This Is The Moment

This is the Moment, This is the day
When I send all my doubts and demons on their way
Every endeavor, I have made ever,
is coming into play, are here and now today.

This is the moment, When all I've done
All of the dreaming, scheming and screaming become one
This is the day, see it sparkle and shine
When all I've lived for becomes mine. From Jekyl and Hyde

Where does one start, I started this diary last year to chronicle the happenings of my countdown to my baccalaureate degree. It seems as if I stopped adding to the clippings of the year, but not hardly. I just found a way to be excited and chronicle by writing at home as well, hoping that some of it would find it's way here.

May 21, 2006, a dream in my eyes that was not too far from attainment when I began here last year. Over that time, I have become employed, I have loved, and lost. But, hell I regained my ability to know love, for real. Why? Because I stepped out of this box I called Baltimore, that has sheltered me for 10 years as I was incubating this thing I would now appreciate enough to call my life.

All of the events leading up to the day were a success, my only regret is that I didn't write as much here as I wanted. That is primarily due to the fact that I was having so much fun, and having so much fun having fun, I just couldn't stop to type about it. Here I am today, I hope I am remotely forgiven.

In my last post, there is the invitation to my senior recital. Can I say that it in itself was an evening filled with promise and ambition. Not because I was a senior graduating, but, because I was a student who had sought his dreams and came back to share with his family the joy of being successful. I truly enjoyed the attention of some 200 people that were gathered on one night to see me in my exit examination of a program that I had waddled in for some years.

My family was very excited to applaud me. Yet, they were being applauded for being the seed that spark my creativity to flame, and got me to where I am today.

It was great to see the many faces that were in the audience, that were there just to say, "I support you", "Thank God you've made it", and "Way to go Boy."

In a 2 part recital, I was able to speak the words of composers like Handel through Brahms, and Schubert through Schumann, and Still through Morris. I then returned to applaud my own accomplishments by singing songs from A Chorus Line, Porgy and Bess, and Jekyl and Hyde.

I woke up on May 21, 2006 feeling awkwardly accomplished, more than I did while I was on any of the tour stops during the school year with my show. I knew that after that day that I would no longer be looked at as a person striving for a degree. Rather, I would be looked at as a person that fought hard through obstacles and adversity, to obtain a degree.

It was wonderful, to have been given elation as I came on the main quad that morning. There where I met with friends and perfect strangers, to undertake a walk that although I had prepared for years, no one could have prepared me for the plethora of emotion that would ride my shoulders that day. In perfect unison, as I cadenced with the graduating class, was I able to hear my own inner cries of joy and relief. Not until that moment had it hit me, that I was making all of my dreams and aspirations reality. It was in that moment that I felt close to the God that had pre-ordered my horizons for that moment. In every step I took, I said thank you.

As I stepped to hear my name and receive my degree, not one word could I hear. But, I immediately hurried across the stage in a profound amount of tears, as my academic dean looked at me with welcome to a new part of my life. I hustled down the platform there to be greeted by my fellow men choirsters who some, had watched me in my transition and were glad to be apart of my cross over. I led out a shout of exhilaration, it was the all that I could do to mark my prolonged coming of age.

As I positioned myself at the microphone, the last time I would sing as a student in front of this vast body of talent, my eyes became heavy with tears. My voice rang through the stadium, and the wrestle of ten long years was heard from my small voice. It rang from wall to wall and person to person, that although we go through many trials and tribulations that the GOD that we serve is faithful to those who dilengently seek him. It was a time to testify, in all sense of the word. Completion, under the matchless ordinance of my father God.

There in witness were the great congregation of my family, who had beat out other families by being in the front row of the onlooking aggregation to ensure that they would see me as I transitioned. They took photos and yelled my name. They cried, and signed because of their disabilities. It was amazing.

I can say that this accomplishment is different, from that of most students, cause when I received my diploma, I had an answer for "So, what's next." That, is by far the best feeling that a person can have. Knowing that there is a future forward plan for them, after they have completed an aggrogous process.

This is the Moment, Damn all the odds
this day or never, I'll sit forever with the gods
When I look back, I will always recall
Moment for moment, this was the moment,
the greatest moment of them all.