Eulogy

Dear Friends,
In all the fairy tales that I’ve heard or read as a child, the road to happily ever after, always lasts three days and three nights. Although I haven’t lived like a princess, I’m happy to announce that I’m retiring
like one! Three nights of festivities have been aligned, quite by chance, to send me off into the sunset. Thus, this weekend, instead of writing my students report cards, I'm wrestling with my retirement speech. At first, I thought it would be a simple matter of thanking everyone for showing up to celebrate my career. But now, I realize that writing a retirement speech is like writing a eulogy (not that I've ever written one). It has to be beautiful, yet sincere; moving, yet uplifting. Above all it has to be real, but not too real, especially when you have 180x2 ears (past and present administration, parents, colleagues, students) listening. My biggest fear is to turn misty-eyed and ruin my eye make-up. But then, how do you put 23 years of good and bad to rest, without tears..................?

Four nights to my retirement speech!