I walked into my closet several weeks ago and was surprised--startled actually--to see a graduation robe hanging with my clothes. I wasn't sure why it was there instead of in my high school senior daughter's closet where it belonged, but I didn't say anything. I knew there was some good reason for it.
It didn't take long for me to decide at the time that when my daughter wore it for graduation that in a way it would be my graduation too. And then on to the fact that today will be commencement for so many other people as well.
When you are a graduating senior and you feel like something is coming to an end as you sit in the college field house with the other graduates and then you hear the valedictorian or the key note speaker remind you that this is a beginning not an end: it sounds reasonable.
28 years later when you are looking at your daughter's graduation robe in your closet, it is not quite so easy to think that this is a beginning rather than an end. But surely it represents the beginning of lots of things.
It represents the beginning for the time the math tutor spent with her when she was in fifth grade and more than math she learned how to believe in herself and what she can do.
The sixth grader she spent "tutoring" in math a couple of years ago (even though she herself still isn't strong in math) will be marching today along with her.
It's the beginning of the idea her mom taught her that can't is a bad word and "we don't say that."
The young mom who befriended her at vacation bible school and treated her like a peer instead of a youth helper will be marching today as well as the moms and dads who hired her to baby sit their children and fell in love with her like their children fell in love with her.
The owner of the small business who gave her a part time job will march even though the lesson he unwittingly taught her was to not work for someone who doesn't treat you with respect.
The youth minister whose picture was her computer screen saver for a brief time after he helped her through a difficult transition in her life will begin today.
The church facility staff member who kept asking you about how that girl was doing when she knew her heart was broken after having to relocate in her 7th grade year will have that conferred today.
Today, decisions to be the parent not a friend and give them safe space to fail and Jesus came to show us how to live and love and google it and allowances and time out and I'm proud of you and call me when you get there and I love you and I still love you and I'll love you no matter what begin.
It's hard to imagine that the next ministry team meeting that I slog into or the next mission event that I summon up my strength to "make an appearance at" or the next dinner I choke down with a smile while I hear about my table mate's cataract surgery might actually hang in someone's closet or even march down the aisle one day.
But you never know.
Today, here's to the people who with Pomp and Circumstance seemingly distantly playing in the backgrounds of their lives, live to march and commence and begin in the lives of those they touch in everything they do.
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