<p>shaw - what a great story! And I’m so glad that your mother will see your S graduate.</p>
<p>Nice story, Shaw. </p>
<p>I wish it was easier to get elderly/slow moving folks in and out of the typical graduation venues.</p>
<p>Congrats to all of your kids and to all of you as well. Very moving stories, tpt and Shaw, wow. I have been mostly lurking for the last five years. But I just stopped by to share that my non-neurotic '13 S just let me know that he is indeed a '13! He just handed in his last paper, four years over in a flash. And to celebrate his commencement along with his dream job offer, we’re insanely going straight from graduation to Machu Picchu.</p>
<p>Good to hear from you neuroticparent! Congrats on the graduation news and the career launch for S! Hooray! What a wonderful trip! It will be a very memorable journey!</p>
<p>Congrats to your S, neuroticparent. Machu Piccchu, wow!</p>
<p>tpshorty!!
Whoo-hoo!! Awesome news!!</p>
<p>tpshorty so awesome ,</p>
<p>np yay for your son</p>
<p>Shaw you always rigt such interesting things. For a person who got through advanced math only, those math geniuses always impress me.</p>
<p>MP, my mother is not slow physically or mentally, despite her age. In one of the weird twists of events, my mother never got any exercise when I was growing up became an exercise aficionado after the Guillain-Barr</p>
<p>That’s fabulous, Shaw. Even when my parents were a bit younger, events like graduations that involved lots of arena stairs were problematic (knees).</p>
<p>I pretty much bit through my tongue last night. Son doesn’t have Friday classes and worked a full shift yesterday…then he came home and took a nap. Fine. But then when he woke up, he complained about what I had made for dinner (I am having a difficult time making meals that will please carnivores, a vegetarian, and a gluten free nut-allergic person), and he complained that we were using the TV on which he wanted to play a video game. I had tortured myself earlier in the day by looking up when his graduation would have been had he made it through his original school. I didn’t yell “Leave the freakin’ nest already!”</p>
<p>Wow, this is a first! I’m usually the one who doesn’t post over the weekends.</p>
<p>Younger D’s show went beautifully. Some neighbors came to see it with us. That was sweet of them…but they bragged nonstop about their own kid - wouldn’t mind, except that their kid grew up to be a not very nice person. Seriously, I am so proud of your kids, and the kids of my friends IRL when they accomplish great things. But this neighbor kid has turned into the sterotypical narcissistic athlete who only speaks to other “popular” kids…he spent unnumbered hours at our house when he was little, and could walk past D, H and I and not even acknowledge us. Hearing parents brag about that kid is difficult.</p>
<p>Glad that younger D’s show went so well. Does high school wrap up in May where you are?</p>
<p>Lots of parents seem to have some pretty rose-colored glasses on when talking about their kids – and not in a good way.</p>
<p>Such sad news about the soccer referee who just died after a 17-year-old punched him after getting a yellow card. Maybe it is because I am an unathletic slug, but what could possibly be the rationale for hitting a referee, ever? I saw kids DQ’d in swimming events for illegal strokes – sometimes even after they thought they’d won their heat – and I never once saw a kid so much as yell at a stroke judge.</p>
<p>missy - glad your D’s show went well. I also have a situation with a set of neighbors/friends who talk nonstop about their kids (well 2 of them anyway), but never even bother asking about our kids. I mean not ever! We both have HS juniors and while we have been told all about their child’s classes, EC’s , friends, boyfriends, colleges she’s looking at, and even her SAT scores(!) we have never even been asked once in 3 years how S is doing (he attends a different HS). Same for the older kids. We hear the whole scoop and not even a how/what is she doing about ours. It’s starting to drive me nuts.</p>
<p>arabrab- I hadn’t heard about the soccer referee. As a parent of a former travel soccer player, I am horrified.</p>
<p>Missy and Fallgirl - we must have the same neighbors.</p>
<p>Hey there 13ers! I just tuned in for the first time in ages to catch up with graduations etc. We had a big lifestyle change in April last year, moved into the rural area of Zimbabwe near the Nyanga mountains (for those intrepid google earth mappers(!). We tired of the urban infrastructural breakdown in Harare, and fell out quite spectacularly with my husbands 3 adult children who had all relocated to Africa, groan,(in their twenties, two of them addicts in early recovery, blah de blah, my stepmothering of over 20 years has been a sore and hard lesson, but I dont hold onto the anguish. Miss my two step grandkids badly though) It is GORGEOUS, we are back in the bush, our own dam, eland passing us nightly, my husband has re-invented himself as a cattle trader (buying from local villagers and selling to the urban abbatoirs). I am now Chairman of the small, and very beautiful village where we live, and have just secured some funding for a small property development project. (Which is a miracle, as Zim is still a pariah state by most measurements, internal interest rates, 26%, yes per annum!, and I managed to get regional funding at 8%). Anyway, weve been busy. My precious Son about whom I used to wail 4 years back, that I knew very little, is still inimitably keeping me much in the dark. He is graduating with a BFA major in studio art, minor theatre. His senior year project was in landart, he was home over Christmas and did some amazing stuff in the local waterfalls, and lakes, (google Andy Goldsworthy for the concept if its of any interest). He has been cast in a movie, as the lead an Irish magician whose gf is a schizophrenic in a mental home .mmmm not for major redistribution, but hey hes happy, independent, and has LOVED his American liberal arts education.I am not going to be there for his graduation, funds bit tight, but his Dad will be there. He is coming home in July for a month, we are going to give him 6 acres of land in the village, and hope like hell that he builds something on it one day as his Graduation Gift! He is then going back to the US for a years work on a post grad working visa. He has a gorgeous gf, they parted summer 2011 to allow some personal growth and are just back together again, she graduated a year before him. She is an Amercian girl, so who knows I may be over visiting grandchildren in NY one day! Hope you open up a post grad thread, will keep an eye open for it. Kudos to you all for the lovely life story this thread has been.</p>
<p>Zim! So good to hear from you!</p>
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<p>Great to year from you, Zim. Thanks for checking in. Hey, those whose kids are graduating, is anyone else giving acres of land as a grad gift?</p>
<p>No land from us. But, I do love the idea of land as a gift. Very permanent and tied to his upbringing even if he is not there.</p>
<p>ShawSon doesn’t want a graduation present, though a) I’ll invest a little bit in his new company; and b) we’ll help him get a new car when the current 1996 model dies. </p>
<p>I have always wanted a house in the mountains. When ShawSon was younger, he told us that when he grew up, he was going to buy us a house in the mountains. Who knows? Stranger things have happened.</p>
<p>Here’s an interesting article that says that college graduates are doing pretty well in the job market relative to others: <a href=“College Graduates Fare Well in Jobs Market, Even Through Recession - The New York Times”>College Graduates Fare Well in Jobs Market, Even Through Recession - The New York Times. Maybe that will give some comfort to those of us whose kids don’t have jobs.</p>
<p>Hi Zim. The new place sounds amazing; glad you’re enjoying it.</p>
<p>No acres to give away here. </p>
<p>Just looked at my new RE tax assessment. My house has gone up 20% in two years since the last one – and one of the comps they used is for a home by a locally well-known but weird architect that the RE listing described as in the “Expressionist Pyramid” style. Which is a surely a lot like my Victorian. Two of the others are mid-century moderns. I think it is all saying that they really didn’t have a lot of comps in our area to use, and they were grasping at straws.</p>
<p>^or grasping at tax dollars, one might say ;)</p>
<p>Zim, great to hear from you! Acreage seems lie a perfect grad gift. I’d give some to mcson, but I don’t think I can sever any off due to my zoning (I only have 2.5 acres but no valid road access…anything not used for our house, studio and poolhouse is pretty much wooded. So at best, he could build a hobbit house on the side of the hill 
which, of course, might suit him perfectly :)</p>
<p>If he and mcgf were interested in living in this city, however, I’d always kind of imagined giving them the old house which we’re currently renting out. But given their interests, it seems more likely that they’ll be San Francisco-bound once mcgf graduates next year. I guess much of that will depend on the whole sustenance thing.</p>
<p>So, graduation was outstanding. Levar Burton gave a hilarious and passionate address at the school of music ceremony that started out with "The good news is you’re graduating…the bad news is that the world is really really sucky 
– I think there might be YouTube copies floating around if you’d like to hear it. </p>
<p>While Levars speech was really hard to top, I also enjoyed Richard Costolo’s insightful speech at the main ceremony – (he’s the CEO of twitter, who first graduated Michigan and tried out life in improv with second city in Chicago before the rise of the Internet and his Cs degree saved him from poverty He pointed out what improv gave him: the importance of taking risks and being present, present, present inside your life to respond and work with what comes at you – it was fabulous advice.)</p>
<p>While getting out of Ann Arbor grad traffic and getting home in time to prep for the party was slightly harrowing, we ultimately had a fantastic time. I suffered a much-deserved hangover yesterday that was ultimately resolved with some lazy swimming and a pedicure, to which I treated mcgf and her best friend while mcson hung out with his friends. Mcson sadly has had the flu throughout the entire time, but seems to be bouncing back.</p>
<p>I had already bought and given him a new, robust computer system for his home studio as a grad gift, so he wasn’t expecting anything more. Which is why it was great fun to give him an iPad mini with a (true) story attached. </p>
<p>About a month or so ago, the Boston Consulting group was conducting research among designers about stock photography usage. People who completed the survey would be entered to win an iPad mini. I’d said to mch I was going to do the survey over lunch, because I had a feeling that I would win the iPad for mcson if the universe decided to shine on him and if he was really going to pull it all together and graduate on time.</p>
<p>A few weeks later I was notified that I’d won the iPad which was a round-about sign to me (in a perversely illogical way) that the universe would look after my kid one way or another.</p>
<p>I think he enjoyed the story almost as much as the iPad. I know the next part for him will be scary, but I do think the kid has a few angels looking out for him. I hope they’re ready for some overtime ;)</p>
<p>Oh, kmcmom13, now I’m crying! If I’m getting this weepy here, I’m not going to do well at graduation!</p>
<p>Your graduation sounds fabulous (except for mcson having the flu). I’m so glad everything went so well.</p>
<p>No plans for gifts of land. I was thinking of getting her a Keurig once she is actually living somewhere, unless she’s living at home, since we already have one! But she texted me last night that she dropped her laptop and now the screen doesn’t work, except for a small corner. Her bf is bringing over an old one for her to use. Her laptop is a little over 2 years old and was not a high-end model. I’m guessing it will be cheaper to get a new laptop than repair this one. At least her recent birthday gift was a back-up hard drive so she can get all her stuff off it. So we may get her a new laptop as a present.</p>
<p>Missypie, glad D’s show went well. Shawbridge, your story about your mom and dad and the scholarship made me cry too. Not a good sign of things to come!</p>
<p>H and I went to see the movie 42 on Saturday. Very inspirational. We also had 4 food-related events we attended over the weekend. I’ve been avoiding the scale because I know I need to get back to more healthy food choices.</p>
<p>Hope everyone has a fabulous week!</p>