Summertime, but first...

Summertime is upon us, but first I'd like to share my commencement message to the students of SUNY Geneseo on our trek out into the wild...

Below is the script, I'll attempt to get some video going soon:

(Also, I realize I'm quoting myself...ha)


"Welcome, Mothers, Fathers, Brothers, Sisters, Loved ones, Professors, Associates

Before you sits the Class of 2009

Take a moment, take a breath

Here we sit, so far away from our smiling freshmen selves. We seem like entirely different people now. Do you remember yourself then, wondering what this would be like, what graduating would feel like? We seem so much older now…

We have worked hard, sacrificed much, and learned a thing or two.

And here the road would seem to end. And yet, when I think that this is the end I remember these words:

“There will come a time when you think everything is finished. That will be the beginning.”

And this, here now, is the start of something.


But to understand this beginning we must come to understand, and I would hope that your parents, friends, and peers come to understand, and come to appreciate, the circumstances of our maturity.

And to exemplify this, I’d like to tell you a story of my maturity. Perhaps some of you remember, and perhaps some of you took part – in the mudsliding on the South Side of campus our Freshmen year.

The rains had been particularly fierce, and it turned the hills into causeways and means of meeting every new face. We all had a great time, but it was not until this year that I realized that that rainwater that was so essential to our beginning college experience was the misery water of New Orleans.

All of our actions are inherently tied with the globalized world – the pleasures that we enjoy in our everyday lives are sometimes the very engines of grief a world away.

The story of our generation, and particularly, of our college years, has been framed by events that have occurred outside of our power to control.



Class of 2009, we began our freshmen years in the wake of Hurricane Katrina, when we realized once again that there may indeed be “no certitude, nor peace, nor help for pain.”

We leave college now on the heels of the election of Barack Obama, an election that seemed impossible that was sold as improbable but was made manifest by our efforts. We leave college convinced that a society that is determined enough can reorganize itself. But we recognize also that this reorganization does not happen alone – that it is generated by individuals cooperating together, working towards defined goals.

WE are going to be those individuals that determine the path our society will take. Our lives will shape the growth and structure of America.

Class of 2009, we now bear witness to the collapse of Wall Street, we enter the age of Responsibility. Let me remind you that we once pegged as the Facebook Generation, the instant Gratification Generation. And instead of a fractured selfish gang, we have become a cohesive coalition that will meet and overcome the problems of today and tomorrow.

WE are among the first of the generations to grow up with advanced technology as a staple within our lives. There are few graduates here who remember what life was like without direct connection to the internet.
Who remember what life was like without a personal cell-phone. WE do not think that these technologies have destroyed our communicative abilities, instead we have adapted our lives and opened new vistas of communication, education, and cooperation. WE use these technologies to better ourselves, to understand the world and to interact with it. Instead of burdens these technologies are tools, are our ways to understand and change our surroundings.

Though other may question our styles of communication they do not understand the depth of our interaction. WE operate as a force that is vigilant, enthralled, and productive.

Our time at Geneseo has endowed us with the knowledge and the ability to shape the outside world.


We have not been in college simply so that we can find a job.


WE understand that our time in college has been a privilege and that now we must repay our debt. We should think of ourselves as assets to society, because of the resources employed to bring us to this point. We hold within our grasp the power to manifest honest change.

I have spoken with many of those graduating today. And the paths that I have encountered are different but all invoke the idea of service, of continued education, of hope for what we can do in the world.

Geneseo graduates will filter across America. Some are biking United States building houses along the way. Some are going onto graduate work at prestigious universities, and will undoubtedly impress their peers. Some are going straight into jobs where they will work up the ladder quicker than most and will someday run businesses and organizations that have an impact the world over. Some are going into the Government, some to foreign nations to work, and some to foreign nations to serve the interests of the United States in our military.

We all will remember Geneseo. We have defined ourselves through our work, through how we questioned what was told to us, through the late nights studying, and the short Saturday nights laughing. Here some have found their spouses, and here many have found lasting friendships.

We go forth from Geneseo now, prepared to meet the world at large. WE are ready for this – we undertake our burden seriously, we think of ourselves both individuals and as members of a collective. WE are not the Gratification Generation but are instead members of the Millennial Generation and though this seems like the end, it is, in fact, just the beginning."