Party Onward

It was supposed to rain.

They’ve been predicting rain here in Our Little Town for much of the week – the kind of drenching, stormy rain that would have put rather a pall over Lauren’s graduation party, the kind that made us glad we’d cleaned out the garage and the house so we could keep a roof over everything even if we weren’t sure how well it would all fit. We set up the main food and seating in the garage, with desserts and other seating in the house, and we hoped for the best.

But the rain held off, the party went forward, and a good time was had by all. Is that a good omen for the future? We’ll call it a good omen for the future. Why not. Omens are where you find them, I suppose.

It’s a nice tradition around here that high school graduations get followed by open house parties – sometimes at home, sometimes at a park pavilion or thereabouts – where the family of the graduate sets out food and drinks, puts up a board with photos of the graduate over the course of their life, and invites people over to hang out and congratulate the recent graduate. Last year these were mostly drive-by events, but now that a critical mass of people are vaccinated we can start having these parties again, which is really nice. Three cheers for vaccinations, and three more cheers for graduation parties, I say.

I went through all of my various photos, printed up a brick of them, and then Lauren chose the ones she wanted and mounted them onto some tri-fold boards that we hung up in the garage. She did a nice job of it. We also had a banner across the back of the garage that I just might leave up for a while because it’s nice.

Once everything is set up (and let me tell you just how much work got elided over in that short phrase) then you wait until the appointed time and have people wander in and out as they see fit. There’s a whole season of these things – we haven’t seen much of Lauren since she officially graduated high school, as she is always off at one or another of them – and that’s a lovely thing.

Lauren made two requests for her party. First, a bouncy house, and second, a taco bar with supplies from one of the local Mexican restaurants. The bouncy house people bailed on us by text at 6:30am – not unreasonable, given the forecast at the time, though sad nonetheless – but the Mexican place came through. They were excellent tacos.

We had a whole pile of people come over, roughly divided into Parent Friends and Graduate Friends, with a small smattering of Sibling Friends. Fortunately all the various Friends are Friends with each other or at least happy to become such, so it went well.

We even managed to set up a Zoom call for people who weren’t able to come by in person, and a number of people logged in from as far away as northern Wisconsin, Philadelphia, New Jersey, England, and Belgium! It was good to see these people who live so far away and have them share this event with us.

There was food, there was conversation, there was more food, and when the food wasn’t enough there was cake, which is a species of food but one that deserves its own entry. At one point an entire grad party of one of Lauren’s friends came by, since their open house period had ended and ours was still running. We were overrun with teenagers and it was glorious.

There weren’t many leftovers.

It is a grand thing to share achievements with family and friends, to gather together in one place or through a Zoom call and celebrate a happy occasion.

Congratulations, Lauren. I’m proud of you.