Menu
I’m not retiring. I am graduating. Today is my graduation day. Retirement means that you’ll just go ahead and live on your laurels and surf all day in Oceanside. It ain’t going to happen.
A few months after graduation I was working in films. It took off pretty quick.
People in my family and camp who grew up listening to rap music love ‘We Are Young.’ I’ve heard it play at weddings. I’ve heard it in graduation parties. It’s a big idea and big song.
I have the loving support of my girlfriend who still attends Wake Forest and is nearing graduation. She helps me cope with the everyday rigors of being an NBA player.
I was on the yearbook staff, so I would take out film cameras and Nikons and take photos around school and at sporting events and things like that. We had a darkroom as well. I just loved it. I also saved up for a video camera to video my friends and cut and paste the videos together and I gave them to all of my friends for graduation.
I thought I should go to New York because it was the place to go to study. I went and tried to get an application from the Juilliard School but they wouldn’t even give me one because I didn’t have my high school graduation.
While I do commend the Administration on its commitment and focus on high school reform, I believe that we must focus on graduation as the key accountability measure.
Since graduation, I have measured time in 4-by-5-inch pieces of paper, four days on the left and three on the right. Every social engagement, interview, reading, flight, doctor’s appointment, birthday and dry-cleaning reminder has been handwritten between metal loops.
I received $100 per week when I started working at the Globe after graduation.
Our promise to our children should be this: if you do well in school, we will pay for you to obtain a college degree.