A week ago, I lamented the passage of time after buying my graduation regalia from Titan Shops:
You might remember this as, “that thing that happened before I wrote about the SPJ meeting with Sonya Quick.”
But that brief moment of panic wasn’t actually all that brief.
Buying the cap and gown was an encapsulation of my anxiety about the imminent transition from academia into the professional workforce.
I’ve become something of an expert at navigating academia. In fact, I’m attending the Department of Communications Awards again tomorrow to get some unknown accolade.
They don’t tell us what we’re in for, so you’ll just have to wait for my recap!
Sick teasers aside, the “real world” intimidates me far more. Not only because job prospects are in decline for journalists at the moment, but because of the increase in necessities. Rent, bills, health insurance… All that good stuff.
I can’t imagine I’m alone in feeling a deep-seeded dread toward the kinds of formalities that mark the transition into adulthood, so I won’t linger on it.
Instead I’ll subvert that fear and anxiety by bringing up my favorite childhood pastime so I can keep my psyche in a place of comfort:
Pokémon
You should all know that I love me some Pokémon. Sword and Shield is coming out soon, and even though we haven’t heard anything since the first announcement, I can’t wait for it to be my obligatory Game of the Year.
Yet, having played the creature collection series since 2000, I’ve never had a reason to justifiably call myself a Pokémon…
Until now.
After I bought my cap and gown, Mom suggested I dig through my closet to find my other gowns. I didn’t remember holding onto them, so I was a little skeptical.
But then I found them.
And the three-stage evolution is actually incredible:
Over on the left you have a cute little preschool graduation gown. Because apparently my preschool did a fancy graduation.
It’s actually impossible for me to imagine ever having been small enough to fit into that.
Though who knows, maybe if I keep working on getting swole at the gym…
In the middle is my high school graduation gown. All the boys wore red while all the girls wore white, and it’s complete with extra cords and doodads—outside of a wreath made of candy that I remember wearing at the time.
Unfortunately, Cal State Fullerton denied me the opportunity of completing the red, white and blue set by using boring, plain black robes.
Like sure, the sleekness of the black robes is pretty nice. And the fact that it looks so big compared to the other two really completes that metaphorical Pokémon evolution I’ve gone through.
But was any of that worth it if America got shafted at the end?
I think not.
… Also for anyone that might ask, this is not my official “cap and gown picture” or whatever. I’ll probably wind up doing that once I have all my stoles and other doodads.
I might even be thinking about some fun pictures to take. We’ll just have to wait and see.
Work in Progress 
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