Ludington: Thoughts of Texas school shootings tarnish joyful graduation day
The California day felt perfect despite clouds and the coolness of the breeze from Monterey Bay. The families and faculty festooned the fence around the school courtyard with colorful paper flowers and placards with student names. Parents, siblings, grandparents and friends filled the chairs in front of a platform erected for the afternoon’s graduation celebration and eighth-grade promotion ceremony.
“Pomp and Circumstance” played over the sound system as the students processed — seven graduates and eight eighth-graders about to enter high school. The school is the Santa Cruz City Schools Alternative Family Education charter school, better known as AFE, a program for home school families.
The eighth-graders went first, proceeding to the platform one by one to receive a flower and a certificate from the assistant superintendent of schools. The self-confident ones said thanks to family and teachers. The shy ones skipped the microphone and returned to their seats quickly.
More: A look at Southeast Polk High School's 2022 commencement ceremony photos
Then came the seniors. Our granddaughter, Lucy, opened the ceremony with a sentimental song of farewell. Next, the first supervising teacher stepped forward and introduced the first of her graduates. With a small class, the ceremony was highly personal with reminiscences of each student’s time at AFE.
Following their introduction, each student gave a speech thanking family, teachers and friends, shared inside jokes and what they plan to do next — summer jobs, college, a job at a bookstore in Paris, study at a comedy school in Chicago.
Like the eighth-graders, each senior received a flower followed by the presentation of a diploma from the assistant superintendent. When the presentations were complete, the class stood, made the traditional moving of tassels and tossed their mortar boards in the air.
Two hours later, we sat in the community center auditorium and listened to the fourth- through eighth-grade students from our granddaughter Geneva’s school present a strings recital, each piece receiving resounding applause from the standing-room-only audience.
Through it all, I thought about 19 students in Uvalde, Texas, who will never graduate, who will never receive the applause and cheers of family and friends, where the only tears falling are those of profound sorrow, not joy.
I thought of empty seats that should have been filled by parents, grandparents and friends who died at churches, supermarkets and shopping malls.
And then I thought of all the politicians who sell the lives of Americans for a contribution from the gun lobby.
Margaret Ludington has lived in Altoona since 1971. She is a retired staff writer and editorial writer for the Herald-Index. Margaret is a mother of two, grandmother of four. She and her husband travel frequently and have visited every state except Alaska and five Canadian provinces.
This article originally appeared on Des Moines Register: Ludington: Thoughts of Texas shootings tarnish joyful graduation day
