I honestly never thought I would reach this day, but here I am. Standing amongst all these other teenage girls, dressed up in white dresses as though we all need to look so similar on a day in which we received similar honors, linking arms with similar looking young men, in similar looking outfits as well. It was extravagant yes, but mundane just the same.
Of course, we had rehearsed, which actually seemed quite silly, all we were doing was walking down a gray path and sitting down. Though, if anyone were to mess it up, just slip up, with all those parents behind her, looking out at their child heading off into the real world, it would be me.
The couple in front of me began to walk, which signaled that it was my turn to link arms with one of those young men dress up in the same outfit as the guy in front of him. It really wouldn't be quite that bad, I suppose, if they hadn't paired me up with some boy who was three inches shorter than me. I knew I would look the same as all the other girls dressed in white, but I'd be so different, so tall, so out there for everyone to see and judge in the back of their minds.
We began walking, and the boy beside me, whose name I never really cared to remember, was grabbing my arm a little too tight for comfort. I tried to pull my arm away slightly, but as we entered the view of parents we were mobbed by flashes from what seemed like thousands of cameras. I couldn't push away from him now, it would seem awkward and maybe even edgy. I just faked a smile, sat down in my seat on the perfectly cut green, and listened to the speeches to come.
Every adult spoke about graduation as if it were one giant funeral. Speaking of all the good they had done, how much they had grown and changed. I thought to myself, I really feel no different than I did before, but I guess Graduation is some big deal where one has to fake some sense of achievement. I had never done anything useful for this world, I have never saved someone's life, I had never been kind for no apparent reason, I was fake, everyone around me is fake. If I were to just leave these fake people right now - step up on that stage receive my recognition via and handshake - and enter a state at which even I wasn't aware of my own consciousness, would anyone even care?
I like your metaphor/simile about graduation being like a funeral. Esther probably would see something as extravagant as graduation as depressing (especially because of the change that is going to college/the real world). You were a little Holden Caulfield-y when you were talking about how fake everything was; I think Esther would be more upset about the hypocrisy. I did like the bit at the end where she was talking about how she has never achieved anything or done anything useful/heroic. I kind of talked about that in my post, when I was talking about Elaine and how she needs inspiration. I think you could have talked a little more about the speeches, because as a writer, Esther would have been very critical of them. Nice job incorporating the little details like how tall she is and adopting her jumping around, rambling voice. Great job overall!
ReplyDeleteHi Rob,
ReplyDeleteApara does a good job pointing out some highlights of your post. I also like the paradoxical metaphor of graduation being a kind of funeral. You capture Plath's writing style/Esther's voice well. You need to make your monologue a bit more specific to KO in 2015 though. Some things will likely be the same as when Esther was living in the 1950s, but what's different? What would she dislike even more in the future? What would she like?