Underclassman says goodbye to Porter-Gaud's Class of '08

I've been to several Porter-Gaud graduation ceremonies since entering the school in the sixth grade. Each one followed the same procedure, the same sequence of speeches and awards and, of course, the alphabetical distribution of diplomas.

The graduation of the Class of 2008 on May 24 was much the same as always, but never has a graduation meant so much to me. This was the class that welcomed me into their eighth-grade math class when I joined them as a sixth-grader, still new to the Porter-Gaud community and slightly lost in more ways than one.

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The students in the Calculus BC class at Porter-Gaud have taken math together for about five years. The class includes all seniors except for Anne Cai (front row, second from right), who is in 10th grade.

I suppose their greeting was a bit pompous, if eighth-graders could be described as such. They made a human tunnel for my entrance, which I refused to go through at the time. Some of them still claim to be mad at me for not going through.

At first, that class was just like any other: another period of the day, another class of students. Now, after five years of classes with essentially the same group of people, I find myself ridiculously, sentimentally attached. The classes were never just about math, and many of the students became my friends outside the classroom, too, in other school activities, as well as just aimlessly wandering around campus.

Through many other areas of school, I got to know many more members of their grade who weren't in my classes. Their class was a group of people who almost all got along well with each other.

True, sitting in class with them, initially sometimes I'd perceive some "fighting," which I finally realized to be simply amusing banter. As a group, they accepted me into their midst, and I never felt out of place after the initial "pomposity," regardless of their love of flaunting their privileges in my face, a practice that reached its peak this past year. They created a nickname for me, Pi, which carried all the essence of the words "math nerd."

Those little things they did in class, the usual jokes and habitual tricks, made all the difference in the world. Their easy camaraderie made math class my favorite; I probably looked forward to it more than to any other. And, yes, somehow through all their antics, we managed to learn plenty, all the way up to AP Calculus BC with Mrs. Reese, who became more of a friend than a teacher, though amazing in both roles.

At previous Porter-Gaud commencements, I knew some names and could predict the awards only about as well as anyone else in the school. This one was entirely different. After listening to two of the seniors bicker daily in class over who was going to get the computer award, I waited with anticipation possibly equal to theirs for the final conclusion to their yearlong debates. The salutatory and valedictory speeches meant much more than the usual thoughts of the high-achieving; I could understand both the lighthearted and the serious implications more, having picked up a sense of their grade from the mini-society of math class.

Finally, the distribution of diplomas was no longer just a list of names and faces matched with paper. Most of the names and faces carried memories with them: abducting backpacks, catching my silly counting errors, obsessing over a Dr. Grip pencil, throwing daily looks of extreme confusion, writing poetry, picking out the prettiest books in the library, cramming short fiction compositions, regaling each other with stories on the way to tutoring at Rise Up and Read, listening to them argue over who was best at bowling and masses of so much more hilarious randomness.

Some of them I never got to know outside the class, but the little world created in class is probably one of the best gifts I've ever had.

"You should be graduating with us," wrote a senior, now graduate, friend in my yearbook.

But I doubt I would be able to appreciate the class of 2008 as much as they deserve if I didn't have to lose them first.

Anne Cai is a sophomore at Porter-Gaud School. Reach her at avcamethyst@gmail.com.