In the Moment

Mr. Weber's assembly address, the first day back from Spring break, 2013.

Welcome back! I have some numbers, which may be of interest to you:

• 20 days of school left before A.P. exams
• 30 days of school until the last class for seniors
• 35 days of school until senior walk and 2 days later, graduation
• 40 days of school until the last day of exams for everyone else.

Not too much longer.

We tend to measure our present by the future, don’t we? It was hard to think about too much except Spring break the weeks leading up to spring break, and now that we’re back, our tendency is to measure time by the number of days until graduation or summer.

I had a high school teacher once who began each class by calling on one of us randomly to lead the prayer. Because we weren’t very good at it, we tended to default to saying the same thing over and over:  “Dear Lord, please let Friday get here quickly.” After about the 15^th time someone prayed for Friday, the teacher quipped, “You know, you’re all praying your lives away, trying to speed things up until the weekend.”

That comment has stayed with me—a good reminder, I think, to appreciate the moment we’re in, the people we’re with, the things we’re doing now, rather than what we hope will come later.   Abraham Lincoln once said "The best thing about the future is it comes one day at a time."

The weather this weekend has been spectacular—spring is finally here, the flowers are blooming, our campus looks great with the flowers blooming. I suppose God could have created a world in which seasons didn’t vary much, where beautiful weather was always the norm, but I’m pretty sure we wouldn’t appreciate Saturday and Sunday as much if he did so.

We’ve been a way from each other a week or so—and that’s been nice for all of us, but now that we’re back, let’s pay attention to one another and appreciate how blessed we are to go to school here, how blessed we are to teach here, how blessed we are to be at JPII.  

Yes, there will be a day when we’re no longer here—seniors, your day is coming quickly. As much as you long for the end, don’t forget to appreciate these last few weeks of high school--your friendships, your teachers, and yes, this place where you’ve spent so much of your life these last four years. 

Work hard, play hard, come out to some ball games to cheer on your classmates, enjoy each other’s company. We started this year way back in August, and it’s been a great year. Let's finish what we started and make it a great last couple of months.