Students, Faculty, Board of Trustees, Parents, Friends, Special Guests, all colleagues in learning.
Since 1960, my 8th grade graduation, I have attended or participated in at least one graduation ceremony most every year. The content of what was said has almost completely left me. I do remember a few, my own graduation from Berkeley, not because of the speeches but because I was with my new dear friend Janet and that 1/3 of the graduating class marched out in protest to the booing of family and friends. That I remember, but the speeches? And here I am speaking at a graduation.
I fear that you will remember little of what I say tonight and I am challenged to have something stick in your memory that connects your experience here at MiraCosta with all that you will do in your future. I have therefore tried to reduce my topic to its essence and spare you the burden of soon to be forgotten details.
(Musical excerpt from Pinball Wizard from the rock opera Tommy is heard here)
We spring into action showing a course of great promise but quickly fall subject to the gravity of the game which draws us toward new destinies obstructed by immutable objects that propel us in new directions.
Despite the rapid redirections and narrow escapes we ultimately are destined to pass through the great flipping gate only to fall out of the game and cue up to begin again.
It doesn't take long before we question the empty repetitiveness of this effort.
How does one break the loop and advance in the game?
Perhaps we could be a bumper, implacable, reactionary and rooted in the game, reactively propelling aspirants in new and unexpected directions.
...better yet we could become a flipper and lie in wait to offer second and third chances.
...we could move outside the game and guide the flippers themselves--master of the game.
...we could simply step away. And the game we just left... Merely a bumper in a greater fractal game.
As your nested games grow in scope and complexity, relish the connectedness of it all. And, as you now step away from this game, if you remember nothing else, remember this--