Throw Your Hat Over the Wall
And other thoughts for the Class of 2025
This past weekend, I attended a high school graduation. A senior named Seamus was one of two students chosen to address the crowd. In his speech, Seamus relayed his struggles during high school - his weight, bad haircuts and self-doubt. To illustrate how he overcame these challenges, Seamus shared a story written by author Frank O’Connor, a fellow Irishman.
O’Connor wrote about how he and his friends had to wear caps as part of their school uniform. After school, the group of boys would roam the Irish countryside, sometimes meeting a wall that was too high for them to climb. Instead of turning back, the boys would throw their caps over the wall. This act committed them to figuring out how to get over as they knew the punishment that waited for them at home if they returned without the caps.
Standing before his classmates, Seamus encouraged them to not back down when faced with adversity. Instead, Seamus hoped that they, like him, would throw their hat over the wall and commit to figuring a way around the inevitable walls that would appear in their futures.
The story Seamus shared was also a favorite of President John F. Kennedy, Jr. He used it in his last official speech given at Brooks Air Force Base in San Antonio, Texas. The president was there to dedicate the new School of Aerospace Medicine, a critical piece of America’s focus on winning the space race.
President Kennedy declared,
“My friends, this nation has tossed its cap over the wall of space, and we have no choice but to follow it. Whatever the difficulties, they must be overcome. Whatever the hazards, they must be guarded against. With the vital help of all who labor in this space endeavor, we will climb this wall with safety and speed, and we shall then explore the wonders on the other side.”
The crowd of 9,000 gave President Kennedy a standing ovation. Our graduation crowd of a thousand or so clapped politely as Seamus stepped off the stage.
After graduation caps were thrown and pictures taken, I headed back to my friend’s house to lay out the cake and ice cream for family and friends who were coming by for a short celebration. The boys and their hats rumbled around my brain. How did they get over the wall? I wondered. Did they ever get in trouble for trespassing? Was what they found on the other side of the wall worth the risk of losing their hats?
I shared my questions with the graduate and her boyfriend who were eating slices of cake at the kitchen bar in front of me. Wrapped in the bliss of young love and celebration, neither was inclined to entertain my questions.
After everyone left and we cleaned up, I wondered if throwing your hat over the wall was the right message to give these new adults. Was attacking every challenge the right approach or would these newly minted knights be left chasing windmills instead? The walls were there for a reason and the life of a challenger is not filled with ease.
Long before Brene Brown made it popular, I regaled the Tri-Valley High School Class of 1996 with Teddy Roosevelt’s “Man in the Arena.” As salutatorian of a class of 52 students drawn from farms around Central Illinois, I was just cocky and unexposed enough to think that I’d personally unearthed this bit of wisdom from the depths of hidden history. Like Seamus, I encouraged my class to get down in the arena and not face the shame that came with standing in the “grey twilight that knows no victory nor defeat.”
Most of my classmates had not traveled out of Illinois let alone into any dangerous lands. What exactly we would face with our newfound bravery was unclear and certainly not what the last thirty years of my life have contained. To mix metaphors completely, I have thrown my hat into the ring more than a few times and gotten trampled.
Even knowing this, I think high school graduation is the right time to encourage these brave new hearts to throw their hats over the wall or enter the ring. Unlike my generation, they have grown up in a world where uncertainty and global challenges have permeated their lives. They are all post 9/11 babies, born just before the 2009 financial crisis to mothers and fathers returning from Operation Desert Storm and Iraqi Freedom.
They are post-Columbine kids who have always known how to shelter in place and where to hide from a school shooter. They are the children of legalized same sex marriages who have grown up with classmates who have two mommies or two daddies. They approach gender fluidity with an off-handedness that mocks the panic exhibited by the adult leaders of their country.
They wear our styles from the 80’s and 90’s without irony. They use the word “slay” to describe someone who is exceptional and already profess that they “get the assignment.” They started their high school years amidst adults arguing over reopening schools and watched milestones like proms and bat mitzvahs proceed with the creative desperation of normality that adults repeatedly told themselves was good enough.
As if she was reading my mind,
posted her own message to graduates. Please go read the whole piece because it’s gorgeous. One of my favorite parts says:Whether your path forward is as clear as brand new freeway or you’re staring at a thick forest with nothing but a machete in your hand, you need to befriend the unknown right now. And the only way to become intimate buddies with an inky black abyss is by looking inward: hearing the voice inside you that feels connected to this gorgeous and scary world in spite of your fears, listening to the melody under your skin that tells you that you’re brilliant and strong and you can show the world your heart without fear.
She also wrote:
Your job is to notice everything, to relish the humiliations of this day, to celebrate the horrors of being young and out of place, to enjoy the delights of knowing nothing.
As I neared the end of my speech to the Tri-Valley Class of ‘96, I turned to the last page and realized that it wasn’t there. My eyes darted to my seat down on the gym floor and to my left. A single white paper rested underneath my chair. I sent telegraphic messages to my friend, Doug, our valedictorian who occupied the seat right in front me. Bring me the paper, I told him silently, still reading my speech. Alas, Doug was so entranced with my message that he remained seated. Heart pounding, I remembered the gist of the last paragraph and finished my speech (which my mom says I delivered beautifully.) I remember thinking as I walked off the stage that if I could do that, I could do anything. Bring on the arena!
The truth is that members of the class of 2025 were throwing their hats over walls as soon as they could toddle. Walls that we allowed to stand in their way and that we kept building. They rolled their eyes, climbed the wall, retrieved their hats and kept going. Which is good for us because we have left them so much to do. What may be more important is that we teach them that they don’t have to reach for every challenge. Or if they do it is not their job to emerge triumphant. That they are here to show us new ways of retrieving that hat. Of surviving the journey over the wall. And we will savor the lessons they teach us along the way.
I am going to throw my hat over the wall today! Wish me well...