It's the Graduation time of the Year

I had the honor of attending a good friend's college graduation yesterday (congrats Julian!). I say it was an honor because it was one of those graduations where they limit the amount of people you can invite (which is ridiculous, and I'm glad that didn't happen at mine-my family would have been up in arms), and I was lucky enough to be included with the family and Brookie. Anyhow, I digress.

We had managed to get through the parking situation, finding the location of the graduation, finding our seats (yes, there were actually assigned seats), remembering that we wanted to pick up a couple programs, adjusting camera settings to make sure we captured all important and non-important moments in the correct lighting, and starting to "observe" what everyone else was wearing at said event. I was taking some intro pictures to the stage and set up, and all of a sudden it hit me: it's been five years (pretty much to the day) since I graduated from UCSB. Holy crap. Five years. I tried to remember what was going through my mind as I graduated that fateful day, five years ago. What was I hoping to accomplish in life? What did I want to do with my life? Have those thoughts changed at all? What I could remember, and very clearly, was how I felt, physically.

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Definitely hung over. I remember napping on Sheena's shoulder during someone's commencement speech. The night before we had celebrated Ana's birthday, as well as our Chicano/Latino Graduation. My mom and grandmother had come into town that day and were staying at my place. Needless to say, a little more than awkward to stumble into my own apartment at 4 a.m. with mom and grandma sleeping in my room. Ah...college. I honestly don't know what I wanted at that point in my life. Law school had crossed my mind, but not seriously. I was excited to move back home. I wanted to find a job. I was afraid of jumping into the real world. Sometimes I think I still am.

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Fast forward past the procession into the stadium, all the graduates taking seats, Erika, Brooke and I clumsily trying to get some close up pictures of Julian...finally settling into our seats for the next hour or so of speeches. I wonder what Julian is thinking, other than ridiculously happy and proud of himself! And aside from being annoyed with the chosen student speaker (I might save that for another blog entry). All I know for sure is that he could see the happiness and pride we all felt for him. Including his dad:

I can't believe how quickly life passes you by. Five years have come and gone, and although I'm extremely happy with what I've done in those years, there's so much more I still want to accomplish with my life. I hope the next five years are as productive, if not more, than the last five.