Wednesday, May 19, 2010

Of Graduation, Flights, and such

It's a good thing the subtitle on this blog is "Random Ramblings of Rose" because I ramble better than anyone I know. Since this is my blog, I suppose I'm allowed to though :) if people don't like the way I write... don't read it. HAHA

Graduation was five days ago and it still hasn't become a reality in my mind. The weekend was alright. Academic Reception was good except that my friend Dani's mom needs new glasses or cataract surgery or something to correct her eyesight and she kept making bizarre observations. Honor's Convocation was the same as usual - four or five of us got the Music Dept Award.

Baccalaureate was fascinating, as is any Mass over which Fr. Stephen H. presides. There wasn't an announcement (I guess that's the excuse) so most of the guys (graduates, all but one of the faculty seemed to know) didn't remove their caps. The homily, while not always relevant was, in the least, non-offensive. I was glad to see the directive to sit or kneel printed in the worship aid. Unfortunately, even that wasn't enough to convince FSH that we should follow GIRM norms. He made his typical ridiculous order that people remain standing. Heaven forbid (LOL) we should want to kneel to welcome the King of Kings. Once again the chalices looked like Wal-Mart wine glasses. Not likely what the Bishops had in mind when they said to use precious metal or other precious substances (GIRM 327-330). All in all, the Mass was very "horizontally focused" with much more focus on those in the congregation rather than the One who we assemble to worship. It saddens me when people mistake the communal aspect of the Mass for a social one. On a positive note - the music was good. Thank God they let Papa H. plan that ... if they hadn't who knows what sort of hokey junk they would have chosen! It's pretty funny when the only Presbyterian involved makes his segment more Catholic than the rest. But then, I've always said that Papa is more Catholic than most of the teachers at Seton Hill.

Commencement itself was pretty anticlimactic. The speakers were good - best quote of the day "If you want security graduates, go to jail." Rose Thepig, sat with me through the ceremony - she was hidden in my sleeve (she's a small stuffed pig) as we processed in. During the receiving line afterward, she shook hands with the President and a number of other faculty. The one major disappointment of the day was the absence of a number of the music faculty. I knew some of them, Mr. and Mrs. H. in particular, weren't going to be there, but it was still hard to graduate without some of the people directly responsible for my staying in music and staying at Seton Hill. I can honestly say that without Mr. H., I would not have graduated from Seton Hill with a degree in music.

Life after graduation hasn't seemed much different. I've been packing and driving back and forth between my house and my parents' house in Ohio. This move is so complicated because it has so many segments. Move to Ohio, move to Cooperstown, move to Europe... and I need different things for each move it seems.

One major thing got checked off my to-do list today. I bought my flight! Now, I will be officially leaving the country on August 1st. Of course, I knew that before I bought the ticket but now it's definite. International flights are such a pain to schedule. I've been watching the times and prices for a couple of weeks and the flight I had planned on booking disappeared yesterday. I found another one today which was actually cheaper than any I had seen. Sure, a 10 hour lay-over in Brussels won't be particularly pleasant, but I'll deal with it.

Well, I think I've rambled enough for tonight.. drop me a comment if you'd like -- I would love to know who is reading this and what they/you think!

No comments:

Post a Comment