The Spotlight

Epilogue

Epilogue

My eyes met Dylan’s across the room, my stomach flipping with excitement. He gave me a wink, making my heart flutter as I turned back to face the front of the gymnasium. 

I took a deep breath, my hands tightly holding the paper in my lap. 

“And now, for the chosen speaker of the class of 2014, Miss Samantha Carson.” Principal Williams said from the podium. 

I clenched my jaw as I smiled, standing up from my seat. 

Here we go. 

The tassels on my cap tickled the side of my cheek as I carefully made my way up the steps to the podium with the microphone. My light blue graduation gown was a bit long, but who cares right? I was wearing flats, which was a last minute decision when I’d twisted my ankle last night in my attempts to practice walking. 

I took my place in front of the podium, placing the piece of paper on the wood. It was all ripped around the edges from my nervous rubbing and tearing of it. 

I took a shaky breath, looking out at the hundreds of people seated in the gymnasium. 

“This is it.” I started, my voice shaking. “This is the moment we’ve been waiting for. For the past 4 years, almost everything we’ve done has been for this moment. A moment that has absolutely no definite purpose other than a piece of paper and a handshake. A moment that seemed impossible when we were freshman and had our first set of finals. A moment that didn’t seem worth it during our first AP exam. And a moment that seemed absolutely ridiculous when we slaved over our textbooks and study guides for the ACTs.” 

I squeezed the edge of the podium, my knuckles pale white. 

“In 20 years, when we look back on our high school years, this might be one of the top 20 moments, but I doubt it will be number one. Your number one will probably be a party that you went to, an embarrassing event you encountered with a friend, or even that one test in Sophomore year that you got less than 30% on. Or it could be that homecoming game freshman year when everyone stormed the field with milk after the game, and it took hours to wash milk out of places you never thought you could have milk. Or maybe that one time, in our junior year, when the fire alarms went off for three hours and nobody knew what was happening, and we got to chill outside for most of the day.” 

I took a deep breath, scratching the back of my calf with my other foot. 

“But this moment right here, this is only a moment. This moment is supposed to signify the completion of our secondary education. But how can it? How can we let one moment define everything we’ve become over the past four years. How can one moment of a few seconds exhibit how much we have all matured over the past four years. One moment doesn’t show the pain and suffering of finals, sports games, and that 5 paragraph critical analysis that almost everybody failed.” I said, cracking a small smile. 

All of the seniors laughed at that one. 

“One moment can’t even begin to show the friends you’ve made since we first walked through those doors in 2010. One moment doesn’t define who you are. Sure, it’s pretty awesome to walk past everyone you love and say ‘I did it, I just graduated high school’. But really, everybody has that one moment when they realize they’ve made it. For some of us, we could’ve had that moment months ago, this very well could be your defining moment, but for most of us, that moment is years to come. That’s the moment when you get that promotion for a job you’ve wanted since you were 6. That’s the moment when you win an olympic gold medal, if anybody here is capable of that. That’s the moment when you get married, have a kid, retire. It comes at different points for everybody, and this is just a moment in passing that may have no importance what so ever to you.”