Shore Faculty Celebrate Graduates

At the annual Celebration Dinner held June 9 in Shore's Dining Hall, faculty members Doug Lucey and Gretchen Bowder offered congratulations and words of advice to this year's eighth and ninth grade graduates and their families. (Read coverage of Shore's Closing Ceremonies.)

Doug Lucey

Upper School Latin and English teacher Lucey began his remarks by reflecting on the elusiveness of parking spaces in Boston. "I open with a situation which our young audience members have not experienced first hand but must have been covered in some Seinfeld episode: driving in a crowded part of town, you’re heading to an appointment, or maybe to a party, running a little late, and you find that perfect parking spot, right in front, and you say, 'Oh, it must be meant to be! The parking gods are smiling on me today!' Or, on the other hand, when driving to a job interview, or maybe out on a first date, you search and search but cannot find a spot anywhere; you get more and more discouraged while circling the neighborhood for the fifth time, sensing that the universe is somehow out to keep you from your goal.

"This sort of thing would happen to me especially when living in Boston, in Davis Square in Somerville, where the street plan must have been designed by an insane child, with the lack of street signs, one-way streets stacked up consecutively, all going the same way.... They seem determined to confound anyone trying to make a simple loop.

"Anyhow, this struggle, and the feeling that some higher power plays a role in your future, both hit upon the focus of my talk tonight.

"I aim to deliver this advice as relevant to you, the graduates, in two main ways. First, you stand on the brink of new adventures, many of you having spent weeks and months agonizing over which school to attend, which school would accept you, whether or not to stay for ninth grade here, what new and exciting elements will be part of the ninth grade year, what other classmates would stay for ninth, etc. These decisions seem determined by forces beyond your control. It feels like only Chance (with a capital 'C,' Fortuna, Lady Luck) can deliver to you the thing you desire. You submit your application, maybe get lucky and BAM! – there’s the parking spot. It must be meant to be! Or, maybe not… What then?

"The second point, related to this notion of Chance as benevolent or malevolent to your goals, stems from an observation of mine that many teenagers tend look at the adults in their life and presume that they have arrived at their accomplishments fully formed, as if we had opened a package, untied the string, and POOF! - We arise mature and professional, equipped with all necessary skills. That with minimal effort, we pull up to the restaurant and BAM! A spot! And look, there’s time left on the meter, too!

"Of course this was not the case, and my message tonight points toward the challenges, toward the dubious, unsettling time between now and adulthood.

"If I have achieved anything in life, professionally that is, I’d be most quick to tout my acquiring languages. I am a Latin teacher, and I am conversant in a few other languages. Students often appear dumbfounded when I mention that I speak several, and they comment on it as if I simply downloaded them into my brain. Yet, I’m here tonight to confirm that in fact I had to circle the block many times, as it were, in order to achieve my goals.

"Early on I did show some aptitude for language, I’ll admit. I excelled at Gibberish - does anyone here speak Gibberish? Yes indeed, I showed potential. Still, if I did have any language talent, I rested on my laurels. I was lazy in my approach, an underachiever clinging to the aforementioned notion that things would just open up for me. Naive as I was, I thought that just by wanting it, I would emerge good at it.

"Over time this malaise morphed out of control, and I developed a vivid spy fantasy. You all know the scenario: Caught in an alley, I notice two unsavory characters approach, sizing me up, shooting harsh comments across to one another in their foreign tongue. But just as they’re set to pounce, I, wise to the game, catch them up, delivering spot-on slang, super-spy-like, uttered with perfect accent and timing. At which point these murderous and intimidating figures immediately transform (as often happens in a dream) into light-hearted and amicable naves. 'Come! Make party with us! You must meet my sister! Now we show you the secret underground of this exotic city…!' And so on. Alas, dear listener, we’ll soon find out this did not quite come to pass.

"Fast forward to my twenties, in pursuit of my fantasy to be a polyglot, I headed to South America. First attempt: Argentina. My best friend had a family friend in Buenos Aires who could put us up while we looked for work - it seemed like fate was smiling on us! But we failed: the financial crisis of 2001 reduced each person’s bank account by half, which meant no one had money to pay for English classes. After a month we returned home with our tails between our legs. We couldn’t catch a break.

"Then another golden opportunity arose:At a Christmas party in my hometown, chatting with a girl I was friends with, I heard about her time teaching English in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil. And, luckily, after a few false starts, I ultimately landed an amazing set up in Rio, complete with a low-rent, high-view apartment, a cell phone, a bike, even a maid - obviously an amazing opportunity.

"But things were not all rosy: my overconfidence leading into the trip pushed me to do zero preparation. Apart from half-listening to some Portuguese language tapes, I arrived incompetent, hoping to rely on my mediocre Spanish knowledge. Sure, there were some fun adventures at the start, but after a month of frustration I suffered some dark bouts of loneliness. Unable to understand even 'Where are you from?' - Vôce é de onde? - I shrank into a shell. There’d be days when I’d not even leave my apartment, too overwhelmed by the Babel streaming out of everyone’s faces. My brain hurt, and I was flailing.

"Even when I could string some words together, I’d frequently launch large language blunders of embarrassment. (No specifics here, but I’ll just mention that too many words I attempted sounded very similar to certain body parts.) Red-cheeked and stuttering, I’d recoil again away from interacting with people.

"At an all time low, in bitter irony of my foolish spy fantasy, I actually got mugged in a back ally, not by anyone worthy of Jason Bourne, but by two desperate kids from a favela, wielding a shiv formed from broken glass, with duct tape wrapped around one end as a crude handle. Clearly, I had not found the parking spot right in front of the Brazilian establishment. I was failing.

"But here I am now. I can speak Portuguese – but how? It was not easy. My comeuppance complete, I resolved to earn my way. I chronicled each mistake I made, laughed at myself, with others, and moved on. I made lists of the new words and idioms I spied from billboards and bumper stickers. I cut off relations with my ex-pat American friends and resolved to speak only Portuguese. Each day I’d design an assignment, something mundane – like going to the grocery store, study up on the vocab, and head out the door. Buying cold cuts was never so exciting! Using the metric system, no less! And bus routes? In Rio de Janeiro? A welcome (albeit harrying) challenge. And so, month by month, I regained my capacity to speak with confidence. I circled and circled and circled the block, and finally arrived at my goal.

"So, dear graduates, how will you achieve your goals? Will something just open up, right where you need it? Will you always get your first choice? And if you do, will it really deliver what you think you deserve right then? You were all wise enough before this speech to know that is not the case. But when you do hit those snags and find yourself flailing, picture me and my difficulty.

"We all need to abide these vagaries of fortune, these countless and even painful setbacks. Listen for a pulse from within, heed your inner voice, and it will propel you past the failures, as you circle the block, toward your goal."

Gretchen Bowder

Upper School Spanish teacher Bowder recalled a moment of panic after being invited by Head of School Larry Griffin to speak at the Celebration Dinner. Griffin reassured her, "You can talk about whatever you want. You know this class pretty well, right? You can talk about ways you’ve seen them grow, things they’ve accomplished. You can be funny if you want to be…."

"OH – funny! How I would dearly love to be funny. And then I experienced a feeling of resignation that turned into calm – a bit of self-awareness, I suppose. I AM funny sometimes, in a mild kind of way, but I wouldn’t say that I’m known for my blistering wit.

"It was that kernel of awareness - that I would LIKE to be funny, but that being funny is not really what I’m best at - that brought me to the topic of my speech to you tonight.

"You guys are students. You are students in a school that makes you work hard, and from which you and your parents hope and expect that you will learn a lot, AND perhaps, get good grades. These expectations are not unreasonable. We want to you learn a lot, and to work hard. We also know that earning good grades can make life a lot easier for you.

"But let’s be honest – life is not about good grades. A grade is just a grade, and a class is just a class. In even just 5 years, no one is going to remember what you got in Spanish when you were in 8th grade, or even in 9th grade, or in any other class that you took as as middle schooler.

"Furthermore, if you learn only 60% of the material in a class during a given year, thereby earning a D, does this make you a bad person? Or, if you learn 100% of the material in a class during a given year, thereby earning an A+, does this make you a good person?

"No. Emphatically, NO. We cannot draw any kind of conclusion about a person’s character based on the grades he or she earns in school. Unfortunately, we tend to slide that way. And worse, we tend to start to believe those things about ourselves. I earned an A. I must be good. I failed. I must be bad.

"If neither of those things is true, and let me assure you – they are not - then what IS important? What DOES matter?

"Let me tell you about a friend of mine. Her name is Kate. I hope that you all have someone in your life like Kate – someone who makes you feel really comfortable, really welcome, highly valued, and very at home. This person calls you up, or maybe you just stop by their house randomly - and they say 'Oh! It’s so nice to see you! Come in! Sit down! How are you? Tell me all about what’s been going on for you.' All of sudden I am settled comfortably on the couch, there are snacks in front of me, and I find that I’m expressing thoughts and feelings that I didn’t even know I had – all because Kate is giving her time and full attention to me. NOW – what personal characteristics does Kate possess? Did she get good grades in school? Turn in her homework on time? Always have a pencil when she came to class? Is she a good speller? Maybe. Maybe not.

"As a child, did she keep her room clean? How about taking care of her things? Was she prone to misplacing her lacrosse stick? Constantly sitting on her iPod? Maybe not. Maybe.

"I wonder if you’ve heard this joke before? Apologies to everyone in the room who identifies with these particular nationalties… It goes like this: Heaven is where the police are British, the lovers French, the mechanics German, the chefs Italian, and it is all organized by the Swiss. Hell is where the police are German, the lovers Swiss, the mechanics French, the chefs British, and it is all organized by the Italians.

"It is obvious to all of us that heaven is where Mrs. McNall teaches athletics, and where Mrs. Bauer teaches art. Hell, on the other hand, might be where I teach physics; my students might remember that I took physics twice and got a D both times. Hell is also where Mrs. Sneeden teaches singing; next time we sing a song as a community, just watch her – she mouths the words.

"Our strengths, as they relate to academics, athletics, or the arts, are generally obvious to everyone. This doesn’t mean that we shouldn’t stretch ourselves to be better at things we find challenging. But what are not so obvious, and what are not so openly appreciated, are the strengths that come from our heart. I have seen these strengths in you. I have seen the ways in which you show your heart, and when you do so, I have seen you exhibit some of the best characteristics a person can possess.

"I have seen you stand up for your own beliefs without putting other people down. I have seen you stand up for a friend when that friend was being put down. You have put your arm around someone who was sad or upset and walked to a place where you could listen and offer advice. You have done your best to be funny and light when you knew your friend could use a good laugh. You have told white lies to save each other from embarassment. You have been honest in the face of temptation. Sometimes you have been honest after temptation had already overcome you, but that’s okay too! You have shared your food, your clothing, and your advisee lunch money with each other generously.

"You have cheered on your classmates when they got up on stage to perform. You have cheered them especially when you could see that they were nervous, when they stumbled, or when had forgotten a line. You patted your teammate on the back when he or she did a great job. You also patted him on the back when he missed the play and was feeling bad that he might have messed things up for the team.

"During your time here at Shore you’ve worked in teams a lot. Perhaps you have marvelled at how organized someone on your team was. She read the directions carefully and knew all the steps that you were supposed to take to complete a project. He kept everyone else on task – even if you found that annoying, you could recognize that keeping the job moving forward was important. Someone else on the team was the dreamer and the big-picture thinker. This person was really good at coming up with ideas. Some of those ideas were crazy, but some were really great. Maybe someone else wrote everything down, and made sure that everyone had a job to do. And someone helped everyone to get along and work through their differences of opinion.

"But maybe you didn’t notice those things. Because after all, no human being is perfect. We ALL at times fail to recognize the gifts and talents that someone else brings to the table - probably someone who is not just like us.

"What are my strengths? I think that I’m good at seeing issues from both sides. I try to put myself in someone else’s shoes and deeply consider what it is like to experience life from that perspective. I try to be fair. Sometimes I’m a great listener but at other times I’m more interested in getting the job done. For me it’s important to strike a balance. I’m good at fixing things…. But you know what? My house is a little too neat and clean. I love my dog, but dog hair on the sofa really bugs me. And to my children’s chagrin, my fridge is frequently empty.

"My friend Kate, on the other hand? Her house is a mess. The dog sits everywhere. Things are piled up, things are broken. But wow does she know how to fully give her time. She knows how to show her friends that she loves them. Her fridge is full; she loves to cook, and she is funny! And you know what, her hairy doggy couch doesn’t bother me at all.

"So – my challenge to you, as you grow, as you move through life – is to figure this out – are you are the person with the hairy couch, or the person with the neat couch? Don’t get me wrong – it’s not always going to be one or the other, because there are degrees of hairiness! Depending on who you’re comparing yourself to, your couch might be neat one day and hairy the next.

"If you have the hairy dog couch, invite your neat couch friend over for a meal and some heart to heart conversation. And if you have the neat couch, be sure to bring your toolbox with you to dinner so that you can return the love by fixing something that needs fixing.

"Keep your heart open. Keep it open to yourself – be kind to yourself - and keep it open to others, especially to people who are not just like you. Be ruthless in examining the areas where your heart 'shows strength' and where it 'has room for improvement.' 

"Recognize that your weaknesses are someone else's strengths, and that your strengths, if you understand them with honesty and humility, can be generously offered to others to help them on their way through life."