WILMINGTON — I noticed something funny as I was preparing my thoughts for this day.
If you look up the word graduation on thesaurus.com, it offers you the word commencement as a synonym. That makes sense: sometimes it's called a graduation ceremony, and sometimes it's called a commencement ceremony.
However, if you dig a little deeper, you find that to graduate means to complete an education. But to commence means to begin something, which is the opposite of completing something.
So the words graduation and commencement are synonyms and antonyms at the same time!
I'll tell you, it's a messed-up world out there. In order to avoid the ambiguity, I propose that we call it a transition ceremony. Something is ending; something else is beginning, and it's all right there in the word transition.
I also like the word transition because it doesn't suggest a specific point in time like the words start and finish do. It's hard to say when a transition is complete. The point is that it's a big day, and we're all really happy and excited for you guys.
I taught math and did lots of other stuff at Twin Valley for three years. The class of 2012 were freshmen when I began, so I feel a special kinship with them. Last year, I took another job. Without exaggeration, it was the most difficult decision I've ever made.
I was very happy here. I had a lot of unfinished work here, particularly in the math department, but the toughest part was knowing I wouldn't be around for this group's senior year. I miss everyone very much and am grateful for the time I had at Twin Valley.
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I have so many memories of this group, but I'd like to go all the way back to freshmen year, before I had most of this year's class in any of my math classes.
My first year at Twin Valley, I coached the junior varsity girls' basketball team. Specifically, it was the JV-B team, the second JV team. At the time, my resume for coaching basketball included years of shooting hoops in my driveway, playing pick up ball in the park, and watching basketball on TV.
Coach Buddy Hayford slapped me on the back, gave me a whistle, and told me I was going to do great.
Most of the girls on that team are graduates: Kate Corey, Stevie Cunningham-Darrah, Ashley Dix, Tyffani Felisko, Nicole Gamache, Lara Littlefield, Jen Waldron, and Sophie Zschirnt. Talent-wise, we were a little rough around the edges, but we had spunk.
We focused on the basics - dribbling, passing, shooting - and we learned a few plays. I got tips from Buddy and studied up on my new Basketball Coaching for Dummies book. It was actually a pretty good book - it even included how to give a motivational halftime speech.
The mood of each practice was fairly relaxed; I wanted the girls to enjoy basketball as much as I did, so I tried to keep it fun.
After a couple of weeks of practice, we had our first game, an away game at Mount Anthony. This, it turned out, would prove to be decidedly unfun.
The Mount Anthony JV team, which I should add was not a JV-B team, employed something called a full-court press. This is a defensive scheme designed to make it difficult to move the ball up court.
When done correctly, a full-court press causes bad passes, turnovers, and quick baskets the other way. At no time during our two weeks of having fun with the basics did we hammer out the finer details of breaking a full-court press.
From the opening tip, their girls were all over us like dots on dice. We were lambs in a house of wolves. One pass after another was picked off and zipped back down the court. The first half was a blur of layups.
We scored zero points in the first half. I'm not sure if we got the ball over the half court line.
I tried my Coaching For Dummies halftime motivational speech, but it wasn't enough. The onslaught continued into the second half, and when it was all said and done, we had not scored a single point.
It was a shutout. A basketball shutout.
Shutouts are fairly common in other sports, like soccer and ice hockey, and to a lesser extent baseball and football. But a basketball shutout? There is something especially alarming and tragic about a basketball shutout.
Watching a basketball shutout is like watching a singer forget the words to The Star Spangled Banner, except that it lasts an hour.
When you are on the losing side of a basketball shutout, emotions run well past just mere embarrassment. We were mortified. I'm not sure what it's like on the winning side of a basketball shutout, but if the other coach's demeanor during the post-game handshake was any indicator, I'd guess it feels like smugness.
I hope I don't sound bitter about it. After all, it was completely within the rules of the game for them to run a full-court press on us until there were only 2 minutes left in the game when they were up 52-0. You can never be too safe!
It's not like I've replayed that post-game handshake a thousand times in my head over the years or anything, and I definitely haven't imagined thousands other things to say besides what I really said, which was “Good game, coach; that was a lot of fun!”
Me, bitter? Doubtful.
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I digress. This is the part of the story where I tell you about how this ragtag group of spirited girls turned things around and beat their rivals in a dramatic end-of-the-season rematch on a last-second shot from an unlikely hero off the bench, and the ball bounced all around the rim in slow motion before going through the hoop, and the music started to play and the fans stormed the court and the other coach cursed the heavens and everyone hugged and cried and then the credits rolled.
As fun as that sounds, it's not real world. The reality of it was that was only our first game of the season, and we had a lot more basketball to play.
The second game we scored some points, but still lost badly. Those first points of the season tasted sweet, though. We ended up having a few close games that season, and lost one game by just a point, but we didn't end up winning a game that season.
This truth might seem depressing and anti-climactic but, looking back, it was one of the more important learning experiences of my adult life. I'd like to share what I consider to be three of the more important lessons I learned from my experience.
First, there's a good chance that the first step you take is going to land you flat on your face. After college in Indiana, I was living at home in Michigan for a little while before finding a job out in the middle of nowhere in Maryland.
I packed all my belongings in my car and hit the road. That feeling I had while I was cruising down the highway is a feeling you only get a few times in your life. It was the same feeling I had the day my parents dropped me off at college. It's the thrill of independence.
It wasn't until I was in Kalamazoo that I realized I had been driving west the whole time. It was not a good omen. If I couldn't even drive in the right direction, what chance would I have at success in Maryland?
But of course I made it there in one piece and had an incredible year.
Next, I learned that you can't always wait for the right moment. I could have told Buddy Hayford before the season that I wasn't ready to be a coach yet, that I needed to do some homework and study my Coaching for Dummies book until I felt more prepared.
Instead, I jumped right in, mostly because Buddy had faith in me, and I ended up learning more about coaching that winter than I ever would have watching basketball coaching videos on YouTube. I also would have missed out on getting to know a great group of girls.
I'm a big fan of preparation, but there is no substitute for real experience, and you're not always going to be prepared for it.
You can't wait for the stars and the planets to align before you try to change something you want to change in your life. When you're new to something and have no idea what you're doing, you can get by with honesty, genuine effort, and a willingness to make mistakes along the way.
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Finally, I learned that the big picture is made up of tiny pixels.
After the realities of the shutout set in, winning a game became a daunting and overwhelming task. If the goal before you ever looms too large, you have to break it down into pieces. Focus on the parts, not on the whole.
We couldn't fix everything in one practice, but we could improve one skill at a time, bit by bit and day by day. We might not have won any games, but we achieved other individual and team goals, and for that reason I look back on the season as a success.
The class of 2012 has already had to process many of life's harder lessons. This community has been through a lot in the last four years. Compared to what you've already been through, a story about what I learned from a JV-B basketball season might seem trivial, but I truly believe that the underlying lessons are valuable.
Finally, don't wait for the perfect moment to chase your dreams, because the timing is never going to be perfect, and a fantastic opportunity might be waiting for you just around the corner.
Jump in before you think you're ready... you'll amaze yourself.
Congratulations, class of 2012, and happy transition day. I love you all. Go Wildcats!