Edison Graduation, take 2

As I walked into the gym this morning, I had the eerie feeling that I was missing my mortar board. I think I would have felt more at home in cap and gown than seated up on stage with Mrs. Gray, Mr. Springer and Mr. Barber. When I looked down at the graduates, I didn't actually see their faces most of the time. Instead, I saw my own classmates, now scattered and about to scatter much father. I saw Puran, Anthony, Sammy, Danielle, Monica, and Sophia, all sitting there waiting to turn that tassel. The people who were actually in front of me look like fourth graders, as if they hadn't changed at all since I left.
As great as it was to be back there, seeing all the teachers that I loved and still love, and seeing some of the brightest kids in the city wearing their gym uniforms, I felt out of place there. I have two alma maters now, but no real school. I don't go to Yale yet. I have hardly even been there. I have little enough right to call myself a Yalie. And so I am displaced, much as those eight graders are. They don't belong at Edison anymore, but they don't yet belong at Northside or Whitney or Lincoln. Highschools only have three classes over the summer, but they also have 5. 4 is the least appropriate.
I got a lot of praise for my speech, but I'm not really convinced. The speech itself, in its written form, I was pleased with. The delivery, though.... I think it could have been very bad. I have a very stiff mannner in that formal context, which usually doesn't serve me very well. In this case, I wasn't exactly sure what to do with the podium or microphone. My dad tells me that I didn't come off as nervous at all, but I think that is a lie. I know that once I got through the middle of the first page, I became more comfortable. I noticed that myself. So maybe I wasn't nervous seeming by the end.
And I forgot to bring my camera. So sorry, if you missed it you missed it. There are no pictures, and I have no video. Just the text of the speech and the collective memories of my parents and myself.