Smth I Wrote Days Ago

She wanted to smile as she stood facing her expectant audience, she ought to be thrilled. Clutching her diploma in her sweaty palms, she twisted her face into what she hoped would appear to be a happy expression; her eyes frantically searched the room. She knew she should have written the damned speech. Oh well, not like it had ever been a problem before… so couldn’t her suddenly ever-so-feeble mind summon a simple tangible phrase?
Her eyes searched the room frantically, row by row… to the front. Her mother had her palms on her heart, clasped together in anticipation of what her daughter had to say. ‘I…’, her eyes rested on the empty chair next to her mother and her capability of communication was totally paralysed. A solitary leaf drifted onto the seat of the chair, and as it touched the smooth, shiny surface, signals triggered off inside her. She couldn’t interpret them. Somehow the fallen leaf broke her trance…
‘This diploma really doesn’t prove much to me in itself being just a record. But the memory counts, it is my journey, my transition into womanhood – my body and spirit no longer a mere child.
However with the process of maturity conjunctive attained levels of superior knowledge, we loose our innocence and the freedom of childhood. Everything in life, is bittersweet, it has a counter balance.
Today I stand here having earned my right to a future and embark on what is effectively the rest of my life; my career; the real adventure. Yet I have just said goodbye to a man who bore witness to my every joy and sorrow till this very day, my past, representative of the beautiful childhood I was blessed with. Is today too, the beginning of an end? I wonder.
Take this as an example, a woman gives birth to her first baby boy, but as he opens his eyes and draws his first breath, she releases her last. Is one more holy than the other? Is one more happy or tragic? Should anything be celebrated? Or mourned? Or both? There is no right answer to this juggle to solve. '