My mother would tell you that my life has always been led by an “astute condition of intuition”. That has a nice ring to it doesn’t it? At least she always thought so. Personally I think that intuition is just an excuse for recognizing the correlation between right and wrong, or lack there of. My father tracks everything back to luck, meaning that I am standing here before you today out of chance. Well, students, today you graduate from one of the top Universities in the country with the whole world ahead of you and coincidence is something that I cannot stand by.
As a life long teacher myself, I've found that my students always bring up intelligence in relation to achievement. The question of aptitude and brainpower has never been a problem or handicap of mine. It is something I was born with, and something that I use as a tool like any other, sometimes not to its potential. All of you out there wearing the yellow honors sashes know what I am talking about. As for the rest of you, just hold your hand over your head and try to grab as much of what I am saying before it flies to far over.
I'm sorry, I'm being hypocritical. I didn’t graduate from college with honors. In fact, it took me five and a half years to get my bachelors in education. Worst of all, they wouldn’t even give me a Masters in the art of class evading. So those of you that have been here for the better part of a decade, get those hands back up and the rest of you, congratulations on rushing away from most simple and care free years of your life.
That said, I did finally move out of my fraternity house, and when I stepped foot into my first classroom, on the other side of the spectrum, with chalk in hand and a curriculum breaking at the seams I knew that I had found my passion.
I hope you all experience the feeling that I was struck by in front of my first group of students. When you do, and trust me you will know, take it all in. It will be the first day of the rest of your life. Finding a passion is like kissing your first true love. It will be exciting, frightening, and completely confusing. Do you feel the butterflies underneath those gowns in your stomachs right now? Those beautiful creatures will be flying up through your throat and down into your knees when you come across your passion. When you face the one true thing in the world that has the potential to make you more qualified or more satisfied then anything ever has the cocoons will hatch and your stomach will fly. Savor the butterflies. If you remember one thing from this afternoon and what I have to tell you, remember that. Do not catch them or be afraid of what they could bring, but appreciate the feeling that they give you and keep it for the rest of your life. Believe me, those butterflies that you are feeling right now, just minutes before you are let out into the real world will be your only friends some days. They will keep you focused and in control. They will take away the pain that comes and hold onto the moments that you never want to forget. They will remind you that life is good and that you have something to look forward to.
Christa McAuliffe enjoyed her butterflies.
The first time I met Christa was in early September of 1984. I brushed her aside as competition and didn’t fret at the idea of friendship. The awards I had won in my tenure at my first job teaching at a private preparatory high school were all too overwhelming for the young teacher and mother from New Hampshire. The other male finalists and I were far to worried about whose resume would fare the best when the final tests came through. The competition was clear and I had my eye on the prize. I was a child of Apollo. When I was just a young kid, I watched, anxiously and triumphantly as Neil Armstrong’s boots crushed into the moon’s surface and the other missions were equally as exciting. That said, my job at the time was enjoyable and I prospered at teaching young minds, but it was no surprise to my family or others that knew me when I put everything I had into the opportunity to fly aboard the Space Shuttle Challenger during mission STS-51L.
After a long application process, the backing of my high school board, and a letter of recognition from the senator of the state I was teaching in, I found myself at the Johnson Space Center in Houston, Texas, as a finalist to capture my dream. I had made it past the initial rounds containing each of the men and women across the country that applied to the teacher in space mission. I was there, along with six other dreamers, and I could feel zero gravity in my near future. My butterflies were going crazy.
On the first day, I sat down with 3 other finalists during a lunch break, each with astounding accomplishments and at the time. They were my biggest competition. We had all taught for years in our fields and met time and time again at seminars and functions during our tenures. You have all probably heard the saying; keep your friends close but your enemies closer. I will tell you right now that that cliché bears no merit to me any longer. From day one in Houston I was friendly with Christa but like I said, she couldn’t hold a candle to the awards that we had won. Lets put it this way, she knew what subject I taught and what high school I worked at and I couldn’t have even told you what state she lived in.
Humility is something that you should all learn, if you haven’t yet. There is always someone out there that is better or worse at what you will strive to do. If you spend time worrying about what they are accomplishing, or whom you should compete with, then you will only hurt yourself. Christa was in tune with that virtue all along, but I sure wasn’t.
As the three week competition went on I grew more and more confident in my chances at being chosen to fly. Through the physicals and the interviews I never wavered. I became friends with the trained astronauts that made the crew for the Challenger mission and I even did several television interviews. Christa was quiet and calm. When it was time to give our final speeches to be chosen I didn’t even shake her hand in preparation. To be honest, I think that I had forgotten that she stood in the running. I would even venture to say that it had crossed my mind, because of her qualifications, or lack there of, that she was just meeting the gender requirement. Christa was the last to speak that day and as I found my seat in the front row of the press conference room I remember getting a sick feeling in my stomach. She said something that to this day I will never forget: “A lot of people thought it was over when we reached the moon, if I am selected, they are going to start watching the launches again.”
Here I was talking about how I had never wanted something more, and how my resume met all of the requirements and I realized that my whole strategy throughout the competition was “Me.” It was all about me. Why I should be in space, how I would reach my dream, what I would take from it, but never anyone else. I never once thought about what it could mean to my students, family and every other child that had the dream that some day they would fly into space. I have watched the tape of our speeches time and time again but it was nothing to what the world felt when they heard her final statement: “That’s our new frontier out there, and it’s everybody’s business to know about space.”
There is a lesson to be learned here and it is far more important than humility, generosity or selfishness. What I took from my chance at working with Christa is integrity. The people in your life that will have the greatest influence on you will be those that demand respect through their impeccable character and honorability. Strive to be one of those people. It is time to stop focusing on who your role model is and start focusing on whose role model you are going to be. Become someone who treats everyone with the same level of respect, whether they can get you ahead or not. Sit up straight, stay organized and know what your goals are. Show me your habits and I will show you your future. Surround yourself with the people that share your same values and trust that you will succeed. If you know what you want, don’t let anyone stop you in getting it, no matter how impossible it seems.
I am standing here before you today because I didn’t fulfill my dreams. My father says I’m lucky. He says that I dodged a bullet and was in the right place at the right time. My sister keeps praying. She guarantees me that God had a path led for me to follow and that space was not along my path. She thinks that I have someone to thank for being alive. My mother still sticks with the fact that I knew, deep inside, that I shouldn’t be aboard that space shuttle twenty-two years ago. She thinks that my never failing condition of intuition saved me from a young death. Christa McAuliffe did not die because of any of those reasons. Christa had a goal and she reached it. She lived with the upmost integrity and treated others the way she wanted to be treated. Her altruism is something that we can all try to live by because on that Tuesday morning in January over two decades ago, Christa was sitting in the only place that she wanted to be in the whole world. I was missing out, watching my dream literally fold in-between my eyes. Never stop following your passion. Your heart will lead you right and hopefully some day, if you are lucky enough, you will be as proud as Christa McAuliffe was sitting in the cockpit of Challenger mission STS-51L, enjoying her butterflies as they counted down from ten to her dream come true.