Tag Archives: graduation

Tiny Grads and Big Emotions

by Woody

For the past week I have had a song stuck in my head. More accurately, a stanza from “Turn Around” and it goes:           

“Turn around and they’re two. Turn around and they’re four. Turn around they’re a young man heading out the door” – or a young woman, of course.

Wayne Bryan, father of the legendary tennis tandem Mike and Bob, shared these lyrics with me back, back, back when my daughter was born. It remained on my mind, and in my heart, until Dallas and her younger brother Greg headed out the door as young adults.

Maya marches in to “Pomp and Circumstance.”

Wayne, who had these lines of wisdom hanging on a wall at home as a constant reminder of how fleeting the time he would have with his twin sons was, later explained in his parenting book “Raising Your Child to be a Champion in Athletics, Arts, and Academics”:

“I found this to be so true. Mike and Bob hit their first tennis balls at age two on Monday, went to kindergarten on Tuesday, entered high school on Wednesday and graduated on Friday. At Stanford, they went up there on Monday and they were going out on the professional tour after their sophomore years on Tuesday.”

By Thursday, Mike and Bob were retiring with 16 grand slam championships and 119 tour titles together after spending 438 weeks ranked No. 1 in the world, and by Friday had their own children to turn around and see grow as if in time-lapse.

It’s no different for grandparents. One day I turned around and my first grandchild, Maya, was born; the next day I turned around and she was two; and yesterday – last week, in truth – I turned around and she was four and graduating from preschool and headed to pre-K.

Grownups sometimes, oftentimes actually, forget how little things are amplified into big things for youngsters. Indeed, I don’t think I have ever seen Maya happier, not even on Christmas morning, smiling so wide she almost sprained her face with joy at her recent graduation ceremony.

The happy and proud graduate and parents.

Nor seen her more proud, for she was beaming like human sunshine. To her, the certificate, rolled up like a baton and tied with a red ribbon, might as well have been a diploma from Harvard.

I wish you could have seen Maya and all her classmates in their miniature full-length gowns of royal blue and matching mortarboard caps, complete with gold tassels, as they marched in among balloons and “Happy Graduation” banners while “Pomp and Circumstance” played.

Beforehand, I would have thought all of this was over-the-top silly. It proved to be as wonderful as fresh strawberries in wintertime. I dare say there wasn’t a pair of eyes in attendance (or watching the video afterwards) that weren’t moist, some even spilling over a little. To be sure, additional lyrics from “Turn Around” gripped my heart and squeezed gently:

“Where have you gone my little girl, little girl, / Little pigtails and petticoats where have you gone? / Turn around you’re tiny, turn around then you’re grown / Turn around you’re a young wife with babes of your own . . . Turn around and they’re young, turn around and they’re old / Turn around and they’ve gone and we’ve no one to hold.”

After the little honorees had all walked across the stage, the principal announced, “You finally did it! The Class of 2023!” Again, at first blush this might seem grandiose silliness for preschool, and yet—

—turn around, turn around, Maya and her friends will be marching with their high school graduating Classes of 2036.

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Essay copyrights Woody Woodburn

Woody writes a weekly column for The Ventura County Star and can be contacted at WoodyWriter@gmail.com. Follow him on Twitter and Instagram at @woodywoodburn. His SIGNED books are available at www.WoodyWoodburn.com.

2021 Commencement Address

by Woody

“Ladies and gentlemen of the class of (2021): Wear sunscreen. If I could offer you only one tip for the future, sunscreen would be it. The long-term benefits of sunscreen have been proved by scientists whereas the rest of my advice has no basis more reliable than my own meandering experience. I will dispense this advice now.”(1)

“The best advice I can give anybody about going out into the world is this: Don’t do it. I have been out there. It is a mess.”(2) “Don’t ask what the world needs. Ask what makes you come alive, and go for it. Because what the world needs is people who have come alive.”(3)

“Find your Passion with a capital P!”(4) “The fireworks begin today. Each diploma is a lighted match. Each one of you is a fuse.”(5) “You have it easily in your power to increase the sum total of this world’s happiness now. How? By giving a few words of sincere appreciation to someone who is lonely or discouraged. Perhaps you will forget tomorrow the kind words you say today, but the recipient may cherish them over a lifetime.”(6)

“Those who bring sunshine into the lives of others, cannot keep it from themselves.”(7) “Wherever you go, no matter what the weather, always bring your own sunshine.”(8) “Do not go where the path may lead; go instead where there is no path and leave a trail.”(9)

“Go to the edge of the cliff and jump off. Build your wings on the way down.”(10) “It takes courage to grow up and become who you really are.”(11) “Always, always, always, always, always, always, always do the thing you fear and the death of fear is certain.”(12) “Fortune befriends the bold.”(13)

“It is not the mountain we conquer but ourselves.”(14) “You can’t achieve mountaintop dreams with downhill effort.”(15) “And will you succeed? Yes! You will indeed! 98 and 3/4 percent guaranteed.”(16)

“Make today your masterpiece.”(17) “Eat a live frog first thing in the morning and nothing worse will happen to you the rest of the day.”(18) “You can’t do anything about yesterday, and the only way to improve tomorrow is by what you do right now.”(19)

“Do not judge each day by the harvest you reap, but by the seeds you plant.”(20) “The true meaning of life is to plant trees under whose shade you do not expect to sit.”(21)

“The price of anything is the amount of life you exchange for it.”(22) “Learn as if you were to live forever; live as if you were to die tomorrow.”(23) “When you get, give; when you learn, teach.”(24)

“Wise are those who learn that the bottom line doesn’t always have to be their top priority.”(25) “We make a living by what we get, we make a life by what we give.”(26) “If you don’t make an effort to help others less fortunate than you, then you’re just wasting your time on Earth.”(27)

“There is a good reason they call these ceremonies ‘commencement exercises’ – graduation is not the end, it’s the beginning.”(28) “When you leave here, don’t forget why you came.”(29) “Don’t cry because it’s over. Smile because it happened.”(30)

“When you leave home, you take home with you.”(31)

(1-Mary Schmich. 2-Russell Baker. 3-Howard Thurman. 4-Wayne Bryan. 5-Eward Koch. 6-Dale Carnegie. 7-James M. Barrie. 8-Anthony J. D’Angelo. 9-Ralph Waldo Emerson 10-Ray Bradbury. 11-e.e. cummings. 12-Emerson. 13-Emily Dickinson. 14-Edmund Hillary. 15-Woody Woodburn. 16-Dr. Seuss. 17-John Wooden. 18-Mark Twain. 19-Wooden. 20-Robert Louis Stevenson. 21-Nelson Henderson. 22-Henry David Thoreau. 23-Wooden. 24-Maya Angelou. 25-William Arthur Ward. 26-Winston Churchill. 27-Wayne Bryan. 28-Orrin Hatch. 29-Adlai E. Stevenson. 30-Dr. Seuss. 31-Angelou.)

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Woody Woodburn writes a weekly column for The Ventura County Star and can be contacted at WoodyWriter@gmail.com. Follow him on Twitter and Instagram at @woodywoodburn. His SIGNED books are available at www.WoodyWoodburn.com.

Personalized Signed copies of WOODEN & ME: Life Lessons from My Two-Decade Friendship with the Legendary Coach and Humanitarian to Help “Make Each Day Your Masterpiece” and  “Strawberries in Wintertime: Essays on Life, Love, and Laughter” are available at WoodyWoodburn.com

 

Retired Teacher Still Giving Lessons

by Woody

FOLLOW ME ON INSTAGRAM: @woodywoodburn

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Retired Teacher Is

Still Giving Lessons

The threat of a ruler rapped across her knuckles was nearly required, but I eventually got a long-ago student at St. Genevieve High School to share her recent story of kindness as a retired teacher.

“I don’t need recognition,” said Marie, who insisted I not identify her further. “I feel like so many teachers do things for their students, not just me. I try to live my life the way my parents did in giving of themselves.”

Her parents taught Marie well, as exemplified by this fresh email from a former student:

“Hi Mrs. (Marie)!

“I received your letter in the mail! Thank you so much for the heartwarming message and for the $10. I shall use it wisely! Maybe something I can put in my dorm room in the future to remember you! Not that I need something to do that. I am just so touched. That $10 bill is worth more than $10 to me.

“Again, thank you for the lovely letter. It was an amazing surprise and you had the most perfect timing. It cheered me up when I was feeling particularly sad about graduation. Knowing that I have your support and that I’m in your thoughts comforts me!

Stay safe and healthy! I hope you’re doing well!!

“Love, Ellen.”

Should anyone take exception with Cornell-bound Ellen’s free use of exclamation marks, know that Ernest Hemingway, no less, was known to use three !!! in a row when writing personal letters.

Marie taught Math, not English Literature, for nearly four decades, including her final 28 years in Ventura County. She retired three years ago.

“I loved what I did for so many years,” she says. “I miss it.”

In choosing her career path, Marie followed in the esteemed footsteps of Sister Joanne who was her high school Math teacher in the San Fernando Valley. Sister Joanne is now in her 90s and living in New Jersey, but the two remain in contact.

“I would often tell my students about her because she was the best,” Marie says. “Once, she told me that she remembered exactly where I sat in class and told me she could always count on me when it came to proofs. What a memory. She made me think I need to keep in touch with my kids.”

Like a boomerang, the notes Marie sends out often come flying back carrying updates about her students’ lives. This year, realizing the overwhelming disappointment caused by COVID-19, especially to 2020 graduating seniors, Marie decided to redouble her efforts.

“I had former students who had to leave their colleges,” Marie notes. “No goodbyes to friends; missed internships; had to go home and quarantine. It’s sad.”

Hence, she searched out mailing addresses and sent a blizzard of cards. What did she write inside?

“I basically told kids I knew this wasn’t the senior year and graduation they expected – missing prom, trips, barbeques, parties,” Marie shares, “but that their next graduation would be different.

“I told them I am so proud of them and know they will go far in life,” Marie went on. “And I know this is only a little bump in the road. I included a few dollars just as a small gift. It’s just something I wanted to do. To me, it’s all about kindness.”

Responses like Ellen’s have been the norm. Student after student has told their former teacher how much her card cheered them up and made them feel appreciated to know that someone was thinking about their trying situations.

Old educators don’t retire, they just teach new lessons.

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Woody Woodburn writes a weekly column for The Ventura County Star and can be contacted at WoodyWriter@gmail.com. Follow him on Twitter and Instagram at @woodywoodburn. His books are available at www.WoodyWoodburn.com.

Check out my memoir WOODEN & ME: Life Lessons from My Two-Decade Friendship with the Legendary Coach and Humanitarian to Help “Make Each Day Your Masterpiece” and my essay collection “Strawberries in Wintertime: Essays on Life, Love, and Laughter” …

Words of Wisdom For Graduates

by Woody

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Dear Class of 2019, In The Words Of . . .

            Hello, Class of 2019. I am honored and humbled to address you on this milestone occasion today. As you turn the page to the next chapter in your lives, I offer the following advice.

“Good advice is always certain to be ignored, but that’s no reason not to give it.”(1) “My advice to you is not to inquire why or dither, but just enjoy your ice cream while it’s on your plate.”(2)

“There is absolutely no reason for being rushed along with the rush.”(3) “It does not matter how slowly you go, as long as you do not stop.”(4)

“Start where you are. Use what you have. Do what you can.”(5) “The secret of getting ahead is getting started.” (6) “Go confidently in the direction of your dreams. Live the life you have imagined.”(7)

“It takes courage to grow up and become who you really are.”(8) “You gain strength, courage, and confidence by every experience in which you really stop to look fear in the face. You are able to say to yourself, ‘I lived through this horror. I can take the next thing that comes along.’ ”(9)

“Twenty years from now you will be more disappointed by the things that you didn’t do than by the ones you did do. So throw off the bowlines. Sail away from the safe harbor. Catch the trade winds in your sails. Explore. Dream. Discover.”(10)

“Life is too short to wake up in the morning with regrets, so love the people who treat you right. Forget about the ones who don’t, and believe that everything happens for a reason. If you get a chance, take it. If it changes your life, let it. Nobody said that it’d be easy, they just promised it would be worth it.”(11)

“Nothing will work unless you do.”(12) “Gardens are not made by singing, ‘Oh, how beautiful,’ and sitting in the shade.”(13) “The one who plants trees, knowing that he will never sit under their shade, has at least started to understand the meaning of life.”(14)

“The purpose of life is not to be happy. It is to be useful, to be honorable, to be compassionate, to have it make some difference that you have lived and lived well.”(15) “One person can make a difference, and everyone should try.”(16) “If you don’t make an effort to help others less fortunate than you, then you’re just wasting your time on Earth.”(17)

“Never give up on a dream just because of the length of time it will take to accomplish. The time will pass anyway.”(18) “Always dream and shoot higher than you know you can do. Try to be better than yourself.”(19)

“Don’t let making a living prevent you from making a life.”(20) “We make a living by what we get, we make a life by what we give.”(21) “When you get, give; when you learn, teach.”(22) “Share your knowledge. It is a way to achieve immortality.”(23) “I argue thee that love is life. And life hath immortality.”(24)

“The fireworks begin today. Each diploma is a lighted match. Each one of you is a fuse.”(25)

“ ‘Thank you’ is the best prayer that anyone could say. I say that one a lot. Thank you expresses extreme gratitude, humility, understanding.”(26)

Thank you, and congratulations.

(1-Agatha Christie. 2-Thornton Wilder. 3-Robert Frost. 4-Confucius. 5-Arthur Ashe. 6-Mark Twain. 7-Henry David Thoreau. 8-E.E. Cummings. 9-Eleanor Roosevelt. 10-Mark Twain. 11-Bob Marley. 12-John Wooden. 13-Rudyard Kipling. 14-Rabindranath Tagore. 15-Ralph Waldo Emerson. 16-John F. Kennedy. 17-Wayne Bryan. 18-H. Jackson Brown. 19-John Steinbeck. 20-John Wooden. 21-Winston Churchill. 22-Maya Angelou. 23-Dalai Lama. 24-Emily Dickinson. 25-Edward Koch. 26-Alice Walker.

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Woody Woodburn writes a weekly column for The Ventura County Star and can be contacted at WoodyWriter@gmail.com. Follow him on Twitter and Instagram at woodywoodburn. His books are available at www.WoodyWoodburn.com.

Check out my memoir WOODEN & ME: Life Lessons from My Two-Decade Friendship with the Legendary Coach and Humanitarian to Help “Make Each Day Your Masterpiece” and my essay collection “Strawberries in Wintertime: Essays on Life, Love, and Laughter” …

Column: Masterpiece Grads

by Woody

New Grads, Create A Masterpiece Day (And Repeat)

Dear Class of 2015, I am honored to have been invited (albeit by myself) to address you here today.

Michelangelo, when asked how he had created one of his masterpiece sculptures, replied simply: “I saw the angel in the marble and carved until I set him free.”1angel

Creating your own masterpiece life, dear graduates, as you journey forward requires a similar process: You must see the angel – your passion – and then set it free.

For Michelangelo, this meant chipping away the pieces of marble that did not look like the angel or the horse or David. In our lives, this means chipping away the distractions and challenges and even the negative people who are preventing us from achieving our dreams.

In addition to being sculptors, you are also painters who create your masterpiece by adding brushstokes of color to the canvas. In other words, by adding determination and patience and love, to name just three key hues.

For good reason my dear mentor John Wooden advised focusing on creating your masterpiece day and not your masterpiece life. A masterpiece sculpture is created one chisel strike at a time; a masterpiece painting one brushstroke at a time; a masterpiece novel one keystroke at a time. So is a masterpiece life – private and professional – created one masterful day at a time, one after another, until they add up to masterpiece weeks, months, years.

To focus on a masterpiece life, or even a masterpiece year, is too daunting. Better to keep in mind this additional wisdom from Coach Wooden: “Little things add up to big things.”

A parable about a starfish emphasizes the big power of little acts. It was a beautiful Southern California morning and a beachcomber was walking along the sand that was littered with kelp and driftwood from a violent storm the night before. In the distance he noticed a man bend down to pick something up and then toss it into the ocean.

Every few steps, the man repeated this calisthenic: stop, bend, stand, toss. But what was he throwing, the beachcomber wondered: Driftwood sticks? Broken seashells? Skipping stones?

As the two morning walkers neared each other, the beachcomber finally realized the man was picking up starfish that, by the hundreds, had been washed ashore by the violent storm’s high surf and left stranded.

The beachcomber could not help but laugh at the other man’s futile efforts. “You’re just wasting your time,” he said. “There are too far many starfish for you to make a difference before they die.”1gradpic

“Maybe,” the man replied as he gently tossed another starfish into the waves. “But to this one I’m making a world of difference.”

As you venture out into the world, Class of 2015, keep an eye out for “starfish” who need your help.

Before closing, I would like to share a passage near the end of Ray Bradbury’s classic novel, Fahrenheit 451: “Everyone must leave something behind when he dies, my grandfather said. A child or a book or a painting or a house or a wall built or a pair of shoes made. Or a garden planted. Something your hand touched some way so your soul has somewhere to go when you die, and when people look at that tree or that flower you planted, you’re there.”

These words remind me of a poem by my grandfather Ansel, handwritten on the title page of his medical college textbook Modern Surgery and dated Oct. 1, 1919, less than a year before Bradbury was born:

“The worker dies, but the work lives on / Whether a picture, a book, or a clock

“Ticking the minutes of life away / For another worker in metal or rock

“My work is with children and women and men / Not iron, not brass, not wood

“And I hope when I lay my stethoscope down / That my Chief will call it good.”

By finding your passion and work that you want to live on, dear graduates, and by creating your masterpiece day, over and again, in the end your Chief will call it good.

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Woody Woodburn writes a weekly column for The Ventura County Star and can be contacted at WoodyWriter@gmail.com.

Wooden-&-Me-cover-mock-upCheck out my new memoir WOODEN & ME: Life Lessons from My Two-Decade Friendship with the Legendary Coach and Humanitarian to Help “Make Each Day Your Masterpiece”

Column: Grads and Artisans

by Woody

New Grads Can Learn From Artisans

 

Graduation season is upon us and, since once again I was not asked to deliver a commencement address in person, I am offering one here in print.

 

Among those who will fling their mortarboards skyward in celebration this year is my youngest nephew from Camarillo High School. And so I will address my remarks to him personally with hope others may find wisdom and inspiration as well.1-quoteKnow

 

Congratulations, Rhett. Before continuing on your educational expedition and life journey, I want to tell you about the banana knife your cousin brought home from Sri Lanka last year as a gift for me.

 

            The curved eight-inch blade is not burnished smooth except for its sharp edge, yet it is still beautiful for its utility – it can cut a banana bunch from a tree, chop down bamboo stalks, slice open a letter with equal ease. In today’s world, having a wide range of skills will serve you well.

 

            Conversely, its lacquered native hardwood handle is art to behold – and hold. Adding to the sublimity is that your cousin watched the master blacksmith fashion this handiwork in an hour’s time.

 

He also saw craftswomen weave strands of colorfully dyed palm leaves into wondrous purses of varying patterns. Meanwhile, from earthen clay other artists created pots and bowls that are equally useful and attractive.

 

            These Sri Lankan artisans, it seems to me, serve as an instructive metaphor. Each day we all receive 24 hours like a new chunk of raw clay or a pile of palm fronds or a piece of metal. Our challenge and duty is to use our vision, talents and perseverance to create something meaningful.

 

           

Greg Woodburn gave new socks and running shoes as gifts to Sikoro villagers, including the Elder Chief here.

Greg Woodburn gave new socks and running shoes as gifts to Sikoro villagers, including the Elder Chief here.

Too, Rhett, I wish to share a story from a trip your cousin took a few years earlier to the tiny village of Sikoro in Mali, Africa. Because his luggage was lost, and because he had neglected to pack anything in his carry-on bag for just such a mishap, he spent two weeks with only the clothes on his back.

 

Yet instead of calamitous, the lost luggage actually proved to be serendipitous because he got a life lesson in experiencing how his impoverished hosts make do with very few possessions.

 

The people of Sikoro live in mud-brick huts, sleep on woven mats atop hard dirt floors and pump water from wells. They lack enough fruits and vegetables. Most do not have shoes.

 

Despite what to us seems a hardscrabble existence, they are extremely happy. They smile constantly, laugh easily, dance freely. Worries about car payments and job promotions do not weigh on their minds. They may not have much materially by our standards, but by theirs they have enough.

 

Rhett, you would do well to pack some of these values of the Sikoro villagers in your luggage, so to speak, as you travel life’s roads.

 

Speaking of packing, Rhett, I wish to close with a scene from the book “Repacking Our Bags” by Richard Leider. He was on a backpacking trek in Africa and the group’s Maasai guide, Koyie, traveled with only a spear and a stick for cattle-tending. Leider, on the other hand, was outfitted with a backpack stuffed with “necessities.”

 

After they made camp the first evening, Leider laid out all his fancy gear. He writes: “I unsnap snaps, unzip zippers, and un-Velcro Velcro. From pockets, pouches, and compartments, I produce all sorts of strange and wonderful items. Eating utensils, cutting devices, digging tools. Direction finders, star gazers, map readers. Things to write with, on, and for. Various garments in various sizes for various functions. Medical supplies, remedies, and cures. Little bottles inside little bottles inside little bottles. Waterproof bags for everything. Amazing stuff!

 

“I look over at Koyie to gauge his reaction,” Leider continues. “He seems amused but he is silent. Finally, after several minutes of just gazing at everything, Koyie turns to me and asks very simply, but with great intensity: ‘Does all this make you happy?’ ”

 

Pursue happiness, Rhett, but pursue it wisely. As Patagonia founder Yvon Chouinard has sagely said: “The more you know, the less you need.”

 

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Woody Woodburn writes a weekly column for The Ventura County Star and can be contacted at WoodyWriter@gmail.com.

 

Check out my new memoir WOODEN & ME: Life Lessons from My Two-Decade Friendship with the Legendary Coach and Humanitarian to Help “Make Each Day Your Masterpiece”