Friday, May 9, 2014

Last band concert (this year).


(Note to self: stop wearing hearing aids to band concerts.)

The members wore black, as usual, except, to celebrate their last concert the seniors were permitted to wear any reasonable thing they wished to. The girls wore pretty dresses, Hamilton wore his blue shirt. There’s not much to say about men’s outfits.

The only newsworthy item of the event is Emily’s haircut. It’s moved her from school girl to young woman. My tin ear was not impressed by the music, and the point of the evening seemed to be recognizing the seniors, and distributing tokens of appreciation for jobs well done to everyone, and especially the departing seniors. They were honored last, and the affair became quite raucous.


Emily's haircut; girls in pretty dresses


Hamilton, even farther away
Taken with cell phone on close up and held high over my head
Not too bad

A booklet of all senior’s pictures with short statements of their aspirations was my highlight. I laughed out loud early on, and then took great pains to contain my amusement as required. Highlights of mostly the amusing follow. All these youngsters have been accepted to a college and most have a string of scholarships.

Michael: Upon graduation I wish to be a Pharmacist and participate in Doctors without Borders program to distribute medication to the less fortunate in Latin America. (He probably will.)

Zach: Plans to become an overweight P.E. teacher who can’t even do a push-up, who makes his students run laps while he rides a golf cart around the field.

Reagan: The Peace Corps, then work in a hospital, and after that field work for the U.N. (I’d bet on her, too.)

Abby: Plans to graduate from Ohio State, move to Tybee Island with her two best friends and become a successful emergency room physicians assistant. After saving his life she will then fall madly in love with Indians outfielder, Michael Brantley. They will have three beautiful children and live in the tropics with their many dogs.

Brian: After college, plans to travel Southeast Asia to be trained in various forms of martial arts by the League of Shadows leader. He then plans to return to Gotham and be the hero they deserve and spend the rest of his days fighting crime.

Samantha: to find a successful career that makes a lot of money so I can travel the world and visit all 7 continents. Then eventually settle down in a warm climate, become a beach bum with my husband, 3 kids and Dalmatian. Playing my flute on the street corner at night for some extra spending money.

Caroline: After graduating will spend a few years married to each member of One Direction and possibly one or two of the Franco brothers, after which she intends to use the alimony to travel the world fighting crime and leading feminism revival movements while living in a tree to protest deforestation.

Joseph: After college will travel deep into the Amazon to find himself and return to a changed society where he will be alone, soon to return to the Amazonian people where he will then be made their chief and live out his life in peace.

Betsy: Finally getting my Hogwarts Letter in the mail, watching Leonardo DiCaprio earn his Oscar, going on a quest to find Waldo, and becoming a Pokémon master.

Calvin: I want to go into space at least once.

Bobby: Graduate college with a degree in Digital Arts and Animation, go on to becoming a Walt Disney Imagineer, and last retire and work as a monorail operator at Walt Disney World Resort  in Florida.


Marisa: Become an Intervention Specialist and marry a doctor/lawyer/CEO and have a few beautiful babies. If that doesn't work out I’m opening a paint-a-plate store with my friend Heather.

22 comments:

  1. They also have a sense of humour.Entering the real world,they're going to need one!
    Jane x

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  2. Love their ambitions. I hope they achieve rather a lot of them. Including the unconventional.
    Big smiles here this morning - thank you.

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  3. Hari OM
    Awww bless. Let's face it, which of us really knew then and is where we thought we would be??? YAM xx

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  4. You know what I love the most? It's that these kids are permitted to be as outrageous as they want. I graduated high school in 1959... we were so straight-laced.... so "by the book"... and I was such an outcast... my crazy sense of humor was not only frowned upon... our high school "predictions" were more like... I want to find a way to have peace in the world and crap like that. I love these kids and don't even know them... but they are the future that needs a sense of humor and a sense that we aren't really as important as we'd like to think. Again... your blog is an inspiration.... and your kids are too!

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  5. Just a bit more.... I'm reading that grape jelly is an incentive for orioles to visit feeders. I haven't done this yet... don't think I've lived down the oriole incident of 20 or so years ago (that Bill reminds me of every time we see an oriole feeder)... but If we were in Ohio a little longer I'd be tempted to do the oranges, the orange nectar AND that damned grape jelly... just to see if I could attract some orioles and do a "na na na na na na" dance in front of Bill in celebration ;-)

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  6. All of them have something to offer to the world, including a huge sense of humor and massive hopes for themselves and others. Oh, how i would love to have a time machine.

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  7. Tell Reagan to slip med school in there post peace corps and pre hospital....she'll get a better gig.
    Nice post.

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  8. It was interesting reading the future goals of these kids. I can't even remember what my goal was. I I do know I'd never heard of Doctors without Borders or the United Nations so my goals I'm sure were not quite as lofty.

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  9. No shortage of humor in that class!

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  10. I enjoyed reading the students' predictions. Thanks for sharing.

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  11. You are one marvel of a woman to be raising your grandchildren, working for the city, blogging, and attending all other matters. I congratulate your grandson for graduating this year and for you being there for them. -- barbara

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  12. Those are outstanding. I wish I had goals that big (and that funny, in some cases). I loved Favorite Young Man's high school band concerts. They were the best high school band I've ever heard. He was also in the jazz band and I could have listened to them play all day. Oh, Lord, I miss my babies.

    Love,
    Janie

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  13. I loved attending my daughter's band concerts. They raised the hair on my arms and the back of my neck! Heck, even thinking about it is raising those hairs :) There's something about a live performance that is really moving.

    Sounds like it moved you a slightly different direction :)

    Fun predictions by those kids.

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  14. I do like Emily's hair cut and I do agree, it "matures" her. Bittersweet the last band concert for the seniors (Hamilton included). So many memories they must have of their band years, no matter how many different bands/schools they might have been in. I loved reading their aspirations, I can see you laughing out loud, I was doing the same with some of them here.

    betty

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  15. My money's on Zach.

    And Caroline needs to get better taste in men, or she's destined for a life of heartache.

    Not that I have tendencies towards judging the joking plans of strangers.

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  16. I had fun reading this Joanne !

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  17. Caroline's future plans are a little--dubious.
    Emily does look so much more grown up with her hair cut.

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  18. Love Emily's new hair style. Great comments from the students.

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  19. Marisa made me laugh.

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  20. well, shoot, you should have laughed. I'd have been laughing with you.

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  21. "There’s not much to say about men’s outfits" - I think that fact says good amount about the differences between men and women.
    Lots of humor in those kids which is good because having humor does help. Even having a crazy plan is better than no plan at all.

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  22. Wow! I loved reading those aspirations. You can really see their personalities. Too wonderful!

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