This will be my last article here. That is merely a fact, and not an interesting one at that. However on the subject of moving on, I am not as comfortable as I seem at the outset. I was asked by a teacher “How do you feel about graduating?” a week before my final day here. I wasn’t sure how to answer. Sure, I was happy to be moving on. But, when dust moves on in the air, one wonders whether it has nostalgia for the ground once beneath it. So too does it feel my own support being lifted from beneath me. Where the world felt so small, and then bigger than anyone could have imagined. Our class has always been the guinea pigs and lab rats, from the multiple variations of the standardized system over the years, to pandemic restrictions and at home learning. It has always been us. Yet, I feel as though we may have become stronger because of it. 

There is a phrase; “As a blacksmith uses heat to temper steel, so should a trial by fire strengthen one’s mettle.” In this, I feel our class has been annealed to a level of strength higher than any before us. The trials, the goals that defined us. The perseverance to pull through anything the universe could throw at us. 2021 is an odd year to be sure, but we still had our passions. Our people, sports, arts, projects and clubs that led us to the end. So when I speak of my nerves about our classes moving on, know that it is not a question of mental or physical strength and ability. Rather it is the feeling and sense of unease that every class must face. I believe we can and will face it, as with all challenges, and once more go undaunted unto the breach. The unknown is only so until experienced, after all. To the Biddeford Class of 2021, may you realize your gifts, and act on them. May you live every day as if the final curtain call was a tragic second away. The sun is splitting the dark clouds, my friends, a clear blue sky ahead of us.