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May 9th 2008

Him & Her:
A Grand Graduation
by Nancy and Dan Sapir

HIM: Two weeks ago we attended a graduation ceremony. There wasn’t an empty seat in the house as throngs of people jammed in trying to get a chair with a view of the makeshift stage where the recent graduates would receive their scrolled certificates, glance out into the crowd in search of the parents and relatives that had journeyed from throughout the South Shore for this auspicious occasion. Flashes were going off from cameras of every make from the moment the graduates marched in accompanied by the stirring music that typifies such events. The emotions were rising to a fevered pitch as the names were called in alphabetical order.

Steven and Michelle Sapir of Tall Timbers Road with graduate Hailey.

It seemed to take forever to get to the S’s when it would be our turn to cheer, commemorating a rite of passage that only a family member could appreciate. Yup. Pre-school graduation was a hoot. Certainly something every 3-year-old should participate in.

I hate to admit it but she made me go. “What kind of a grandfather are you anyway? What’s more important to do today then going to your granddaughter’s graduation?” I never remember going through these kinds of graduations when I was a kid. You started kindergarten and that was it, the beginning of your formal education. Kids back home in New Jersey never even heard of pre-school. I don’t think I ever heard of Montessori until I was in my 30’s.

I got to thinking about this whole nursery school thing and checked the yellow pages. My god, they’re all over the place. And the names are so, so nursery school, with names like Captain Pal, Growth Unlimited, KidsPort, Kinder College, Pied Piper, Super Kids, and Tiny Town. Then there’s Noah’s Ark (wonder if they offer discounts for two), and my favorite name, Miss Jo-Anne’s Bright Beginnings (I think I need to enroll). I must admit I love the slogan at the Children’s Workshop in Kingston, “Where play is a child’s work.” When did all these places spring up? I bet they all have their own graduations, just like the one we went to. Kids were running in every different direction. Kids just seem to always run; they never seem to walk…just, run. They never look where they run and it is often into some one or some thing. It always seems that at such events there is always one kid that starts crying, just as all the important stuff is beginning.

The more you try to shut the kid up the worse they get until the crying becomes a screeching. Only a two-year-old could make such sounds. I started fidgeting and she started squeezing my arm so I wouldn’t say something ugly. It was then she told me that the sounds were coming from our youngest granddaughter, Emily. The graduate we had come to cheer on was Emily’s sister, Hailey. Sibling rivalry had once again presented itself. Did you ever notice the looks of other parents when a crying kid in the audience is drowning out the ceremony?

It’s like a controlled rage. Their lips tighten, the forehead develops deep furrows and they look like they just smelled something very bad. You know you’re in trouble when 80% of the audience looks like that.

It’s at that point when one more child is rushed from the hall. Once again we can return to the pomp and circumstance of the moment. I couldn’t help but eye the 20 boxes of Mama Mia’s Pizza that was being set up as the graduation was nearing its conclusion. The dessert table was to die for along with another table laden with dips, meatballs and other delicacies. Things were looking up.

Next the little grads sang songs. Ever notice that there are always a couple of kids that always know all the words? Most of the kids hum along on the hard parts and jump in full blast for the chorus. What I like about that age is that if they don’t know the song, they just stand there and don’t sing. Nobody seems to care.

It ocurred to me that there is no way a production like this can fail. Everybody was loving it. I glanced over at her. She never felt my stare. She was far away. I imagined a day, 33 years ago at the South Shore Hospital when our Steve was born. I fast-forwarded to the day he and Michelle were married. Then came Hailey, that would be our graduate. We were witness to all that had happened those years ago, and it was all beginning to take shape again, in a church basement, amid screaming kids, pizza, cameras, and oh yes, tears. I was grateful we had been a part of it.

HER: Of course when he went to school they used an abacus and bought twenty huge candy bars for fifty cents after walking three miles to the store in bare feet in winter in six feet of snow. I come from a town of Polish and Russian immigrants whose idea of education was learning how to count U.S. currency. If you could read and write after that, it was a bonus.

Today parents are kinder to their kids. I always tell mine that I wish I had been as good to them as I am to their children. Those little kids at the ceremony live their lives cushioned by love and attention. No one screams and no one spanks. No one sticks a thumb in their little armpits or gives them that ‘wait until I get you home’ look. Of course, the kids are out of control, but no one seems to mind except us old folks who sneer at other people’s grandchildren and wish we could give them one right upside the head. But, as it happened, it was one of ours who had to be taken from the room. The poor little thing must not have been feeling well or she never would have disrupted the graduation thus causing her aunt to miss the whole thing.
And leave it to him to notice the food first although it really was good, and now I know that I’ll never have trouble getting him to Hailey’s school again. If one of our kids ever won the Nobel Peace Prize, before he’d commit to attending the ceremony he’d have to know the caliber of the refreshments first.

But these are the times that make memories. Little Hailey will one day say, “Remember when Grampy fell asleep at my nursery school graduation and didn’t wake up until they gave him pizza?” Or “ Remember when Grampy fell asleep at my first, second, and third birthday parties while he was watching a ballgame?” “And how about the time Grampy wouldn’t let me watch “Finding Nemo” because he wanted to watch football?”

Then again, they might say “Grampy always made us laugh.” Or “Grampy went back to work after my party even though he was so tired.”

This is what life is all about-little kids singing off-key while their families applaud them madly. This may be the sweetest music life has to offer.