Graduation day


I've recently completed work for my master's degree. My master's is in MAT (master's in arts of teaching) or we can just say I got my master's in education which is what I tell people. The ceremony was OK. It was too long for me. They could have mailed me my damn degree, which I found out they are going to do anyway. What I'm wondering is why graduation is supposed to be this glorious culmination of academic efforts and then the university charges you to graduate? Not only graduate but to pay for the cap and gown and God forbid you have to get announcements, which are the biggest rebuffs known to man. My mother, who is the equivalent of a black June Cleaver/Mrs. Klump from "The Nutty Professor", was very happy but didn't forget to mention that I did not send our church announcements that I was graduating. I was like, "Mom, those people could care less." Its like the Chris Rock joke goes, "Black people have really fucked up priorities. If you do something successful you're thought of as arrogant. Or a "smarty art nigga". You think you're better than me because you got your master's. You think you're my master nigga! Well let me ask you this. Can you kick my ass?" Its a fucked up situation. I know church is supposed to be a house of God but I've seen a lot of contempt in church and found it pretty depressing. Most of the time I just like to sit in the back and mind my own business. I look at the huge churches on television with thousands of members and the whole essence of going to church in the first place seems like a facade. The whole point of church, I always thought, was to gain a sense of intimacy with God. How can you do that with 10,000 people supposedly worshipping at the same time? Anyway, I've officially got my master's degree. My grandmother didn't forget to lay some guilt on my as well. She asked me, "Why don't you stop dating those white girls and find a good black girl to settle down with? You and your daddy are just the same. Neither of you has patience with women." I wanted to say, "Because black girls don't suck dick." But I decided that's a war that would be better left alone. Sometimes I wish I could trade brains with Dr. Dre and make my life easier.