That’s right, graduation.
This can only mean one thing: graduation ceremonies.
Graduation ceremonies can only mean one thing: Graduation speeches.
Graduation speeches can only mean one thing: wasting fifteen minutes listening to a presumably female valedictorian recap all of the boring nonsense no one cares about, proving:
1 - Just how out-of-touch she is with all of her peers.
2 - Just how tight she is with her parents and pastor.
3 - How she cares far too much about learning and far too little about having any type of intercourse.
Since, like you, I am bored to tears and teeth grinding every year when I attend a graduation commencement (only to hear the same exact speech from a different person) I thought I would offer some reprieve.
Generally, it’s only the statistically smartest kids that get to give a speech at graduation. This saddens me for a couple of reasons. First, as I mentioned above, the valedictorian is generally a super-conservative female. Why would you want to listen to her recap the journey? This is where I wish they would let the kid with the lowest graduating G.P.A. slide in and bat cleanup by giving the last of the commencement speeches. I want to hear the funny weed-head kid that actually lived it drop knowledge, not the virgin with perfect attendance that spent the weekends hanging out with her parents.
Since I graduated 45th in my class, I was not asked to give a speech at my high school commencement.
Their loss.
Being that it is once again graduation time, I decided to share the speech I would have given, had I cared enough to cheat even more in high school and solidify one of the top two slots. Maybe you can pull this up on your phone for a quick read in the coming weeks when you are stuck listening to a stupid kid bore you to migraines with her wide-eyed, cliché commencement speech. I’ll be in Evanston, IL this weekend for a ceremony at Northwestern. Hopefully, I will not be forced to pull out my phone and read my own blog.
Here we go…
“Good afternoon friends, family, faculty and Class of 2000 graduates…and Good Morning strippers,
My name is Todd.
Since most of you know me, I won’t bore you with too many details. For more information, ask either your daughter or any of the cheerleaders.
Let me first recognize all of you scholars that thought it might be humorous to garnish your hats with unfunny text and dooshey decorations. I hate you all.
While reflecting back upon my high school voyage, I was NOT reminded of any quotes from the Bible, or from Bill Shakespeare-so I won’t be leading with that predictable nonsense.
When graduation speeches don’t start with quotes from God or Billy, they generally start by saying ‘We made it!’
This one will not.
Because we didn’t make it. We graduated high school, which anyone with 70% attendance and only mild mental retardation will tell you was a complete joke. This brings me to my next point: Why are we even celebrating? We intelligent students are asking ourselves this question right about now. We ask ourselves this because being congratulated for graduating high school is like being congratulated for brushing your teeth, you didn’t really do much. But, for you dumb shits, this is your mountain-top…your one shining moment. If you’ve ever wondered what kind of person still works at a gas station after high school, it’s retards like you. So for you all, “Congratulations. You made it!” Yes, you conquered the ever-daunting education curriculum in one of the dumbest states in America with a robust C- average. Enjoy the bottom rung of the Shell Corporation ladder.
And now for you overachievers…
You studied hard. You did heaps of extra-curriculars and loaded your academic resume with tons of crap for your college entrance forms.
Look around….
Some of us did almost nothing.
We smoked drugs in the bathroom. We cut class. We got to know the truancy officers on a first-name basis. We slept through the classes we actually did attend, and we faked illnesses so we could sleep on the cots in the nurse’s office because it is are far more comfortable than doing the “straight-arm” sleep move on the classroom desks.
That’s what we did.
And somehow, we all ended up at the same finish line. All you have to show for your sacrifices is that gay sash. Magna-Cum this, Suma-Cum that, what’s the difference? Colleges don’t really care. I graduated Suma-Cum-BARELY and I’m going to college. Colleges accept students who pay them…so, see you guys there. Let this be a lesson about working hard-and how it is always a worthless idea…unless someone is naked.
At this moment, I would like to recognize those students will perfect attendance. Would you all please rise?
(applause…)
Yes….it’s you robots that scare me the most. How, in four years, did you NOT grow tired of the monotony and minutia that is every high school? The same building, same classes, same holier-than-thou teachers, same cafeteria lunches, same unquestionably gay gym teachers, same first grade-level Art class posters explaining how you need to fire up and cheer the football team on to beat this week’s opponent. How did that not nauseate you enough in four years to say ‘You know what-f_ck that sh_t, I’m staying home today?’ I see a cubicle in all of your futures. And, I imagine your status quo-asses will retire at the same pay rates you were all hired on for.
Moving on…
I will not be saying anything along the lines of ‘one chapter our lives is ending and another is beginning.’
I will also not be making reference to us being ‘The Future’ or ‘Changing the world.’ Everyone does this shit and it is 1) cliché and 2) false.
I consider it a bit premature to label ourselves ‘The Future’ after graduating from an institution that still has typewriters in the Keyboard lab. Just because you graduate from high school does not necessarily mean you are ‘The Future.’ I thought my cousin was ‘The Future’ when he graduated back in 1998. Twelve years, 50 pounds, two kids, one crystal meth habit and three arrests later, I can safely say he wasn’t ‘The Future.’ He never really changed the world. He mostly just ate cheetos.
So what is our future?
What is ‘next?’
It appears we go to college, date a hippie that is perpetually barefoot, learn pieces of every Dave Matthews Band song on acoustic guitar, get an STD, receive loads of poor academic advice from advisors that know nothing about us, get pushed through the system, pop out 4-5 years later with huge amounts of debt that we apparently exchanged for a degree we can neither pronounce nor explain-and that does not match any education requirements for any occupation listed on the internet. The best we can hope for is landing a job we hate with every fiber of our being that leaves us manically-depressed and that doesn’t compensate us enough to pay back the loans we incurred to get it. Luckily, we only have to put up with that job nine hours a day for the next 50 years. Then, we will retire at 87 with barely enough money to feed ourselves and that bitter bag of bones that pulled the goalie and stuck us with a kid 50 years back-yet hasn’t shagged us in 45. By then, Global Warming will have the year-round temperature hovering near 193 degrees and we will stay indoors all day wondering 1) if our osteoporotic arm will snap the next time we lift the 8-ounce remote control and 2) how in the hell there is still a syndication deal in place on the Miley Cyrus channel that plays all of those old “Saved By The Bell” reruns we have all seen 4,000 times.
After that, we will die….and that appears to be the good news.
There’s your future.
Lastly, I would like to take a second to clear up a couple of rumors. Though everyone always suspected it, I never had sex with (insert female’s name here). On the other hand, no one would have ever suspected that I did hit (insert female teacher’s name here).
The pleasure was all yours.
Two G’s, bitch.”
You’re welcome,
