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Commencement Address
CCRI President Ray Di Pasquale
May 16, 2008
Community College of Rhode Island
Commencement Address
May 16, 2008
Karen Adams, commencement speaker and anchor, WPRI
Creation: On the first day, God created the dog and said, “Sit all day by
the door of your house and bark at anyone who comes in or walks past. For
this, I will give you a life span of 20 years.”
The dog said, “That’s a long time to be barking. How about only 10 years and
I’ll give you back the other 10?”
So God agreed.
On the second day, God created the monkey and said, “Entertain people, do tricks and make them laugh. For this I’ll give you a 20-year lifespan.”
The monkey said, “Monkey tricks for 20 years? That’s a pretty long time to perform. How about I give you back 10 like the dog did?”
And God agreed.
On the third day, God created the cow and said, “You must go into the field with the farmer all day long and suffer under the sun, have calves and give milk to support the farmer’s family. For this I will give you a lifespan of 60 years.”
The cow said, “That’s kind of a tough life you want me to live for 60 years. How about 20 and I’ll give back the other 40?”
And God agreed again.
On the fourth day, God created man and said, “Eat, sleep, play, marry and enjoy your life. For this, I’ll give you 20 years.”
But man said, “Only 20 years? Could you possibly give me my 20, the 40
the cow gave back, the 10 the monkey gave back and the 10 the dog gave back?
That makes 80,
OK?”
“OK,” said God. “You asked for it”
So that is why for our first 20 years, we eat, sleep, play and enjoy ourselves. For the next 40 years, we slave in the sun to support our family. For the next 10 years, we do monkey tricks to entertain our grandchildren. And for the last 10 years, we sit on the front porch and bark at everyone.
Life has now been explained to you.
(Please note: This is not my original thought but came to me via e-mail.)
You have all done the 20 years of playing, sleeping, eating and enjoying. Most of you have now entered that 40-year span, the work phase, the slaving under the sun, the supporting of someone in your life.
I am well into that phase, although I still like the playing, eating and entertaining.
Thirty years of my work life has been spent in television news, a business once described by Gonzo Journalist Hunter S. Thompson as this. “The TV business is a cruel and shallow money trench – a long plastic hallway – where thieves and pimps run free and good men die like dogs. There’s also a negative side.”
There is no doubt, that the television business is tough, immediate and sometimes – OK, often – PLASTIC.
But for me, it is the most rewarding career I could have ever asked for.
I was the first person in my family to graduate from college. Maybe that’s the case with some of you graduates this evening. I’m proud of that, as is my family.
As I know you are proud – you should be – because you have broken a cycle. You have set a new direction for your life. Stand proud.
When I was in college, I was miserable at all things “OLOGY” – biology, kinesiology, geology, psychology, physiology – all “ologies.” No good.
But I did find a great interest and often a consuming passion for history, politics, communications, writing, radio and television.
My parents, both raised in small farming communities in the Midwest, were very concerned. “What was I going to do with my life?” Basically they were telling me that had their doubts as to whether I had any marketable job skills (not exactly their words – that’s more of today’s business lingo). In their eyes, I was spending all this time and money in college and probably wasn’t really headed anywhere.
But I did head somewhere right out of college, armed with my degree in speech and theatre and minor in journalism: home – unemployed – trying to find a job in television or radio. The closest I came to that was watching the soaps in the afternoon.
My mother put her foot down. I was not going to sit around the house all day. I was going to go apply for a job at an insurance company down the road that was hiring.
After much protest, I went. I was hired. I sat in the middle of a room full of people with a calculator, making sure insurance numbers were accurate with the sheet I was given.
After the second day of working those numbers in the middle of a room full of people who for the most part appeared miserable, something ignited a fire in me and I called every place where I had sent a résumé or filled out an application. Three days into my new job, while making my “desperate” phone calls during my lunch break. I was told by a radio station they wanted me to come to work in their news department.
In that moment, my life changed. I went to my supervisor on the floor and told him I had the opportunity to go after a job, I really wanted and I was going to have to quit. His response: “Good.” You see, I never did balance that sheet of numbers I was given the first day.
So I went to work in radio (by the way, the news department consisted of one – me). I worked from 5 in the morning to after 6 at night and most weekends, and the whole time I was at the radio station, I was calling the local TV station for a job.
Within six months, the news director at the television station called and said, in order to stop your phone calls, which are bordering on harassment, we would like to hire you.
I’ve been in TV news ever since and it turned out for my parents that, despite the lack of marketable job skills in their eyes, my odd mix of journalism, communications and history turned out to make me uniquely qualified for television news.
So here was this gal from a little farm town in Missouri headed into TV – think Mary Tyler Moore on a much, much smaller scale.
But the point here: Don’t settle for some job just to get out of the house; don’t give up on going after a job you think you really want; and there’s a fine line between stalking a future employer and being persistent.
Now I like to separate or categorize my years in television.
I being with B.C. – that’s before consultants, cellular phones and dot-coms.
Armed with a notepad, pencil, camera and microphone, I headed out each day to cover the stories that affected our communities – our neighborhoods.
Working the Midwest, there were many times I traveled down bumpy dirt roads, sent out as a spotter for funnel clouds because the region was under a tornado watch. Using a CB radio, my photographer and I would call in locations where either the tornado had already passed and damage was done, or if we saw conditions threatening for a tornado or the times we actually could spot the funnel emerging from the clouds.
There were stake-outs with cops, coverage of fires, accidents, crimes of all kinds including murder, hours spent in courtrooms.
Over the years, I have interviewed the heroes, the best and brightest, the bravest, the saddest, the loneliest and the lowest of the low – those who will spend years behind bars.
I’ve traveled into cities to cover hurricanes. Talk about an eerie feeling when you and your photographer are in the only car headed into the evacuation area, while there is bumper to bumper traffic headed out.
I spent many years traveling to Washington, D.C., for stories on our congressional delegations.
I had the honor of traveling to the Far East on a trade mission as the
media liaison for the governors of Missouri and Oklahoma where I spent weeks
in Japan; in Seoul,
South Korea (where tanks were in the streets and we were warned there were
listening devices in our rooms) and Hong Kong; we were in the city when the
treaty was signed by the British to return Hong Kong to the Chinese.
I’ve sat in the pit of NASCAR races, been on the field of Super Bowls, covered movie premieres and Hollywood events, traveled to many parts of the world – all places I could only read about as a gal from a small farming town in Missouri.
And the point here: Don’t limit your range of opportunities. Don’t settle
for always playing it safe. There are times to be adventurous. There are
times to take a chance, even when you are scared.
Television news has changed a great deal – I look back on those “B.C.” years
fondly. Then consultants took over. Here’s a couple of descriptions of
consultants:
“Someone who takes the watch off your wrist and tells you the time.”
“A man who knows 99 ways to make love, but doesn’t know any women.”
“Someone who is called in at the last moment and paid enormous amounts of
money to assign the blame.”
Consultants entered the world of television and changed it forever. They convinced news directors of what is important, regardless of whether those “consultants” had spent a day, much less years, in the community and are in a large part responsible for those mind-numbing endless teases that are superficial and sensational. “If it bleeds, it leads.” Crime is big; if there’s a sexual angle, that’s even better. Fires with lots of flames are good.
The fear factor is important – if it happened to her, it could happen to you; that snowflake today might be a blizzard tonight.
Newsgathering has changed. Let’s now add in cellular phones and dot-coms. Anyone armed with a picture phone can capture events where it would be impossible for news crews to be everywhere or even be aware of incidents that are unfolding. Oftentimes, this can be of great help – with these eyewitness videos, these cell phone photos leading to arrests and stemming crime – but there is a disturbing side, too – violent acts captured and then posted on YouTube and Facebook and MySpace, all those dot com Web sites that are emerging every day. Horrible acts that should never have been publicized but are – and I believe are contributing in this country to the desensitizing of violence. And that worries me!
I don’t want us to forget local news. If we don’t change the emphasis on what is important – what is good – who do we have to blame for all the problems in the world?
We can’t continue to glorify the dark side. I’m afraid that in many ways, we are not handing over a world that is in a good place.
Now, we look to you to make it better – to fix it.
I’m sure many of you get up every day thinking the odds are against you. I’m sure somewhere in your life, there’s been that person who is negative, who says you’ll never make it, who wants to hold you back or is afraid that you will make a better life for yourself – you might leave them behind.
Sitting here in this field house, I know you graduates have made some really tough choices, working extra jobs to get this degree, giving up some party time to study for a test. As they say, “that tassel didn’t come without a hassle.”
Poet Maya Angelou was being interviewed by Oprah Winfrey (I love Oprah) and they were talking about life’s lessons and Maya, in that wonderful voice of hers, told Oprah: “I’ve learned that no matter what happens, or how bad it seems today, life goes on and it will be better tomorrow. I’ve learned that you can tell a lot about a person by the way he or she handles these three things: a rainy day, lost luggage and tangled Christmas tree lights. I’ve learned that regardless of your relationship with your parents, you will miss them when they are gone from your life. I’ve learned that making a living is not the same thing as making a life. That life sometimes gives you a second chance. You shouldn’t go through life with a catcher’s mitt on both hands; you need to be able to throw something back. I’ve learned that whenever I decide something with an open heart, I usually make the right decision. I’ve learned that even when I have pains, I don’t have to be one. That every day you should reach out and touch someone; people love a warm hug or just a friendly pat on the back. I’ve learned that I still have a lot to learn. I’ve learned that people will forget what you said, people will forget what you did, but people will never forget how you made them feel.”
Now when this wonderful woman said these things, the audience was hushed. I read these words from time to time to remind myself of what I need to be. Probably the most important thing I’ve learned over the years is to give back to my community. I can’t even begin to explain to you what I have received in return. You just can’t miss with acts of kindness!
Now your diplomas from CCRI should serve as a daily reminder that you have done something good – good for yourself, good for your family, good for your community!
I don’t expect any of you to remember much of what I’ve said here, but I want all of you to know this: It has been a true honor to stand before you. I only hope that you to take these thoughts with you: Live well. Don’t listen to the negatives. Give back.
And in the later years, when all of us up here are in those last 10 years – you know, the dog years of creation – we won’t be barking at everyone from the porch, but we will be smiling and applauding you. Because within all of you is the power and the ability to make this world a better place.
You can – you will – change the world.
Congratulations!
