5/24/19

*this* time, a recap of *everybody's* graduation ceremony

Well, the "commencement" - of what, I know not - certainly, though, it's the ending of this "war", at least for those of us who will have graduated this year, but, anyway, that ceremony was this morning/afternoon, on a floor that I was actually already somewhat familiar with, given that the Devils routinely held "draft parties/equipment sales" way back when, into the earliest years of the Prudential Center, before either eliminating such events entirely, or simply heavily restricting them; my point is, though, was that that night in late June of I-don't-even-remember-which-year-anymore (although it was definitely post-2007, given that the building opened then...) was vastly different from this late morning/early afternoon, which was, arguably, "the beginning of the end", in a sense, since the vast majority of people end up doing things even more differently than the typical post-secondary/"youth" career/higher education/military/"trade" school(s) split for decades afterward, instead of still going through the "educational" stages of their lives - while nothing seems "constant" after one's early 20s (on average, or at least I think that's the case...), maybe I've been too concentrated on my own future recently to look at "the bigger picture", and see that maybe things won't remain as "uncertain" as they currently seem going forward!

Now that the "commencement" ceremony, which, disappointingly/surprisingly, included neither the "cap toss" that usually concludes similar ceremonies, nor this, in my admittedly biased opinion, has come and gone, I acknowledge in advance that this might seem like me "burning bridges" at this level, to an extent, after (some of) the events of these past few years, instead of the ones prior to recently, but I figured I would tell you more about my the evening of my high school graduation being vastly different from this morning, and that I did actually have that "support group" that I so dearly desired this time around, only to end up lacking in the end, if you will, once; the problem with that was that "group" that had essentially formed over the course of years prior to me graduating high school essentially instantly "faded away", since, as I mentioned multiple times recently, we all started "growing apart" from each other by then, and, as my undergraduate years progressed, only increasingly "vanished" after providing an "emotional high", of sorts, around the time of that graduation ceremony that ended up lasting up until sunrise the following morning (Friday evening -> Saturday morning), to end up being replaced by "new" people, who I would only end up seeing maybe dozens of times, instead of hundreds, or possibly even up into the thousands, in the cases of those people I had met in, say, middle school or earlier; that is to say, while I still felt "small" in comparison/contrast to the "special occasion" that was graduating on the local high school football field here (not in the old Meadowlands Arena, as, ironically, the following year's graduating class in my district got to do, since the stadium here started getting renovated between those two (6/28/13; 6/27/14) ceremonies; those lucky SOB's...), with hundreds (800+, to be exact...) of other students, as generations here had previously done, and many future generations will keep doing, at least then, I honestly wasn't feeling nearly as "lonely" as I have just within these past few months, since, again, I, and many others, had built up "groups" over years that ended up having that one thing, at least back then, that seems to be in increasingly short supply nowadays - loyalty, without acting all "transient"-like...

I feel though, overall, that that's yet another "spectrum" that exists nowadays - some people tend to enjoy certain parts of their lives more than others; the difference usually ends up being which parts of their lives they end up "enjoying" the most - I think I've told you more than enough times by now, including just above here, that I had more of a "love/hate relationship" over these most recent years than I did prior to then, but, honestly, I feel that it's up to each individual person to mostly extract what they considered to be the "best" moments of each "stage" of their lives - for me, that was far and away my "study abroad" summer, since things like that almost always get "contained" to one's undergraduate years - even then, I almost "tapped out" after just the first week, since I remember getting extremely "homesick" then; overall, though, I can't say I would've even gotten close to this point, never mind surpassing it, without moments like those helping "guide" me forward through (back then) future challenges!

Anyway, despite the various complaints I made earlier this month, on various fronts, I'll acknowledge just as much for my own sake as anybody else's that 99.99% of life honestly remains the same except for what happened this morning/afternoon, tell you for the official last time now, at least in my undergraduate years, to "stay tuned" for whatever the heck will end up happening in the foreseeable future, and tell you that overall, I'd say that I feel no less "accomplished" by now than most graduates; just like many, yourself included, lest I forget, who preceded this year, the many others who also reached this point in recent years, and many future generations of "young adults", nothing will be able to remove these accomplishments/degrees/diplomas/titles/etc. from any of us at any point in the future!
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5/19/19

looking back at last night, now that it's *officially* in the past

Well, last night was this year's business school convocation ceremony on my campus, wherein everybody who got degrees in various business disciplines within the past year or so, myself included, finally ended up receiving their degrees after many years of "battles" in this "war", especially in high school and college, which, for the most part, are (usually) the only such occasions marked by large-scale ceremonies, although I've increasingly noticed some lower-level schools holding "graduation" ceremonies - in fact, the end of my middle school years were actually marked here just days after my last day there, to witness one of my cousins "graduate" middle school, although that essentially involved getting all of them lined up on stage in the auditorium in that high school building and having their names announced individually, so, essentially, like what happened just last night, except (A) indoors, and (B) on a smaller scale, along with, also, pretty much being the opposite of how my high school handles its annual ceremonies, sending students to the original high school building here, which I think I mentioned a few days ago; anyway, getting back to the present day, there were only a few names I personally recognized out of the 700+ names read out by the weirdly "futuristic" voiceover software...

Otherwise, I'd say I still ended up feeling just about as "lonely" deep down inside with hearing and seeing many of the other students around me all congratulating each other, even after heading to this Peruvian restaurant close by and "downing" one of these in what would usually be a more "celebratory" mood, at least for most people - like, I swear, I've felt more "welcomed" at places like MSG, even, over the years, than I did just last night, despite practically being guaranteed to be around 99.99% "complete strangers" in those venues, and I've even felt less nervous entering those places on all the occasions I have, since, then, it was other people who always ended up being "front-and-center", like various college teams, or, in the case of this old sporting venue, the Devils/Nets, along with this (original Yankee Stadium) and this (original Meadowlands Stadium); add to that the various college sporting venues (Army football; Princeton hockey; Stony Brook football; Yale hockey; various more "minor" college sports venues - places, I should mention, in which I've already felt sort of "awkward" feelings, so I think it'll only end up being even weirder still heading to those places in the future, after these graduation ceremonies...) I've visited up until now, along with all the domestic and international places I've traveled to throughout my life so far, and that easily adds up to hundreds of hours spent around, again, "complete strangers", yet at least then, in those places, I've pretty much always known going in that that would be the case; I just never expected that whole "mentality" to extend to the evening of my undergraduate business school graduation ceremony, though, in which I spent the first however many minutes just standing and waiting for everybody to get seated, along with noticing everybody else finding their families/friends/relatives/etc. - maybe, just maybe, next weekend will end up producing different results, since, then all of the "schools" within the university will be represented; I can say at this point, though, that I won't exactly be "holding my breath" too much for things to turn out to be drastically different inside the Prudential Center - I guess that ended up proving this part of my most recent post here a few days ago flat out wrong, at least last night:

"(That being said, though, I have this weird feeling, deep down inside, that me changing from finance to marketing ended up getting me "left behind" in terms of graduating "alongside" any of those people, and I'm honestly a bit ticked, also, deep down inside, that certain other things didn't turn out differently along the way; I'm sure, though, that the whole "spirit" of college graduation in general will still end up allowing me to celebrate somewhat, despite me most likely knowing few, if any, of the people who will also end up "walking" in ceremonies a week apart from each other beyond being "acquaintances"/"classmates"!)"

...as I mentioned to you a few days ago, though, I honestly pity those people who end up "peaking" at this point in their lives, since doing that essentially means they've ended up doing just about nothing "noteworthy" in their lives after their "college years", although I'm sure things similar to what I'd say I currently happen to be going through myself can still end up "de-railing" just about anything that people might have in mind for the future - maybe just taking some "me time" out of certain days this summer, like wandering around N.Y.C. every so often, using up those two 40% off Amtrak coupons at some point within the next couple of months (expiring 7/16), or even re-visiting the various schools in which I had spent the previous "levels" of my education, now that I've essentially "made it"; in other words, I'll do and/or take just about anything (healthy) at this point in order to allow me to feel a bit more "hopeful" about my future once again sooner rather than later!
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5/12/19

highlighting a recent Latin American political loss; various college hockey/retail/soccer updates; some "reminiscing" about my "youth"; etc.

On the political front this past month, twice-elected Peruvian President Alan Garcia recently committed suicide after being chased by various Servicio de Inteligencia Nacional (SIN) intelligence officials and Peruvian police officers looking to arrest him on charges/warrants related to "Operation Car Wash"/the Brazilian energy/oil firms Odebrecht/Petrobras; I'd say most of us Peruvian "ex-pats" have been "mourning" said events, but, in reality, most of us remember him as the president responsible (between 1985 and 1990) for fumbling a couple of instances of hyperinflation - the first of which was the "old" (1985) Peruvian sol, replaced in 1985 by the inti, which itself ended up getting "hyper-inflated" after only a few years to be replaced by the "new" sol (1990), as seen in these KFC commercials of the era:



...now, even that wasn't nearly as bad as what was happening over in Brazil back then:


...even still, the Peruvian economy going from one "hyper-inflated" currency to another in such a short stretch of time was more than enough reason for people like (most of) my relatives and others to escape the country "once and for all", and head to other parts of the world, so, honestly, remembering more things like that, and not as many as, say, what the economy here was doing back then (at least pre-"1987 stock market/Wall Street crash"), has led most of us to not "mourn" the losses of our various (former) politicians!

In sports news, Miami (OH) and Nebraska-Omaha released their 2019-20 hockey schedules, and the NCAA just announced the locations for its (March) 2020 and 2021 hockey East/Northeast/Midwest/West "regional" semi-final and final games, prior to the (April) national championship weekends each year, in Detroit (2020) and Pittsburgh (2021):

2020: Worcester, MA (Northeast); Albany, NY (East); Allentown, PA (Midwest); Loveland, CO (West)

2021: Manchester, NH (Northeast); Bridgeport, CT (East); Fargo, ND (Midwest); Loveland, CO (West)

...now, it's been a while since I've been up to Albany, NY (2014), but aside from Bridgeport, I've yet to visit any of the other game locations in general (including the national championship game sites - Detroit 2020 and Pittsburgh 2021), so, with me now being out of college (at least at the "undergraduate" level), I consider that the perfect reason to take a trip like that!

Also, this might be way too early of an announcement for you to handle, but I'll be right about here for, actually, the very game you see pictured in that image - Boston U. v. Cornell @ MSG, yet, as in previous years, not until Thanksgiving weekend, specifically the Saturday after that!
In retail news once again, the Garden State Plaza in Paramus, N.J., arguably the world's original "mega-mall", will be getting a new "town center"-type addition to its property, featuring an apartment complex, a hotel, and new retail establishments, little by little throughout the early 2020s, using buildings and open spaces all around the property:



In other retail news, on a smaller scale, there's a video game joint around here that I, personally, have visited off-and-on pretty much since it opened back in 2005:


Well, while I, personally, was still "laid up" at home throughout February recovering from the bunion surgery I had undergone at the very end of January, something apparently set the founder/owner of the joint (who also happens to help out with the National Videogame Museum in Frisco, Texas) off to the point that he ended up firing the crew that had been there for years prior to the past month and a half or so ago, on top of recently having overseen the departure of another employee who had worked there for pretty much the entire decade up until sometime last year; what's bothered those of us "regulars" of the place the most, however, is that he did so (A) via text message, and (B) with no warning whatsoever, simply installing a new group of employees there within days of him apparently having fired the previous crew, which, I might add, was basically in the same "boat" as myself, still going through college on various local campuses, which I, and, surely, others, ended up "piecing together" little by little from various "overheard" conversations over the years; I must confess my relative lack of purchases over the years, with the exception of one of these, and, most recently, last year, a Star Wars-themed "bi-fold" wallet (mostly just "feeding" the various arcade machines inside), along with my personal respect for the owner, who's always seemed, sometimes, a bit too "chatty" about video gaming on all the occasions I remember seeing him inside, but, again, I've also been questioning whatever "motive(s)" within the past few weeks to just plain up and fire people who had literally put themselves through at least one "level" of their education(s) by dealing with items from the mid-1970s through the present day, and seeing a place that I, personally, had seen even in its previous format (a comic book shop), along with literally having attended middle school directly across from the joint (2006-'09), so I'd like to thank you now for having read about my disappointment in the actions of a local business operator/owner; personally, I'll likely end up visiting the new version of that joint, in Springfield, N.J., owned by one of the first employees of the one I've lived near its entire existence, who has been pretty much "left alone"!

Well, this week officially marks my last (full) week as an undergraduate student - well, at least in terms of all the "ceremonial" aspects of those years, since I actually finished my actual classes last summer - personally, it seemed even weirder not being "on-campus" basically at all from about last August until Sat., 5/18 and Fri., 5/24, than it did transitioning from my life-long "K-12" school district (Clifton, N.J.) to campus over the summer of 2013, since at least back then, I still at least occasionally found people I had met, and more-or-less become friends with (one of whom I actually (accidentally) ignored a little "greeting" from when passing by a bench she happened to be sitting on outside the old business/current graduate/nursing building my very first day on-campus, largely, I guess, out of sheer "nervousness", to the extent that I didn't even notice that some people with whom I had graduated high school literally months earlier were also on-campus, at least initially), along with people I ended up meeting during my college years, to various extents; I'm also glad to be able to tell you that those years ended up spanning thousands of miles (11,098, to be exact, between Rome, Italy, here (the N.Y.C. region), and Tokyo, Japan) in terms of distance, between my whole "study abroad" summer in Japan (mid-May - the very beginning of August 2015), and my "post-graduation" European trip last year (the first half or so of last September), along with four different languages (English, obviously; French, which I took classes in all through middle and high school; Japanese, since I was over there one recent summer; lastly, Spanish, being from a (partly) Peruvian family), and, as I'm sure you've noticed by now, my borderline obsession with sports, which, as you'll find out later, will only continue this summer; weirdly, considering I'm just about done with my college years, I think I feel more "connected" to my old high school once again for the first time since then, mostly 'cause of this place, which is (currently) composed pretty much entirely of either current, or "soon-to-be" undergraduate students, who, now that I'm on the subject, I actually gave one of these boxes as a "gift", of sorts, last Christmas - ironically, up until just a few days ago, when both finding the location itself and a few of its current college/high school-aged employees on Instagram, I thought they were all currently still in high school, especially considering the location's popularity with that whole "demographic" over the years; regardless of my current sort of "conundrum" now that I'm out of my undergraduate years, I'm sure I'll end up meeting new people as the years roll on, and I get increasingly settled into "professional" life very soon!
As for the latest bit of "looking back" I'll be doing this time, I'd like to take you back now, if you don't mind, to practically the beginning of my education, since, after all, I actually ended up going through college, even, with at least one person I had met back in elementary school, let alone middle or high school, although, if I'm being perfectly honest, I ended up meeting most of the people with whom I ended up graduating high school in middle school or later; but, as I told you a few days ago, I slowly ended up losing touch with the vast majority of them in order to make way for new people in my various college courses; ironically, it seems like social media has largely made it easier for people to "keep in touch" with each other, instead of being confined to, say, middle/high school/(possibly) college yearbooks (FULL DISCLOSURE: I, personally, don't remember where my middle school yearbook ended up getting left; as such, I made sure to be almost too protective of my high school yearbook, but I didn't end up getting one of those after finishing up the last of my college courses, though), even despite the more "transient" nature of most peoples' lives after high school, since, as I and many other students ended up finding out the "hard" way these past few years, (A) most people end up not continuing in the same places then, (B) those who were never more than "acquaintances" to begin with end up remaining that way, for the most part, except if they end up taking similar course/etc. paths to eventually end up reaching their Bachelor's and/or Master's degree(s) after moving up to that level, and (C) some of the students who end up starting their college years alongside everybody else end up dropping out/transferring at various points during their undergraduate years! (That being said, though, I have this weird feeling, deep down inside, that me changing from finance to marketing ended up getting me "left behind" in terms of graduating "alongside" any of those people, and I'm honestly a bit ticked, also, deep down inside, that certain other things didn't turn out differently along the way; I'm sure, though, that the whole "spirit" of college graduation in general will still end up allowing me to celebrate somewhat, despite me most likely knowing few, if any, of the people who will also end up "walking" in ceremonies a week apart from each other beyond being "acquaintances"/"classmates"!)

(On top of all that, there was even one night a few years ago when I remember hearing my name getting called a few feet away when heading to whichever class I was headed to that evening; the problem with that was that I never saw who it was, and nobody's "confessed" to having done that since then, so I'm afraid I'll never find out who that "mystery person" was...)

(Also, I should probably add that I think I managed to sort of "bond" with a few fans of "metal" music, which, if you ask me, is basically nothing more than "loud noises!!" throughout all those years, weirdly enough, by simply (re-)telling them this famously "dark" mythical story...)

 (The events of later this month won't exactly have been a "full-circle" moment for me, though, unlike the evening of my high school graduation, which took place in the old high school here, which got "downgraded", essentially, to its current middle school status in 1962; again, I went through those academic years in that very building, so that made that occasion extra-special, at least for me, to have returned to my old middle school to officially graduate from high school; in fact, I found this post online yesterday that perfectly outlines my current feelings!)

 Well, the "topsy-turvy" weather around here this past weekend brought out even more thoughts of mine, some "pleasant" in nature, and others a bit more "worrisome"; on the better note, I actually remembered that I had seen some people I had met at some point up until now on seemingly random occasions throughout the past few years, whether it was around my hometown, somewhere on campus, or, in the case of one of my fellow (H.S.) "class of 2013" members, both on-campus, and inside Penn Station one night a few years ago, when we were headed opposite ways, since, as I would find out then, she had actually transferred from MSU to some campus over in N.Y.C., so I have a feeling that that transfer ended up keeping her at the undergraduate level even longer than students like myself, who merely changed concentrations/majors, instead of changing campuses (I never ended up finding out where, BTW; just that she had transferred over to the opposite side of the Hudson River...) - I honestly had some of those thoughts in the back of my mind myself when I started my undergrad years, but me ending up even more nervous than I thought I would be entering the past few years, and my family (I believe I've told you before that I lost my grandparents just months apart back then...)/grades/social life/pretty much everything suffering as a result ended up quashing those plans; I'd like to think I rebounded somewhat on pretty much all of those "fronts" later, though, especially after my, as mentioned, miserable freshman year, and particularly, I'd say, after (A) studying abroad; (B) starting in the new business building, followed by (C) changing from finance to marketing, in that order, since I truly believe those things allowed me to "break away" from my past plans for my future (now, don't get me wrong; I still like things like this, but, as you can probably tell by me constantly attending sporting events, with more still on the way soon, I feel much more comfortable in that environment...), and allow me to (sort of) "reset" my life up until then...

Now that all of that is pretty much over by now, though, and I'll have to either (A) become "professional" sooner rather than later, (B) continue my education, or (C) do both of those things in some place(s), at some time soon, while somehow also at least trying to salvage some of what I once had, I have a feeling I'll end up feeling more "nostalgia" the next few years after my undergraduate education, just as I did when starting these past few years, and, honestly, to much more of an extent than I thought I would, mostly 'cause those years tend to be the end of one's "youth", unless they, say, serve in the military or something first, and then decide to pursue their college educations in whatever degree(s) they desire (as I found out over in Japan, weirdly enough, meeting a few guys over there who at least were serving back then on the Yokosuka "Commander Fleet Activities" U.S. Navy base) - personally, I rejected that whole "lifestyle" originally, since I've never liked "machismo" much, although I'm sure there might be similar opportunities going forward, like AmeriCorps, the Peace Corps, and other such types of organizations, as I'm sure there were in recent years, but I ended up continuing my education, and, as such, never ended up taking advantage of them recently!

 (...on top of that, I should probably also tell you that I've actually (A) shed, honestly, many more tears just within these past few days than I did even the summer between high school and college, despite everything I've told you these past few days, (B) "slept in" way too  much for most people my age, and (C) lost my appetite somewhat recently, even for things I've pretty much always liked, in what has honestly become one of the loneliest stretches of my life up until now, when, again, it seems as if almost everybody I once knew (in other words, prior to my undergraduate years), and more-or-less "hung out" with, has disappeared into "professional" life, and I barely seemed to meet anybody beyond then (in other words, in college) - I don't necessarily want to "alarm" you with all of that, but you might end up taking things that way; I'm sure this is neither the first time you have had, nor the last time you will have had, people like myself "confiding" certain such "deep" secrets with you, though, so I'd recommend you do with all of this information just what you usually do, and nothing more...)

Last but not least, I'll remind you, once again, that I'll tell you more precisely about the business school/general ceremonies each of the following couple of weekends after this one, but, now, I'd like to leave you with a couple of excerpts from a couple of speeches made (almost) back-to-back by then-recently-installed British Prime Minister Winston Churchill in 1940, right between the beginning of WWII and Germany taking over France, which might not seem particularly "fitting" or "relevant" to you, but they sure seem relevant to me right now:

"'I have nothing to offer but blood, toil, tears and sweat'...'...men will still say, 'this was their finest hour...'Victory; victory at all costs; in spite of all terror; however long and hard the road may be, for without victory, there is no survival!" - admittedly, badly "squeezed" together by me to try to prove the point I'm trying to make here about other things, like, you know, some points during college education seeming like "battles" in one long "war" that sometimes seems "un-winnable", but only up until the end!


Also, more stories about the sudden collapse of the Alliance of American Football; now, keeping the updates coming for next fall, Bemidji State, Michigan Tech, and Minnesota State all released their hockey schedules for 2019-20, while Arizona State announced that it would be sending its team to China for an exhibition tour largely designed to help promote "growing the game" over there ahead of the 2022 Winter Olympics!

Anyway, getting past that little bit of "reminiscing" of my undergraduate years, I figured I would update you once more on the latest news within the "retail sector":











Lastly, this time, I should probably tell you that I'll be at the 2019 CONCACAF Gold Cup soccer doubleheader set to be held around here Mon. night, 6/24 @ Red Bull Arena in Harrison, specifically sitting in section 222, a corner of the stadium - first, Bermuda v Nicaragua shortly after 6:30 P.M., followed by Costa Rica v Haiti immediately following Bermuda v Nicaragua (most likely starting shortly after 9 P.M.); judging by the fact that Costa Rican fans combined with Honduran fans to sell out Red Bull Arena back in 2017, I have a feeling the Nicaraguan fans (first game) and Costa Rican fans (second game) alone will produce respectable showings in the stands this year, especially considering the lack of Bermudan/Haitian fans almost everywhere!
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