Graduation - Maya Angelou

          Last night at 7:00 pm I had my seminary graduation ceremony. To be honest, I was not very excited about sitting for an hour and a half especially for something that I didn’t think was all that important. I would much rather have stayed home and had them mail me my certificate. As the ceremony started and finished, I noticed that during it my attitude changed. The speakers that spoke were very uplifting and made me fill proud of myself. They talked about all that seminary had taught us in the last 4 years and how much more we can learn moving forward. There was an amazing musical number and it ended up being a great night; I was happy I went and was proud of myself for sticking through seminary all 4 years.

           My experience last night reminded me of this story Graduation by Maya Angelou. It made me realize how hard it would be to want to go anywhere in life and accomplish/achieve any goals I had in my life. Without my parents, friends, family, church leaders, and seminary teachers pushing me to graduate, I know for a fact that I wouldn’t have. I would have stopped showing up to class or turning in make-up work. It made me think about how excited this little girl was of herself that she had graduated 8^th grade. She deserved to be proud of herself and to that have so brutally taken away from her even for a minute is extremely wrong.

            My experience last night made me slightly understand some of the trials that African Americans had to go through. You can hear about it all you want but it takes experience to understand the pain and suffering they actually endured.  Although it was small, and honestly not that relevant it made me appreciate African Americans and their heritage/culture/strength.