Page 29 - 1926 Gleaner

THE GLEANER
members of the graduating class one would think that the ut- most of happiness had been surpassed-at least it is right on the peak.
Then every once in a while, sometimes twice in a while, a wave of regret comes·over us. It is not a desirable wave that en- gulfs us-sometimes it waves around the back of the neck and sometimes around the front of the neck so that one is forced to swallow hard at his Adam's Apple. Then it is that many hand- kerchiefs appear, to take from the eye an imaginary piece of gravel. Also many an imaginary phone call arrives which neces- sitates the absence of some graduate from the presence of his or her friends.
Now, we graduates realize that we have left our Alma Mater. We are now to use the phrase, "out of all these things". No more will we dread the ring of the school bell which used to summon us to our "prison" as we then thought-but of which we now have a different idea. No more will we get "called upon the carpet" for carving our names in the desks or the walls. But once again we are having the privilege of coming back to see the "Commencement Exercises" and I wish I was also having the privilege of listening to this Valedictory Address.
Valedictory, V ALE D I C T 0 R Y with a word as long as that for a name you will not usually expect a very long speech, but although this address expresses my feelings perfeotly, it will also resemble me in another respect-like myself, it will be short, if I can read fast enough.
While most people have been writing out Christmas lists, mending their largest stockings and in other manners preparing for the arrival of jolly old Santa Claus, we the graduates, have been combing our hair, powdering our noses, also mending our stockings-and in other manners preparing for that most im- portant event, that crowning event of the whole school year, that event, the Collingwood Collegiate Institute Commencement, which is most eagerly awaited by students, graduates, parents and friends alike.
To many of us the commencement used to mean a chance to exhibit before the patient public, our dramatic, operatic or idiotic characteristics as the case may be. Now it holds for us some- thing far more definite. We now have a keener realization of the more serious meanings of the word "Commencement". To us now it at first signifies a time. of happiness, of care cast aside for the moment, a time for the happy, brief reunion of old friends after a separation that seemed to endure for ages. Sec- ondly, it signifies our sta~t-our commencement in life. And so it is that I come up here as a representative of the graduating class of 1925 to express our thoughts and feelings in this Vale- dictory Address.
This is graduation-graduation; the consummation of all our hopes, the goal of all our desires for the past four or five
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