe or not mature enough for this job yet but they fail to realize the fact that he has not failed at many things yet and and before we even discuss that we need to look at Trump too because that is one of the reasons why a lot of people felt safe with running with Trump because they know that he bust his ass and worked hard his own or what and got some things done he obviously believed in himself more than anyone else that's where we are right now when I was trying to think of the moments that struck me most over the past four years I was reminded of an encounter I had earlier in this year when I was volunteering at the Bethesda Hospital when a man approached me in the hallway from behind clutched me on the shoulder and I turned around to face him and extended his hand out to me and he said class of 1985. a little shocked and at a loss for words at the time I really extended my hand out to him as well paused for a second and I said class of 2003. that was it and the two of us went our separate ways but as I turned around and walked away that day and as I now turn around and look back at the time that's passed since then I realized that when that man said class of 1985 he meant a lot more than just the date on which he graduated for him the words class of 1985 included all of the experiences he'd had with friends with classmates with his teachers and with himself over the four years that he had spent at Saint X something more than a symbol that was stitched on his class jacket something more than a phrase printed at the top of his program at graduation tonight 18 years later the situation is still about the same tonight as we graduate our potentially mindless response class of 2003 takes on a whole new meaning one that comes to collectively include the four years preceding it more than just this graduation we've all been working toward so 18 years from now when we look someone in the eye and say that we were class of 2003 at Saint X what will that mean what will we remember when we say that we were class of 2003. we might remember that we were yet another class to have the greatest number of National Merit finalists in the state of Ohio we might remember that our cross-country team won its second state championship when we were sophomores we might remember our state-run in football last year the the trip that many of us made to Canton Ohio and the Bittersweet moment of ending up as runners-up we might remember that we were the senior class when our swim team won its 25th state championship or we might remember that the best recognition our school could give for that 25th state title was an optional fifth period lunchtime ceremony we might remember any and all of those things 18 years from now but when we say class of 2003 I doubt it'll be any of those things that will first come to mind and I think that for each of us it'll be something different but I also think that even as early as tonight we can all pretty accurately predict what that'll be no matter how far ahead we look I know that one of the things I'll remember forever will be one of my first experiences as a non-catholic Hindu at Saint X where the mass of the Holy Spirit our freshman year I hopelessly and desperately looked around at all the fellow students to see what they were doing sitting up and standing down sitting up and standing down at all the wrong times you know I was uh see path pretending to sing along to the songs I really didn't know and I'll remember how that all changed as the years passed but if I'm to remember that experience 18 years from now then I'll also be sure to remember my experience in my sophomore religion class when I was exposed for the first time not only to the ideas of a Catholic School but to the ideas of my peers you know what I've heard many commencement speeches before and I will say that this brother at the age of 18 he's extremely organized he's smooth he's given everybody their accolades he's not talking about himself he's talking about the success of the entire school and his experiences while being there and his love for just the camaraderie and everything not about his grades and about him studying over and over and over to achieve the high grades that he's received but although he did touch on that because he said they will have study sessions and they will go over it time and time again to make sure they got it right I've never been that type of that type of study or before ever ever sometimes I get in my bag when I'm doing videos and whatnot so that I can be knowledgeable about certain things just so I can speak live and and not make a fool of myself even in that I've never been this dedicated to anything but this is almost done guys so we about to really get into the meat of it and eventually of myself and I'll definitely remember emerging from Saint x with a personal faith that was neither Catholic nor strictly Hindu but was finally something that I could call my own as I was trying to figure out how it would end this speech tonight I considered ending it with a mutual wish of good luck to everyone but I'm glad I'm now stopping short of making that mistake because when I thought about it I realized that wishes into luck wishes and luck alone are not responsible for why we're here today because it's neither wishing nor luck that's gotten us to where we are it's not wishing that's letting us graduate it's not luck that got us accepted into colleges and it won't be wishing or luck that's going to carry us on its shoulders for the rest of our lives we're not here because of our good luck alone we're here because of our good work and God's help good and the sole end of that work shouldn't be achieving any great reward rather it should just be doing the work itself and receiving nothing more in a way in a way to give and not to count the cost it isn't about reaching the destination it's all about making the journey to get there and in the end we might find ourselves at a destination far from the one we have in mind tonight and so tonight we find that this graduation this commencement is neither an end nor is it a beginning but is simply another step on the journey along which we embarked long ago indeed it is better to travel than it is to arrive but if we look back at the travels over the past four years we will realize that tonight is not the destination of those travels but is instead only another stop on that Journey so tonight let that Journey begin actually excuse me it's already begun thank you all and may God bless [Music]

Channel: LFR FAMILY

Views: 60,014

Keywords: lfr family, reaction, lfr family reactions, van hall, reaction video, reactions, lfr family reaction

Id: h2fplYe9jjI

Length: 12min 26sec (746 seconds)

Published: Tue Aug 15 2023