A few weeks ago I wrote a sappy piece on graduation. After the actual graduation took place, it got me thinking that graduation is a lot like a bar or bat mitzvah. Allow me to explain. After years of attending many simchas, Baruch Hashem, you realize they are all pretty much alike within certain parameters. Cute kid, funny-looking kid, good voice or bad voice, speech too fast, too slow or you just can’t understand it because the kid needs a little speech therapy. The mother of the kid finally lost the weight, still needs to lose weight or, good for her, doesn’t really care what she looks like. The food at the simcha is amazing, terrible, can’t recall because I spent the last two days in the bathroom…you know what I am saying.
It has gotten to a point that a few days after the simcha, I will say to the person making the simcha, “Your kid was amazing, the food was incredible and you looked stunning.” Because, let’s face it, what are you really going to say to the person making the simcha? “Does your kid know how to read Hebrew? The food was terrible, I hope you at least got a good deal and who helped you pick out that dress—does she like you?” Ya, even I would never be that honest. But with everyone saying the same thing—who are we really helping? The point being, there is so much sadness and tragedy in this world, we need these happy occasions to keep us from going insane. So let the kid make mistakes, bring on the food poisoning and who really cares what anyone is wearing…lets just celebrate. All of our kids are perfect, even when they aren’t and we love our friends for who they are not what they wear..well at least I hope so because I dress like a homeless person on a good day.
This brings us to graduation. There has been a Facebook posting overflow of graduation photos, posts and comments. I have been guilty of these as well. Parents writing things like, “So proud of Jimmy and all that he has accomplished…we can’t wait to see what the future holds.” Ah yes, we are so proud of Jimmy. He graduated without getting arrested and he maintained a solid D average. We only had to ground him every other month and he finally passed his road test after failing it seven times. But we are never letting him drive because we don’t trust him. My point? No one is writing any of that on Facebook because what purpose would it serve? Jimmy’s parents are proud of him and they are hopeful for his future. Just like we all are for our kids. Even if every parent-teacher conference for 11 years were total nightmares, Jimmy’s parents held on to every positive comment that they heard, even if those comments were just adjectives used to describe the terrible things Jimmy was doing in class.
We go to graduation and beam with pride when we see our kids in their caps and gowns. Did they only pass Chemistry because the teacher was magnanimous and felt bad for his student that only got an eight on the final? Once that student has her diploma, no one will ever know and everyone will still pat that kid on the back and say congratulations. Because, again, with all of the bad stuff that goes on, we need the good stuff, even if it is good stuff wrapped in some white lies. So let us tie this all together…never tell anyone what you actually think, because no one really wants to know and it serves no useful purpose. Saying something nice is just as easy as saying something nasty and in the end, we all just want to feel special and loved. Whether it be at your kid’s bar mitzvah or graduation. Whether your kid was valedictorian or whether your kid can’t spell valedictorian.
And if this column didn’t make any sense, you can still feel free to be honest with me because I am a middle child and I can take it. Well, actually, I can’t, I just pretend to because middle children are good at that as well.
By Banji Latkin Ganchrow
Banji Ganchrow can be reached at [email protected]. Apparently some of you were trying to reach her and didn’t know how…
