Student Speech Delivered at the Washington University Engineering Graduate Student Recognition Ceremony
I take with me memories of the 1992 U.S. Presidential debate. Eager to get involved in all the excitement I volunteered to help wherever needed. I remember spending several days in the makeshift debate HQ giving out-of-town reporters directions to the athletic complex. I remember being thrilled to get assigned the job of collecting film from the photographers in the debate hall during the debate. And I remember the disappointment of drawing the shortest straw among the student volunteers and being the one who had to take the film out of the debate hall and down to the dark room five minutes into the debate - with no chance to re-enter the debate hall after I left.
I take with me memories of university holidays which never seemed to apply to graduate students. I remember spending many a fall break and President's Day holiday with my fellow grad students in all day meetings brought to us by the computer science department.
I take with me memories of exams that seemed designed more to test endurance and perseverance than mastery of the subject matter. I managed to escape taking any classes that featured infamous 24-hour-take-home exams, but remember the suffering of my less fortunate colleagues. And what doctoral student could forget the pain and suffering one must endure to survive the qualifying exams?
I take with me the memory of the seven-minute rule, which always seemed to be an acceptable excuse for being ten minutes late for anything on campus, but which doesn't seem to apply anywhere else I go.
I take with me the memory of Friday afternoon ACM happy hours, known not for kegs of beer, but rather bowls of rainbow sherbet punch. Over the several years that I attended these happy hours they enjoyed varying degrees of popularity, often proportional to the quality and quantity of the accompanying refreshments - but there was always the rainbow sherbert punch.
I take with me memories of purple parking permits, the West Campus shuttle, checking my pendaflex, over-due library books, trying to print from cec, lunches on Delmar, friends who slept in their offices, miniature golf in Lopata Hall, The Greenway Talk, division III basketball, and trying to convince Dean Russel that yet another engineering school rule should be changed.
Finally, I would like to conclude, not with a memory, but with some advice. What would a graduation speech be without a little advice, right? Anyway, this advice comes in the form of a verse delivered to the 1977 graduating class of Lake Forest College by Theodore Seuss Geisel, better known to the world as Dr. Seuss - Here's how it goes:
My uncle ordered popovers
from the restaurant's bill of fare.
And when they were served,
he regarded them
with a penetrating stare . . .
Then he spoke great Words of Wisdom
as he sat there on that chair:
"To eat these things,"
said my uncle,
"you must excercise great care.
You may swallow down what's solid . . .
BUT . . .
you must spit out the air!"
And . . .
as you partake of the world's bill of fare,
that's darned good advice to follow.
Do a lot of spitting out the hot air.
And be careful what you swallow.
Thank you.
