May 23, 1997
by Mark Norris
Thank you very much for giving me this opportunity to be your graduation speaker. I am very proud to represent this part of Shelby County and I am proud of the contributions that Tipton Rosemark Academy has made in education over more than 30 years. This is a first for me and I know people much more deserving who have waited a lifetime to be invited to do something like this and regret that they have never had the opportunity.
Now that I have the opportunity, I realize that we may have a real problem. For as much as I cherish the opportunity to try to impart some weighty words of wisdom to the Class of 1997, I am haunted by the specter of my own high school graduation way back in 1973 and the fact that I have absolutely no recollection of what our graduation speaker had to say on that day. So here I am truly wanting to say something meaningful to you and your parents and your faculty knowing full well that you really want to get on the with conferring of diplomas and get on with the rest of your lives.
Since I was first invited eight weeks ago, I have struggled in my search for that perfect pearl of wisdom to leave you with -- something short and succinct you can take away from this ceremony that may help you along life's way years hence. Who better to ask than my own 75 year old mother whom I must admit disliked high school intensely. She suggested that I build upon a simple theme: "Boys and girls, aren't you glad that this is over?" I told Mom I did not think that would be particularly well received so I asked a lifelong friend who now owns and operates an auto parts store in Ohio what he would suggest, and he said that my life's message for you should be. "Whatever you do, have a good time". I'm not sure that your parents would draw much comfort in my delivering that message. I reflected upon my friend, Van Pritchartt's yearning to be a graduation speaker. He was the editor of the old Memphis Press Schimitar. Now he is the editor of The Collierville Herald. In fact, he wrote an editorial last week, saying that he was getting a graduation speech ready just in case someone ever asks him to give one, and he said:
There must be a way to outdo all those graduation speakers who simply say to go out and make the world better. They neglect to tell how. That must be because they don't know.
And they never tell the grads to do something fun. I have sort of wished to have the fun of being a ski instructor or a tennis pro. If only a graduation speaker had told me it was O.K.
Saying to do something worthwhile is nice, but it's hardly a worthwhile graduation speech if you don't say what's worthwhile.
Mr. Pritcharrt concludes that we should tell graduating seniors to simple be the best you can be at anything you do, that "being the best will be worthwhile and can help make the world a better place and will be fun at the same time."
And then I attended (but did not speak) at the Bolton High School graduation last night. Homer Bunker, Chairman of Shelby County School Board, was the graduation speaker. He seemed to have come the closest to what I'm after. He posed a series of questions in trying to determine what is truly important in life and, therefore, what you should be prepared to do along life's way as you leave this place:
Can you name the five wealthiest people in the world?
Can you have five Heissman Trophy winners?
Can you name five winners of the Nobel or Pulitzer Prize?
Can you name the last five World Series winners?
His point was that most of us quickly forget world class achievements even though those people were the best in their field.
He then posed different questions:
Think of five people you enjoy spending time with.
Name five people who have taught you something worthwhile.
Name five friends who have helped you in a difficult time.
Last five teachers who aided your journey through school.
Name five people who have inspired you.
That, I though, was getting closer to the heart of a meaningful message -- appealing somewhat more to our spiritual side.
In a sermon by one of my ministers at St. George's Church in Germantown back in January, 1994, Rev. Susan Crawford challenged us to consider the meaning of our lives. It was a pivotal moment in my life. A defining moment when I decided once and for all to seek public office. She asked, "How do we determine how to devote our lives? How do we know what will give us bliss in the sense that Jesus in the Book of Mark encourages us to follow our bliss but be prepared to make some sacrifices." And she said that, "What God wants for us and from us has something central to do with what we most deeply and truly want for ourselves." What this means is that our true vocations, our callings, will come from our deepest yearnings" To follow the way of the Lord. She went on to say, " We are made for commitment and loyalty. Our captivities are what give us purpose and drive, meaning and motivation and inspiration . . . God's call usually involves our doing the kind of work we most need to do and the kind of work the world most needs for us to do."
I remember thinking that I knew the kind of work I wanted to do at one point during my high school education. I grew up on a small farm in Ohio. We raised horses there, and one of my favorite visitors was the blacksmith. I'd sit for hours in the heat of the day while he tended to the hooves of our horses watching him manipulate steel and horse flesh before the coal fired forge and anvil in his pickup truck. his stories were all about powerful people and powerful horses and the drama of life and hard work along life's way.
And after my father died when I was 12 years old, and I had gone to Boston to a college preparatory school very much like this one where I studied Latin and French and lots of things we did not have in school back in Ohio, I got homesick and decided that I really didn't want to be a student but a blacksmith instead. It did not seem to me that anything I was learning made much difference, and life would be more meaningful in the long-run if I could just become a blacksmith.
So I packed my bags and called for a taxicab to carry me to the airport and was waiting on the steps of the classroom building when one of my teachers appeared and engaged me in some conversation. He never refused to let me go, although he certainly could have. But he did ask a lot of questions about what I thought the future would be like if I cut my education short and became a blacksmith in Ohio. What opportunities might I miss? Maybe I needed to know a little more about things before I struck off on my own. Maybe there would be plenty of time for blacksmithing and better smithing at that if I finished school first.
With that goal in mind, I decided to stay for at least the remainder of that year and then the next and the next, but I always keep that goals in mind and planned to return to my widowed mother on her farm in Ohio just as soon as I got my education. Which is what led me to Colorado after Boston because I figured it would be good to live out West for a time while getting my college degree since I knew Mom would need me back in Ohio just as soon as I graduated. I went to a liberal arts college because I wanted the broadest education I could have so I wouldn't get tied down too much on one subject. And somewhere along the way I'd seen some unscrupulous folks try to take advantage of my mother and her small farm, and I started thinking that, with all that I had learned, maybe there was something I could do to learn how to help people like my mother avoid trouble and the types of things that can make life so unhappy. And so I studied harder and worked hard enough to qualify for law school, and I guess you can figure out the rest of the story. So here I am, practicing law, serving the public and blacksmithing for fun on the side.
Tipton Rosemark Academy stands for quality education in a Christian environment. Throughout your years here you have been immersed in a tradition of academic excellence, the value of which can be summed up really in a single word. "Freedom". St. John said, "You shall know the truth and the truth shall make you free." You have at your disposal now the freedom to think critically. Freedom to distinguish between right and wrong, good and bad. Freedom to choose your own destiny -- where to live, what job to work, and what is important to you in this life. Freedom to set your own priorities, to be your own boss. Freedom to reason, to love and to establish meaningful values. In short, you don't need me to tell you what is important, you have the freedom to make the most of life while you can. To do the best you can with what you've got. Indeed, to be happy in the truest sense.
Think of your life's experiences as a bag of tools and the poem by R.L. Sharpe: A Bag of Tools:
"Isn't it strange! That princes and Kings
And clowns that caper in sawdust rings
And common people like you and me
Are builders for Eternity?
To each is given a bag of tools
A shapeless mass A book of Rules
And each must make ere life has flown,
A stumbling block. Or a stepping stone."
Thus, given all that you are blessed with, and the tools at your disposal, take these thoughts and carry with you this admonition: "Keep your options open, follow your bliss, and endeavor to make a meaningful contribution as you proceed along life's way."
