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Editor's note: The following is the text of Carolina commencement speaker Trudier Harris-Lopez's prepared remarks for her address, which she delivered Dec. 20 at the Smith Center. Harris-Lopez is the J. Carlyle Sitterson professor of English. There were more than 1,300 December graduates.
Good afternoon.
I begin by offering thanks, first of all, to Chancellor Moeser and the UNC
students and faculty who are responsible for me standing before you today. It
is indeed an honor to be here, and I recognize those upon whose shoulders I
stand and who have made this appearance possible. They include, of course, my
own deceased parents, who, in spite of having five kids before I arrived,
nonetheless took a chance on yet another one. They include the neighbors,
teachers, and church folks in Tuscaloosa, Alabama, who were instrumental in
encouraging me to stay in school. And of course they include a plethora of
individuals who have carved out paths of opportunity over the past several
decades. I thank them all.
To you who are about to stop paying tuition to Carolina, I say,
"Congratulations!" You have made your families proud, and you will continue to
make them proud in the productive years to come.
I am not going to stand here and talk about how much you are going to miss
Carolina, from the wonderful food in Lenoir and Chase, to the lectures you've
heard in Carroll Hall, to fighting with Caroline to get the courses you wanted,
to the many days you've spent in Kenan Stadium or here in the Dean Dome. I'm
sure you have those images -- and many, many more -- properly imprinted upon
your minds.
I am also not going to dwell on how traumatic this semester has been for all of
us, on your place in that specific history, or in its ongoing consequences. You
have heard and you will surely hear enough of that.
Nor am I going to dwell on that strange summer and spring that we have been
having in November and December, for surely it must mean something. That, too,
will have to garner its reflective points from some other source.
So what am I going to do? I'm going to focus on some "D's." Since this is a
December graduation, and since I know that, in a few years, you probably won't
remember very much about it or me, I thought I might try to make some slight
impression on your memory by tying my remarks to life in what I call the "D"
world -- "D" as in "Divine December." So let's remember December and its
accompanying "D's." First of all, most of you are probably in DEBT. Don't feel
badly. Most of the rest of America is in debt as well. When I went to obtain a
loan on a house several years ago and did not have any outstanding debts, the
lending agent told me that it was "Un-American" not to have debts. So I've made
it a habit since then to be as American as I can be.
My advice to you, however, is to make every effort to relieve yourself of your
current debts before you acquire any additional ones. I know. The fancy car and
the apartment are calling you, as is the new professional wardrobe, but contain
yourselves for just a little while. Trust me; there will be plenty of
debt-building opportunities waiting for you.
Let's talk about DECISIONS. Many of you may already have decided what job
environment you're going to be in come January 1st, while others of you may yet
be praying for results from interviews. Certainly the job will enable you to
become the debt-building Americans in whom my lending officer firmly believes,
but there are obviously lots of other decisions to be made. What kind of life
will appeal to you? Will it be one in which money drives you more than anything
else? Or will it be one in which some kind of mission, some commitment to
giving back to the communities that supported you, will also hold sway? You may
be thinking, "I'm too excited right now to think about going out and joining
the trenches of charitable America. Give me a bit of time." But think again.
Many of you have given heartily of your time while at UNC. You've been mentors,
interns, Big Buddies, Big Brothers and Big Sisters, and just about everything
else we can imagine.
It's a Carolina tradition. I urge you to keep that charitable tradition close
to your hearts and make decisions to be as helpful to your new communities as
you have been at Carolina. Consider it a DUTY, a crucial part of being alive,
and well, and human. Besides, we'll all be so proud to hear of your good
works.
Now, some of you are sitting there with DOUBT, perhaps wondering IF a job will
come through. IF it will have a remotely acceptable salary, and IF it will be
in some barely tolerable living place. You're dwelling on the seventy or eighty
people -- if not hundreds -- who applied for the same job and wondering if you
have the slightest edge over them. I advise students to think about that
situation this way: If there are as many as 500 applicants for a single job,
and you are in the running, somebody is going to get the job. Why can't it be
you? If you've prepared well and done as much as you possibly could to ensure a
good result, then why can't the job be yours? Instead of focusing on the other
folks, believe that you can lead the pack as well as some imaginary opponent
out there whom you've created.
In contrast to doubting, there are some folks seated out there who might be
tempted to DAYDREAM. Now these folks might have just slid through this last
semester at Carolina, on a hope and a prayer, and expect that things are just
going to go their way. These chosen few believe that good looks and a smile, or
good conversation, or good social skills will land them precisely where they
want to be. And perhaps they will. But then again they might not. So it's best
to transform those dreams into living color reality, and that means being
DILIGENT. You have to execute the clutch three-pointer in a crucial game or the
field goal to break the tie, which might be equivalent to writing the creative
report when someone else is just being perfunctory.
It's kind of a shock, I know, to realize that you're going to have to go back
to being a freshman -- especially after you've earned the status of cool
seniors waiting for graduation day. When do I get to take a break, you ask?
Well, not right now. The race of life is going on, and you cannot afford to
hang out in the bleachers. Besides, there's usually nothing in the bleachers
except the hot air from all the folks who claim to play and coach better than
the participants in the game.
I invite you to be DARING in the lives you lead, the jobs you hold, the beliefs
you develop from this point on. What's the pleasure of always being one of the
herd, of never venturing out? How else can you make progress except by
challenging the assumptions of the environments into which you will go? Dare to
be imaginative. Dare to be creative. Dare to take a chance on a different way
of conceptualizing a project. Dare to explore a new avenue of research. Dare to
believe that the world needs to hear from you and give it something worthy of
its listening. Why be content to get up every morning, hop into your car, and
drive to an office where you plant yourself in a job for which someone else has
set the parameters of operation, where someone else has made all the decisions,
where someone else has assigned you the position of cog in the wheel? Dare to
take the wheel apart and find out what makes it run. Dare to re-invent it.
DEMAND of yourself your own standard for excellence, but don't drive yourself
onto a psychiatrist's couch. During your years here at Carolina, you have been
evaluated by someone else's standards, calculated your grade point averages by
someone else's standards, joined organizations for which you had to meet
certain criteria, and been aware, always, of someone passing judgment on you.
Now you can set the standards. They might incorporate some of the things you've
experienced here, but they might well go beyond that. Challenge yourselves;
lift the bar on minimum achievement and leap even higher. DETERMINE to be the
best at whatever you elect to do. If you are a scientist, why not imagine and
construct the first shuttle to Mars? But do it fast, because I want to be
around to make the trip.
And ... while you're transforming worlds and conquering space, dare to have fun
in the process. In other words, don't forget to DANCE. Now I'm not talking
about just going out and sweating on a dance floor a couple of weekends out of
the year. I'm talking about the attitude you bring to life and to all your
activities. Haven't you spent enough years being nerdy? Decide now to be
brilliant and have fun. Why sacrifice one for the other? There is a place in
life for leisure to offset all that thinking and creativity you're going to
bring to your new work place. So you might as well plan some smart, balanced,
recreational diversions from it. While you're planning how to take over your
company, and proceeding to do that, don't wake up one morning and find that
you're fifty and you haven't taken a vacation since you went skiing at
Carolina. That would indeed make Jack and Jill dull boys and girls. Find a
place for yourself and your family in your life. You DESERVE the best, and the
best is not about working twenty hours a day.
I know, therefore, that the professional side of your life after you leave UNC
is going to be productive, imaginative, and creative. I want to return,
however, to one of the intangibles, that is, how you live your life. When
you're out there, in that larger playing field of the "real world," you will
encounter DIFFERENCE -- as has been the case at Carolina. There will be people
who are not as tall as you are, or not as skinny -- not as light as you are, or
not as dark -- not as able as you are, or not from the same regional or
geographical background -- and certainly not as smart. They may not be as
computer literate or Internet savvy. They most likely will not have the exact
same tastes in dating or in marriage. They may not be as progressively feminist
as you are or as staunchly conservative. They may dislike or even hate your
southern accent, and you might find their northern or western or foreign speech
a bit trying at times. But just as you are now willing to accept different
tastes in food and music, fashion and religious belief, or to be eclectic in
your own tastes, expand your horizons and accept whatever new differences you
encounter as well.
One of the truths in which I firmly believe is that you gain little for always
being a member of the pack. Certainly, as Americans, we ALL have to pay taxes,
but we don't all have to go to Harvard or Berkeley, or vote for the same
political candidates, or wear jeans and dreadlocks. As a culture, we
intrinsically respect certain kinds of differences. I invite you to be
open-minded in accepting more. After all, as some not very original thinker
once said, "variety is the spice of life." It was because George Washington
Carver was a black scientist working in the segregated South that he discovered
so much about sweet potatoes, green beans, and peanuts, including making peanut
soap. If he had been like everybody else around, we would not have reaped the
benefits of his creative genius. That difference made a difference. While we
would rather not have that particular difference of segregation repeated, there
probably will be comparable ones, and more of them, and your expansiveness of
mind will have to respond to them in dramatically different ways.
If your personal relationships move toward commitment and/or marriage, DELIVER
the best of your emotional life. Don't enter halfway into a romance and expect
to get one hundred percent positive results from it. You didn't expect that of
papers you turned in while you were a student here. You wouldn't expect that of
a proposal you might hand to your boss next year. And you wouldn't expect it of
someone who holds your emotional life in their potentially crushing hands.
Emotional health in relationships is about being open enough to expose yourself
to vulnerability. It is my great hope for you that the earnestness you give
will reap earnestness in return.
Ten years from now, when you reflect upon Carolina, I sincerely hope that you
will do it with a great spirit of DEVOTION. Of course, by then you will have
belonged to the Alumni Association for all of those 10 years. You will have
returned to the campus on several occasions. And for those especially
imaginative takeover artists, you will have founded -- or re-vamped -- some
company and made a few million dollars. You may even be a senator from North
Carolina or planning your campaign to become President of the United States. It
is my sincere hope that you will remain devoted to Carolina, that you will stay
in touch, and that, as opportunity allows, you will take a hand in shaping its
next two hundred years.
These tidbits of advice, commentary, and good wishes ultimately amount to one
large directive: CARVE OUT YOUR OWN DESTINY. Don't wait for someone to tap you
on the shoulder and say, "Lige Pendergraft, because you're so wonderful, I just
purchased a tax-free house for you in the Bahamas, and, oh, by the way, here's
ten million dollars."
"Life ain't like that," so take yours in hand. Claim it! In the meantime,
All you darling damsels and dashing young men,
Don't sit there waiting for your ships to dock in;
Dash out today, demand the very best attention,
With a detective novel, a discovery, or a dual
invention.
You can't be daunted, for you're down, dainty, and debonair,
Only a fool who aspires to domination will think you're square.
You'll never be dumbfounded by the doggish competition.
`Cause you're just dapper enough to remember your mission.
It's about destiny, not devilishness; deftness, not danger,
Opportunities developed, not defeated in anger.
You can't be dismissed; so let the world take heed,
You are the advance guard of a dawning new breed
Of brain children -- doctors, diplomats, a doctoral student or two;
Dieticians, dentists, dermatologists, and diamond cutters too.
Darkness cannot block your way, for you turn dimness into light
And dazzle the world around you to make everything bright.
So calm down Detention! Stand back Destruction! Move over Delay!
To the loftiest of destinations, these graduates are on their way.
Donning their duds and documenting their paths not just to the stars alone
--
So let them pass. Make way, deserts! Move, mountains! "Look out, "they
gone!!"
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