Commencement is bittersweet

Deirdre Newman

High school seniors are hit with a barrage of questions in the last

few months of school.

Where are you going to college? What do you want to do for your

career? Who do you want to be?

These are the questions Estancia High School graduation speaker

Brieanne Aronson, 18, tackled during her graduation speech Thursday

at the Pacific Amphitheatre on the Orange County Fairgrounds.

“There’s a lot of emphasis on the future in the past few months,”

Aronson said. “At first, it was overwhelming. I wanted to throw back

at them, ‘Did you know what you wanted to be before your first day of

college?’ ‘Are you still doing that now?’”

Aronson urged her peers not to fixate so much on a particular

career but on a concept that exhilarates them and that will

ultimately lead them to their destiny.

Aronson was one of seven speakers who had inspiring words for the

class of 2004 -- a class that has logged more than 12,000 hours of

community service and boasts six valedictorian scholars, Principal

Tom Antal said.

Before the ceremony, Antal summed up the graduating class.

“To me, this class is marked by humanity -- they’re genuinely nice

people,” Antal said.

Speaker Arwyn Knott urged her fellow seniors not to neglect their

altruistic side.

“It’s only giving that makes you what you are,” she said.

Many of the graduating class said they had bittersweet feelings

about leaving high school.

“I’m excited; I’m ready for it,” said Melissa Willey, 18. “It was

a lot of work, but worth it. It was fun too -- meeting new people,

being with your friends, always feeling comfort at school.”

Matt Stevenson, 18, said it would be weird to no longer have the

structure of being in school.

“Everything you’re raised with -- going to school five days a week

from 8 a.m. to 3 p.m. -- it’s all gone,” he said.

Farrell Roth, 18, said she learned as much about life from her

teachers and friends as she did inside the classroom. She is planning

on joining the Air Force and studying meteorology.

Many of the students said they will miss their favorite teacher,

Tom Moody, who taught government and is retiring this month.

“He made government really interesting,” said Britney Tyner, 18.

“I learned a lot.”