Yesterday evening was the iSchool Convocation
ceremony. (It really bugs me that they call it convocation,
because convocation is what happens at the beginning of the school year. On the other hand, it's not commencement either, because that's the official UW ceremony this afternoon.) It started at 7pm with a reception, and the ceremony itself was at 9pm.
The reception was actually kind of silly. I mean, it wasn't any more silly than receptions usually are, but I think receptions are inherently silly. There are too many people and too little time to have anything more than very superficial conversations, so I tend to find them quite tedious. This one wasn't tedious, partially because we arrived fashionably late, but it was silly. Besides, Mom and Dad and Jeff knew either no one or almost no one. In retrospect, I should have introduced them to people, but it seems silly just to introduce them to people with whom they will share shallow platitudes and nothing else. Have I mentioned that receptions are silly?
The ceremony was rather nice but kind of anticlimatic, in my opinion. The nicest part was that I had 5 PhDs to put my hood over my head and arrange it properly, which I doubt will happen again. But like my whole iSchool education, the ceremony as a whole just couldn't compare with Mount Holyoke.
Senji says:
"commencement" is a silly name too -- you commence your degree at matriculation, when you start studying!
Laurabelle says:
It's the beginning of the rest of your life, sort of thing.
And anyway, it's academic tradition. It's not particularly supposed to make sense.
Senji says:
Oh, I understand that... :)