I duly graduated from the University of Wisconsin’s School of Library and Information Studies this morning at approximately 10 am—and just to make sure no minds had changed about letting me out, I attended the Letters and Science graduation ceremony this afternoon, too.
Longtime CavLec readers know that I hate having pictures taken and never post pictures of myself on CavLec. I am not planning to break the streak now. However, I offer you Still Life with Diploma Cover (42K JPEG), which contains (clockwise from carnation): the white carnation handed to us at the SLIS ceremony in lieu of an actual diploma, the gorgeous flower arrangement sent to me by the good-hearted SLIS student from Chicago I’ve been hosting on Wednesday nights, my C. Berger award certificate, my Beta Phi Mu certificate, my Valmai Fenster award certificate (from last year), an index card with a chunk of Augustine’s Sermon 169 on it, the diploma cover handed to us at the Letters and Science ceremony in lieu of an actual diploma, and (suspended from the diploma cover) my tassel.
David got some good pictures of the Bibliomedusa in her magisterial attire this morning, which was bright and sunny and beautiful despite the weatherfolks’ gloomy prognostications. I’ll post ’em, but they’re going into a password-protected directory with a very short shelf-life. If you want the directory location and login, email me.
Magisterial attire, for those of you who don’t know, involves a black gown with calf-length squared-off sleeve ends that practically beg you to sit on them, thus binding yourself into your chair because your hands can’t reach the chair-arms to help lever you up. (I did this twice at the SLIS ceremony and once in the afternoon. Bibliomedusae are obviously not known for grace.) These sleeves make great pockets, however; mine held my St. Augustine index card, the class-gift check, bobby pins, and a couple of pennies at various times through the day.
You also get a hood that in our case was spiffy white velvet with a red satin stripe on a black ground. (Pity the poor master’s graduates of the Music School, who got stuck with pink velvet and the aforementioned red stripe—yuck.) It looks silly going on—one feels rather like Santa Claus—but once in place it’s quite, well, magisterial, as long as it doesn’t cut off your air supply in front. And we Beta Phi Muers got to wear our purple and white honors cords.
Don’t make the mistake, by the way, of trying to wear the hood as a hood. Emperor Palpatine doesn’t have a master’s degree. And your hat is the traditional mortarboard, cap slightly too small (so bring bobby pins; I made a special trip to the store to pick some up last night, and I’m glad I did!), back corner just the right distance from your head for everyone who passes behind you to run into it.
I spent the day alternating between lunatical grins and slight weepiness. I didn’t actually break down in tears, though I was quite close when I got up to give my little spiel for David and Professor Flanigan. But Professor Flanigan would kick my sorry magisterial butt if I lost the ability to pronounce my Latin, so I didn’t. (I did cut the Augustine in half, in deference to my classmates’ patience for dead languages. You CavLec readers get the whole thing.)
David took me to Caspian Café for lunch after the SLIS reception, and promenaded me around the Terrace until it was time to line up for the Letters and Science ceremony. This proceeded with admirable dispatch considering the number of people who had to walk across that stage. (Master’s graduates are lumped in with the bachelor’s folks, though the Ph.Ds get their own ceremony. We master’s grads sit up front, go onstage first, and look cooler.) Congresswoman Tammy Baldwin shook an unbelievable number of hands (including mine, and I am genuinely proud to have shared a stage with her even for thirty seconds), the speeches and the music were great, and I’m glad I went, seeing as how it’s my third college degree but the only mass graduation I’ve ever been to.
A lovely day, and I will never as long as I live forget it. But I haven’t mentioned the coolest part. You know what the coolest part is?
I AM A LIBRARIAN. No matter where I go, what I do, or who pays me to do it, from this day onward, I AM A LIBRARIAN.
And that, my blog-friends all, who have watched this process from the day I had the idea and to whom I am eternally grateful for congratulations, behind-the-scenes support when I needed it, and a warm welcome to the profession—that, my friends, is cool.
(The title of this post is a reference to this earlier one. Bloglines users may not be seeing the <del> tags; trust me, they’re there.)
