Graduation Affairs. Friday, June 10th, 2011

Well, today was the big day.  My little sis graduated high school.  Crazy how it was me walking that stage two years ago.  For those of you confused to why I had to come to Oregon to siee my sister graduate, let me explain.  She is technically my half-sister.  In other words, we have the same dad and different moms.  We were both born in california, only my mom and I moved to North Carolina later in life and her and her mom moved to Oregon fairly early in her life.  Whenever I go out to visit my dad, I try to coordinate with her so we can be out there at the same time.  She is a lot different than me in personality, but we still get a long well.  I try to keep in touch with her on a fairly regular basis, but it can be difficult seeing she does not have a cell phone.  Her mother is very strange and has led her astray in many aspects of her life.  My dad and I try to right the ship.  Love her regardless.  She will be heading off to Portland State next year to potentially study urban planning, or something of the sort.  Best of luck to you Bianca.  Even though you said you wouldnt show me your blog, so I probably wont give you the link to mine and therefore you wouldn't be reading this right now.

Early on in the day we went out on the family we are staying at's boat to cruise around the lake for a little bit.  The number of beautiful houses around here is amazing, and it makes me want to go be extremely successful and marry some babe.  But I suppose I should graduate college first.  We got ready and headed down to Salem, where my sister lives.  We met her for lunch at a steakhouse and caught up for a little bit.  We cruised around Salem, Oregon to see her stomping grounds.  She has an awesome internship at the local art museum so we checked out there and then we went to some desertery for some baller cake.  We had to get to the graduation 2 hours early in order to get a seat, but don't worry, it gave me plenty of time to read Harry Potter 7.  I was definitely overdressed, considering I wore blue pants, madras tie, and a vest to an ourdoor graduation.  But hell, like I say, "if you look good, you feel good."  Bianca went off after the ceremony to go party with her friends, and we headed home to go to bed.  The house next door was having a party and I was temped to go over, as there is a girl going to Stanford that is an all-star tennis player and extremely smart and beautiful living next door.  Aka perfect wife material, but could not build up the confidence to go to some rando-house party just to hit on some babe.  She'll have to come to me if she wants that ring...  (I think I lost about half of my followers in the last few sentences alone...).

Today's quote was sitting in a book by my bed and I thought it was very appropriate for today's events.  It is a little bit longer than normal, but hang with me,

"Place yourself among those who carry on their lives with passion, and true learning will take place, no matter how humble or exalted the setting.  But no matter what path you follow, do not be ashamed of your learning.  In some corner of your life, you know more about something than anyone else on earth.  The true measure of your education is not what you know, but how you share what you know with others."

To me this quote exemplifies what education is all about.  We spend 13 years in school by the time to graduate.  And then 17+ by the time we graduate college.  But to learn what?  I do not think we pay all this money and spend all these hours going to school to purely learn what is in books.  And if you do, you are not really getting an education.  In order to truly learn, you must grow as a person and develop the skills necessary to communicate and interact with others.  You may not get a 4.0, but if you develop the right attitude and place yourself among those who push you to be better, you will do just fine.  Confidence is key, as it will allow you to believe in yourself and follow through with what your mind sees.  So to those of you still in school (and maybe even out of school), it is never too late to "learn how to learn."