My Graduation from Purdue
Breakfast
I drove to the Courtyard by Marriott at 8 AM to pick up my mom. While I waited in the lobby, I collected and read through the brochures for the regional attractions and found a few places that I would like to take the family for some R&R—most of which involve an indoor swimming pool. There is something about an indoor pool and the smell of chlorine that spells r-e-l-a-x-a-t-i-o-n to me. At about 8:30, I asked the front desk to call her room, and they were kind enough to give me her room number (109). Nice room, by the way! The bed reminded me of an extremely comfortable one I had at a Sheraton in St. Louis. We got back home a little before 9 AM, and by then Melissa had a nice breakfast of eggs and fruit along with pumpkin pie and some kind of ginger spice strudel from Bob Evans. Raul and Lucy showed up about 9:30, followed by Melissa’s parents at 10:15. I ironed my doctoral robe, and we headed out for West Lafayette around 11:20. The drive to Purdue was gray and dreary. It wasn’t the ideal weather, but it wasn’t all that cold, so I can’t complain too much. In as sense, it was a fitting way to end my higher education, all of which has taken place in the Midwest. Melissa did most of the talking from the back seat on the way over—kind of a movie director’s commentary on a DVD. Oddly, there were few cars (if any) at FBC Russiaville as we passed by there around 11:30.
Pre-Ceremony
We go to the University Street parking garage about 12:30, so we snacked on some grapes and apples as well as pinwheel sandwiches before we parted ways—me to the Armory and the rest of the family to the Elliot Hall of Music where the ceremony was held. I had to report to the Armory at 1:20, so I was there quite a bit early, which was fine with me. I was feeling a bit nervous and just wanted to check and double check that everything was in order. Upon entering the Armory, a woman worker gave me an information card to fill out regarding the pronunciation of my name, etc. I took this card to a station on the west side of the room to get a picture of me taken with my cap, gown, and a diploma cover. After this, I went over to the Graduate School table to line up behind the “Doctor of Philosophy” sign. I was assigned #57 in the marching order, and the worker at the grad school booth folded my gown over my left arm, and I kept it there until the marshal took it from my arm during the hooding ceremony. I had about an hour to wait around, so I chatted with a couple of other Ph.D. candidates, Harsha Gunawardena from the Triangle Park area in NC who was graduating in analytical chemistry and Maryse Jayasuriya from El Paso with a degree in English.
At 2:03 PM—the same time that Melissa and I were pronounced man and wife 14 years ago—we began marching from the Armory to Elliot via the scenic route. One of the Purdue trains was parked outside the door as we exited the Armory. We turned east, and headed east toward Elliot Hall as it began to sprinkle. It was a shock to the whole line when we realized that the processional kept marching past the entrance to Elliot and toward the engineering square where the giant fountain was. We marched toward the far end of the square and then toward the fountain, which was off given the time of year. For the most part, we marched without anyone saying a word. It was just the sound of high heels clicking and clomping herd-like along the wet walkways. Our line parted around the main fountain and then headed toward the stairs of Hovde Hall where the same mascot train met us once again. There were also two plain-clothes security guards scanning the crowd. They looked as if they were from some eastern European crime organization. Climbing the steps and going into Hovde Hall was a surprise to me, and it seemed odd to march past the place where we had to pay our bills. We walked through the 2nd floor of Hovde and across a second story walkway that led into Elliot. A woman was filming us with a large, mobile TV camera as we marched into the building, and although we didn’t know it at the time, the feed was going live to the large screens in the front of Elliot. I looked for the family as I marched down the aisle, but didn’t see them. As it turned out, they were on the second row of the first balcony. We filed in to our rows and waited for the rest of the candidates to enter.
Ceremony
After the national anthem and a moment of reflection, Martin Jischke, the President of Purdue, gave an excellent address to the candidates to mark the school’s 200th commencement. He gave an extended illustration about Harvey Wiley, one of the first faculty members at Purdue and the “father of the FDA.” He also made the point that we have a valuable resource that the wealthiest older people would trade their wealth for—time. So, what are we going to do with this time. He also mentioned that the Space Shuttle flight currently in orbit is commanded by a Purdue graduate.
Following the conferral of an honorary degree on Deborah McDowell, an expert in black critical feminist theory, it was our turn to be hooded. Our section was asked to stand and make our way to the stage, and the hooding ceremony began. It took 3 or 4 minutes before it was my turn to walk across the stage, but in that time, it was fun to look up and see those ahead of me being hooded. I felt emotional when thinking about their accomplishment, almost as if I was somehow a distant observer of the event. When it was my turn to be on stage, I offered my hood to the marshal, stepped in front of the wooden rostrum while facing the audience, and was hooded by Cindy Nakutsu, the interim dean of the graduate school. I then walked over the Martin Jischke, who handed me my diploma while saying: “Congratulations, Dr. Mosley. Great job and best of luck in the future.” I then left to the stage and returned to my seat where I was relieved to be done with my part of the ceremony.
When the ceremony was over, I scanned the audience for a couple of minutes before finally spotting Melissa on the first balcony. I made my way toward the back of the auditorium as Melissa took pictures and Little Raul waved from the balcony. I went up to the balcony and we took pictures for a few minutes until it was obvious that the event staff was waiting on us to clear out the balcony. Plus, my robe was supposedly due back to Follett’s by 5 PM, which was only about 10 minutes away. We took a group photo in the lobby and then rushed to Follett’s where I was able to return my robe down in the text book section on the lower level. As it turned out, the store closed at 6.
Dinner at Olive Garden
I ordered the Tuscan Garlic Chicken, which was excellent, although I could have just as easily gone with the Roma Chicken. I sat at a round table with Raul, Lucy, and Little Raul, while the rest sat at an adjoining rectangular table. Although the tables were pushed together, the conversations took place mainly within each table. I talked mainly with Raul about my dissertation and how Raul is planning on writing some articles on the topic of immigration.
Drive back.
The drive back was dark and rainy. What a dreary and depressing landscape when it is raining at night in north central Indiana. I caught up with some of the news from home. We stopped to see Christmas lights at Oaklawn Acres between Lafayette and Kokomo. This was a great display, but somewhat hard to see through the foggy windows.
Back at Home
We got back to the apartment and loaded the boxes that were in Raul and Lucy’s rental back into the Byrom’s Suburban. We spent about an hour chatting as Raul Matthew played on his Pearl Harbor computer simulator game. Raul and Lucy left about 9:30. Mom then gave us a couple of gift books—one dealing with the Advent season and the other was a childrens' book that had flashing Christmas lights embedded inside the back cover. I took my mom back to the hotel, and returned home to work on recording the day’s events.
You can check out photos of this day at http://community.webshots.com/user/RAMosley.
I drove to the Courtyard by Marriott at 8 AM to pick up my mom. While I waited in the lobby, I collected and read through the brochures for the regional attractions and found a few places that I would like to take the family for some R&R—most of which involve an indoor swimming pool. There is something about an indoor pool and the smell of chlorine that spells r-e-l-a-x-a-t-i-o-n to me. At about 8:30, I asked the front desk to call her room, and they were kind enough to give me her room number (109). Nice room, by the way! The bed reminded me of an extremely comfortable one I had at a Sheraton in St. Louis. We got back home a little before 9 AM, and by then Melissa had a nice breakfast of eggs and fruit along with pumpkin pie and some kind of ginger spice strudel from Bob Evans. Raul and Lucy showed up about 9:30, followed by Melissa’s parents at 10:15. I ironed my doctoral robe, and we headed out for West Lafayette around 11:20. The drive to Purdue was gray and dreary. It wasn’t the ideal weather, but it wasn’t all that cold, so I can’t complain too much. In as sense, it was a fitting way to end my higher education, all of which has taken place in the Midwest. Melissa did most of the talking from the back seat on the way over—kind of a movie director’s commentary on a DVD. Oddly, there were few cars (if any) at FBC Russiaville as we passed by there around 11:30.
Pre-Ceremony
We go to the University Street parking garage about 12:30, so we snacked on some grapes and apples as well as pinwheel sandwiches before we parted ways—me to the Armory and the rest of the family to the Elliot Hall of Music where the ceremony was held. I had to report to the Armory at 1:20, so I was there quite a bit early, which was fine with me. I was feeling a bit nervous and just wanted to check and double check that everything was in order. Upon entering the Armory, a woman worker gave me an information card to fill out regarding the pronunciation of my name, etc. I took this card to a station on the west side of the room to get a picture of me taken with my cap, gown, and a diploma cover. After this, I went over to the Graduate School table to line up behind the “Doctor of Philosophy” sign. I was assigned #57 in the marching order, and the worker at the grad school booth folded my gown over my left arm, and I kept it there until the marshal took it from my arm during the hooding ceremony. I had about an hour to wait around, so I chatted with a couple of other Ph.D. candidates, Harsha Gunawardena from the Triangle Park area in NC who was graduating in analytical chemistry and Maryse Jayasuriya from El Paso with a degree in English.
At 2:03 PM—the same time that Melissa and I were pronounced man and wife 14 years ago—we began marching from the Armory to Elliot via the scenic route. One of the Purdue trains was parked outside the door as we exited the Armory. We turned east, and headed east toward Elliot Hall as it began to sprinkle. It was a shock to the whole line when we realized that the processional kept marching past the entrance to Elliot and toward the engineering square where the giant fountain was. We marched toward the far end of the square and then toward the fountain, which was off given the time of year. For the most part, we marched without anyone saying a word. It was just the sound of high heels clicking and clomping herd-like along the wet walkways. Our line parted around the main fountain and then headed toward the stairs of Hovde Hall where the same mascot train met us once again. There were also two plain-clothes security guards scanning the crowd. They looked as if they were from some eastern European crime organization. Climbing the steps and going into Hovde Hall was a surprise to me, and it seemed odd to march past the place where we had to pay our bills. We walked through the 2nd floor of Hovde and across a second story walkway that led into Elliot. A woman was filming us with a large, mobile TV camera as we marched into the building, and although we didn’t know it at the time, the feed was going live to the large screens in the front of Elliot. I looked for the family as I marched down the aisle, but didn’t see them. As it turned out, they were on the second row of the first balcony. We filed in to our rows and waited for the rest of the candidates to enter.
Ceremony
After the national anthem and a moment of reflection, Martin Jischke, the President of Purdue, gave an excellent address to the candidates to mark the school’s 200th commencement. He gave an extended illustration about Harvey Wiley, one of the first faculty members at Purdue and the “father of the FDA.” He also made the point that we have a valuable resource that the wealthiest older people would trade their wealth for—time. So, what are we going to do with this time. He also mentioned that the Space Shuttle flight currently in orbit is commanded by a Purdue graduate.
Following the conferral of an honorary degree on Deborah McDowell, an expert in black critical feminist theory, it was our turn to be hooded. Our section was asked to stand and make our way to the stage, and the hooding ceremony began. It took 3 or 4 minutes before it was my turn to walk across the stage, but in that time, it was fun to look up and see those ahead of me being hooded. I felt emotional when thinking about their accomplishment, almost as if I was somehow a distant observer of the event. When it was my turn to be on stage, I offered my hood to the marshal, stepped in front of the wooden rostrum while facing the audience, and was hooded by Cindy Nakutsu, the interim dean of the graduate school. I then walked over the Martin Jischke, who handed me my diploma while saying: “Congratulations, Dr. Mosley. Great job and best of luck in the future.” I then left to the stage and returned to my seat where I was relieved to be done with my part of the ceremony.
When the ceremony was over, I scanned the audience for a couple of minutes before finally spotting Melissa on the first balcony. I made my way toward the back of the auditorium as Melissa took pictures and Little Raul waved from the balcony. I went up to the balcony and we took pictures for a few minutes until it was obvious that the event staff was waiting on us to clear out the balcony. Plus, my robe was supposedly due back to Follett’s by 5 PM, which was only about 10 minutes away. We took a group photo in the lobby and then rushed to Follett’s where I was able to return my robe down in the text book section on the lower level. As it turned out, the store closed at 6.
Dinner at Olive Garden
I ordered the Tuscan Garlic Chicken, which was excellent, although I could have just as easily gone with the Roma Chicken. I sat at a round table with Raul, Lucy, and Little Raul, while the rest sat at an adjoining rectangular table. Although the tables were pushed together, the conversations took place mainly within each table. I talked mainly with Raul about my dissertation and how Raul is planning on writing some articles on the topic of immigration.
Drive back.
The drive back was dark and rainy. What a dreary and depressing landscape when it is raining at night in north central Indiana. I caught up with some of the news from home. We stopped to see Christmas lights at Oaklawn Acres between Lafayette and Kokomo. This was a great display, but somewhat hard to see through the foggy windows.
Back at Home
We got back to the apartment and loaded the boxes that were in Raul and Lucy’s rental back into the Byrom’s Suburban. We spent about an hour chatting as Raul Matthew played on his Pearl Harbor computer simulator game. Raul and Lucy left about 9:30. Mom then gave us a couple of gift books—one dealing with the Advent season and the other was a childrens' book that had flashing Christmas lights embedded inside the back cover. I took my mom back to the hotel, and returned home to work on recording the day’s events.
You can check out photos of this day at http://community.webshots.com/user/RAMosley.
posted by Raul Mosley at
4:51 PM
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