Four-Year Celebrations

Do you remember your high school graduation? Or your college ceremony?  Right now, it’s graduation season, and countless students are celebrating the end of one part of their life, and looking towards the future with wide eyes full of potential.

I don’t remember much of my high school or college graduations.  I don’t recall which quote I selected for my yearbook – although I feel it was similar in sentiment to the credit card commercials highlighting the pricelessness of working towards a reward.  I know my family was present, as well as a few friends.  And at the time, I knew that those moments were important milestones and ones that I was proud of achieving.  However, the only thing I really, truly remember was the feeling of potential…that life was just beginning and I could make it into whatever I wanted it to be.

As I see my nieces and nephews graduate, I see that same hope and untapped potential in them. They’re excited about life and all the things they can do with it.  I sometimes feel that hope is lost along the way as we plunge further into adulthood.  It seems to me that everyday routines can make us lose that feeling of “anything is possible.”

Today is the feast day of St. Bede, a scholar, theologian and historian from the early Middle Ages that I was introduced to while studying in England. And one of his quotes seems quite fitting for how I’m feeling today – a day I’m trying to feel again that hopefulness of younger days: “Unfurl the sails, and let God steer us where He will.”