My graduation day was cold and rainy. Some might even say the weather started to get bitter, but that would be an exaggeration, especially in comparison to the ceremony itself.

For the most part the ceremony was alright. It was small and quick and I didn't want to cringe for the better part of it. Until it came to one of the faculty speakers. One of the design faculty. (By the way, for those who aren't in the "know": Illustrators and designers hate each other. It bugs the designers to no end when an illustrator can step away from picture-making to design something better then they can when they didn't have to take self-important design classes. It bugs illustrators that designers are, for the most part, arrogant prats who make much more money then they do while producing horrific design that has the uncanny ability to butcher any illustration it comes close to.)

But I digress! This member of the design faculty stood up and immediately started talking straight to the designers, ignoring the fact that there were also illustrators, digital artists, animators, and filmmakers sitting among the graduates. He thought it would be fun to quote already painfully over-quoted designers and to say things like, "Less is more." Now don't get me wrong, in the right hands, that quote and the sentiment behind it can be a pretty cool one, but not at a graduation. Especially when that same speaker goes on to give us (well, okay - just the designers) the last lessons. Lesson #3 was "Less is more." Unfortunately, this is a lesson that ALL of us had already had before, designers or not, so it was really stupid that he though it would be novel. He then went on to have a total of 9 "lessons." Hardly taking his own advice. If he wanted to be cool, he should have made "less is more" the first lesson and then thrown all of the rest of his cards over his shoulder.

Still, if you can get over the radiant example of Designer as God, the ceremony was alright. But although it wasn't my school's main graduation, there were still enough people around to make me feel anxious. I don't deal well with crowds. But it's over now and I have my piece of paper that clearly states I am a bachelor of the fine arts.

But the best part of the whole thing? No sore feet and all that entails. Whereas all the other girls were wearing the fancy little numbers they had probably shopped long and hard for, I woke up the morning of the graduation and wondered for the first time what I was going to wear. I picked the best shoes I have - my tall punky black boots. It was a relief. I'm not sure I can describe quite how much I've always despised being harassed into shopping for formal shoes.