The Speech of My Life

Today I said goodbye to my 49 eighth graders: my students, my friends, my children. This is the five minute speech I delivered to a packed house of some 400 to close a precious ceremony full of hula, singing, slideshows, raps, laughter, tears, and diplomas. I was the concluding act and this is what I said. I will never forget this day.

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Here it is, eighth graders. Your last lecture. I’ll make it short and sweet.

Aloha. Class of 2014, I am deeply honored to be a part of your transition ceremony.

For those of you who don’t know, my name is Mr. O, and I used to be a hobo.

It’s true! Sort of. Let me explain.

Eighth graders, you and I met 27 months ago, in February of 2008, when you were bright-eyed and wild sixth graders. I joined the school as your English teacher. We did lots of things that you still remember. I taught you that America spends more on chocolate bunnies at Easter then on Presidential elections. You remembered the part about the chocolate bunnies. We wrote essays about the meaning of life, the Universe, and everything, and you reprimanded me, telling me to just let you by sixth graders and not ask such big questions. Most memorably, I told you about what I did on my twenty fifth birthday.

Here is what I told you:

It was my twenty fifth birthday, and there I was, alone, on the edge of the World, inside of a metal box. There was cold, spooky surf crashing against foreboding sea-cliffs. The sky was chilly but bright as the sun rose over the mountains. I had left family, friends, and familiarity for the unknown, and here on my twenty fifth birthday, I found it. I surfed with Kelly Slater on this day, on the bottom of Australia, in the midst of a year trip around that country continent.

You never forgot that story, and after a little sixth grade style reasoning, Nani Welch Keliihoomalu said one day: “Let me get this straight: You went to Princeton, and then became a hobo?”. I never had a chance after that. The name stuck.

I have wandered many times in my life, and I may very well wander again, but my time with you, eighth graders, over the last three years has been one of the best periods of my life. As your English teacher, and this year as your U.S. History teacher, I have had the rare opportunity to guide and get to know 46 inspiring young people. I have seen your personalities flourish, your bodies transform, and your minds thrive. I have watched you go from awkward sixth graders group dancing in circles at our school dances, to confident eighth graders, and um, well, you’re not group dancing in circles anymore. I was even the DJ at one of your dances, but you all fired me forever after I demanded that we talk at length about offensive lyrics in popular music. (By the way, I still think I was a great DJ). I have seen you change from children into young adults. It is the most radical change I have ever been a part of in my life.

I have observed the last three years of your life from an adult perspective. But I wonder what each of you will remember of this strange and wonderful chapter of your life. Perhaps you will think like I taught you, like an historian, and remember some of these world-changing events of your middle school lives.

Barack Obama runs an historic campaign for the presidency, and we have our own mock election at school. Mr. Obama wins the school election and the real election, and he goes on to transform our country.

The American economy crashes in the worst downfall since the Great Depression. The Hawaii economy suffers, as do many people in our school community.

Congress passes national health care reform, marking the most significant change to social policy since the 1960’s.

The Boston Celtics and the Los Angeles Lakers each win an NBA championship (By the way, Kalan Camero, the Celtics are going to take it this year).

Zac Effron and Justin Bieber become irresistible pop culture icons (Alina Katase, neither of these guys are good enough for you).

November 2009: Shakira releases She Wolf, unknowingly providing the soundtrack for our eighth grade girls’ birthday parties for the rest of the year.

An unusual earthquake an Haiti devastates the poorest country in the Western Hemisphere. HPA responds with bake sales, fundraisers, and donations.

You might remember some of these things. But the truth is, when you look back at these years, as a college student, as a father, as a grandmother, as an elder, from wherever you stand, my guess is that you won’t think about world events very much. Instead, your memory will be personal. You will think about you and your friends, the times you were happy, and the love that you felt.

When I am a husband, a father, or an old man, rocking away in my chair, these are some of the memories I will treasure:

-Kamalani Hurwitz, giving birth to a basketball, in my first weeks as a sixth grade English teacher.

-President fluffy buns, a.k.a., Walter Disney, trying to bring order to a mock class government in open revolt.

-Kimi Cantyne, dancing the hula to celebrate the fiftieth Anniversary of Hawaiian statehood.

-Tsing Ting Tsai, jumping off a 15 ft. rock cliff into Kealakekua Bay, and saying he had just fulfilled one of his life’s dreams.

-Roman Kandirovsky, beating me at chess, and then giving me his chess set, saying, “You need the practice more than me.”

-Claudius Saalfeld blurting out in the middle of my lecture one day, “ I liked you better when you had a beard.”

-Connor Peterson hoisting his Tommy Gun in the Bugsy Malone musical.

-Peyton Rapier, jamming out on guitar at our school talent show.

-Nani Welch Keliihoomalu, making an animated movie about a sick, broke, and lazy thirteen year old girl as a metaphor for America’s problems today.

-Sung Sik Choi, rolling off the stage after playing the unforgettable MC at our school talent show.

-Fish killers, Ryan Fujioka, Ian Rice, and Kalan Camero, spearing some fish for our dinner, and Ian giving a kiss on the lips to one of the fish.

-MC’s Morgan Monahan, Kimi Cantyne, Kelly Kumove, and Nani Welch Keliihoomalu, happily entertaining you all every Monday morning at assembly (“Be good, we’re watching!”).

-Joey Kaiilimai blessing us all in prayer at our final dinner dance.

These memories, and countless more with every one of you here, will bring me happiness and smiles forever.

Which reminds me, there is something I want to tell you eighth graders about my going. I love this community, and all the students here, and I love this work than any work I’ve done in my life. This has been my dream job. Deciding to leave was challenging and bittersweet. That’s why I asked all you eighth graders for advice.

You guys had all sorts of ideas as to what I should do next. Move to a big city. Join yoga classes. Move to Las Vegas. Go to England. Go back to being a Hobo. Read lots of books. Travel the world. Become a travel journalist. Move to the Jersey Shore. Party. Exist. Have a mid-life crisis. Surf. Take a break and live free. Climb a mountain. Join UNICEF. Go into the wild. Have buckets of fun. Buy Justin Bieber tickets. Stay in the islands because Hawaii is too good. Become an actor playing a teacher. Stay home. Make a lot of money. Go to Alaska and hunt and fish.

So many good options. I really wanted to do all of them, and still I hope that I do.

But do you know, out of all these awesome ideas, what I chose? I chose something even I didn’t expect. I chose to continue to be a middle school teacher.

What? As fearless eighth grader Deedra Yamabe once said to me. “Why would you want to teach middle school?”

Why do I choose to teach you all, eighth graders? Because I like spending my days with you. You make me laugh, smile, and even cry. Because watching you perform, reading your ideas, and helping you be better people gives meaning to my life. Though I struggle to be lively at 7 AM, I am always happier when I see you in the morning, when Madison Inman, Kimi Cantyne, and Kelly Kumove walk in to my room to dish fashion advice. “Mr. O, I think, it’s time to ditch that old yellow jacket,” or “that’s an interesting hairstyle”, or “I can’t take you seriously with those glasses on.” And when I drive home at the end of the day, totally exhausted, I always feel like something important happened.

I don’t have my own yet, but I consider you my children.

Eighth graders, look around you. Go ahead, look around. Freeze this moment. This family, the family that you have been together, some of you for nine years, or for three years, or for just a year, it’s time to say goodbye to this family.

Some adults are leaving, for Illinois, for California, Maui, for the great unknown. Some students are leaving, for Malaysia, for Oregon, for California, for the great unknown.

Today we say goodbye. Not to each other, because we will meet again, sooner or later. Instead, we say goodbye to who we are, as an ohana, right now. We’ll walk out today into the bright sunshine, into summer, into life and the future. But for one last time, look around, and treasure your final moments with your HPA family.

This is the end. Eighth graders. You carry our love, our support, and our hope. Make me proud. Make us all proud. Make yourselves proud.

Aloha.