The Graduation - Part 1

We got to witness the coolest thing!  Our nephew graduated from West Point as a 2nd Lieutenant in the United States Army.  As we were walking around the campus, people kept congratulating us, as if we did anything.  He did it.  We were just innocent bystanders enjoying the ride.

It started four years ago.  We came out here in March 2020 for family weekend.  It was right before COVID took over.  We got to tour the campus and see Brendan in uniform.

After that, we'd come up once a year to go to a game, a sprint football game, that is.  He and James both played on the sprint football team.  

We'd come up and watch the game on Friday. On Saturday we go to that other football game.  

After that, we'd get to see the boys and have dinner with them.

Four years later, here we are.  

It started on Friday with the graduation parade.  I love all the military stuff, especially here.  This particular ceremony has been done the same way for over a hundred years.  All the cadets march onto the plain, the seniors for the last time.  This is the traditional transfer of seniority from the "firsties" (the graduation class) to the "Cows" (the juniors).  The seniors are at the front of the plain as the remaining cadets march by.  It’s very cool to watch.

The Plain where the parade takes place.  I love this view.  All the cadets will be coming through the sallyports.

It starts with a demonstration by the parachute team.  All the seniors are jumping.  This is one of my favorite things.  These people land with precision.

All the cadets marching onto the plain.

Saluting the colors.

The seniors are reviewing the cadets.  They remove their hats until their company passes by in review.  Then they put their hats back on and salute. 

After the parade we all converged on the plain for photos.  Brendan with his brothers, John & Paul.

The big day is Saturday, Graduation Day.  I graduated 100 years ago but I still remember the excitement from that day and I didn't go to a school that had hundreds of years of history and tradition.  I can only imagine how these cadets must have felt following in the footsteps of so many before them and to be part of something special: The Long Gray Line.

The seniors gather one last time at Michie Stadium (where there is very little shade).

The commencement speaker was Vice President Kamala Harris.  It's the first time in history that a woman has given the commencement speech at West Point.  I can't recall who spoke at my graduation but I'll remember this forever!  In the bleachers are all the other cadets.  As names were called, there was lots of cheering from that section.

Brendan Windsor!  

The salute.

The accepting of the degree.  That's his actual diploma!  Mine was a blank folder.  After getting the diploma, they had to walk through a maze of people to salute, shake hands, etc. before heading back to their seat.  

This fella got the loudest cheers.  He was the class GOAT.  It doesn't mean what you think it means.  This guy is graduating last in his class meaning he has the lowest GPA.  West Point is tough and a lot of cadets drop out.  This guy was able to pull it off and he still graduated from West Point!  According to tradition, all the cadets donate a dollar.  At graduation, the cadet with the lowest GPA is honored with the title GOAT and given the bag of money.

Once all the names have been called, the First Captain calls out "Graduating Class, dismissed!"  Then all the cadets toss their caps.  Another tradition is that all the little kids in the stadium storm the field and pick up the hats as a souvenir.  The rumor is that the cadets put money in them. 

The photos were coming fast and furious and I wasn't to keep up with them all.  Brendan and his brothers.  L to R: John, James, Brendan, Paul.

The boys with Grans.

Brendan with Bev, Paul and Uncle Jim.

Grans and Paul.

You'd think the festivities were done but no.  There's more.  We all headed to the firstie club for lunch.  

The long "march" to lunch.  After lunch, is the commissioning ceremony. This is when cadets change from their gray uniform to their officer uniform.  They pick their commissioning officer, the place on campus where it takes place and who his first salute will be.

Brendan chose Constitution Corner for his commissioning.  Brendan with his commissioning officer.  The commissioning officer says some very nice things.  Then James read the orders.  

Brendan's parents, Mark & Michele, pinned his Lieutenant bars.  The commissioning officer administers the oath.

Paul is Brendan's first salute.  (I "borrowed" this photo from David.  He was in perfect position to get it!)  I like that James is in the background looking on.  

The first family photo with the newly minted 2nd Lieutenant.

James and another cadet folding the flag that was used during the commissioning.

Brendan and all his grandparents.

Celebration table.  There are lots of goodies: cake, cookies, brownies, etc.

David and Dad.

John and Paul.

The celebratory dinner.  On the left side: Me, John, Elaine, John, Jim, Paul, Dad and Mom.  On the right side: Paul, Bev, Mark, Brendan, James, Michele, David and Sharmila.  It's a family reunion! (Missing is Brittany and Destiny).

What a weekend!  It was busy but worth it.  You'll note that the title of the blog is "Part 1".  That's because we'll be back here again in 2 years when James graduates.  Looking forward to it!

Third Time’s A Charm!

In 2022, we’d planned a trip to Orlando to see Marina.  Technically, she’s my step-mother but I don’t like to use that term for a couple of reasons: (1) I’m 56 and it just sounds weird and (2) it has a bad connotation as in the “evil” step-mother and Marina is anything but that.  Anyway, we hadn’t seen her in a while so we booked a flight in September of last year to go.

The week were supposed go, Hurricane Ian hit Orlando. Luckily all my people were okay. Orlando hasn’t been hit by a hurricane in years!  I couldn’t believe the one week I picked…anyway. We rebooked for November of last year.  Imagine my shock when Hurricane Nicole hit that same area.

Somebody didn’t want me to go to Orlando.  I mean seriously.  I randomly pick two dates and BOTH times there’s a hurricane?  

You’d think I’d take the hint.  But I did not.  We rebooked again for this past weekend.  I called Marina and made sure April wasn’t hurricane season.  

We got to the airport and all was good.  Our plane was at the gate, the sun was shining, all good. Maybe, this time we’re gonna make it and the forces that were keeping us out were gonna let us in. Ha!

Just as we were about to start boarding, the gate agent announced that there was weather in Orlando and that we’d be delayed by 45 minutes.  John and I just looked at each other like you can’t be serious.  I took a look at the radar and sure enough, they were predicting severe weather right when we’d be landing.  I pulled my book out and kept reading.  I was stunned when 45 minutes later, we started to board.  

Now, we're on the plane.  I heard the engines starting and then....I heard them stopping.  The captain got on the speaker, "From the flight deck, uh, we just heard from air traffic control that they want us to sit here a little longer.  Maybe about an hour.  Since we're all ready on the plane, we'll just stay here.  Sit back and get comfortable."  John and I looked at each other again.  Uh-oh.  He's thinking they are going to cancel the flight.  I'm thinking I'm not getting off this plane until it's in Orlando.

An hour later, we were in the air and I exhaled a sigh of relief.  The flight itself was not bad.  No turbulence, no crazy people.  We landed in Orlando and I’m thinking, excellent.  Let’s get off the plane, grab our luggage, get the car and go.  Not so fast.  Another plane is at our gate so we had to sit on the tarmac until they left.  Now is 1:15 am and we still have to get our luggage.

We made our way to the luggage carousel and waited.  About 45 minutes later, all the bags have been delivered but we haven’t seen ours.  The place is a madhouse because we weren’t the only flight delayed.  Turns out some of the bags were inadvertently put out on the carousel next to us.  It’s 2 am.  John's looking at me like could this get any worse?

Survey says! Yes, yes it can!  We went down to the rental car floor and it was mayhem.  There are people everywhere.  All the car rental companies had long lines of people.  I normally rent from National but this time I rented from Budget because it was cheaper. I thought Budget had a program where you could bypass the line, kinda like National, but no.  I had to get in line like everyone else.  There were kids asleep on the floor in the line we were in.  That should tell you how fast it was moving.  We stood there for 30-45 minutes and never moved an inch.

Finally, John couldn’t take it anymore.  He called an Uber and we just left.  We got to our hotel room in Orange City at 3:30 am.  I wanted to raise my arms in victory and shout I win!  Instead I crawled into bed and fell asleep.

The next day…oh wait, no.  It was later that morning!  We met up with Marina.  Now comes the good part.

There are hugs all around and she says, "You want to get a drink?"  I said, "Sure.  You want to get a coffee or something?"  She looked at me and said, "No.  A Margarita." That was the last thing I expected to come out of her mouth.  So I said, "Yes." 

And we did!  After she took us by her apartment, we found a place nearby and got these big mugs of margaritas.  It was awesome.  

That night we all met up with Lisa, Gema and Juan Pablo for dinner at the Olive Garden.  Gema is Marina’s niece but they’re the same age so they’re more like sisters (although Gema did point out that Marina was a few months older).  I met Gema and her husband, Jorge when my dad passed away back in 2010.  Lisa, is Gema’s daughter.  I’d never met her in person but I felt like I knew her because we text all the time. Juan Pablo is Lisa’s son.  I follow all his adventures on Facebook.  He is a cool dude who does some cool things.  Except for the fact that Jorge wasn't feeling well and couldn't come, it was a fun dinner.  In fact, it was so much fun that I forgot to take pictures.

The next day, we met at Marina’s house.  Lisa was taking us to Mt. Dora, which was a cool little town not far away.  Unfortunately, Jorge still wasn’t feeling well so he and Juan Pablo didn’t come.  We all piled into Lisa’s car and had a blast.

Waiting at Marina’s.

John and Marina.  She loves her John.  

Before we went to Mt. Dora, Lisa gave us a tour of Sanford and Lake Mary.  These are two little towns around Deltona/Orange City where they all live.  She's a great tour guide.

This is "Old Joe" (the alligator, not the guy standing there).  Old Joe was the largest and fiercest gator in the lake around the turn of the 19th century.  According to the story, he'd eat fish, deer and other large animals.  Apparently he was pretty popular with the lady gators because all the gators in the lake are his descendants.

Hamming it up with Old Joe.

John, Marina, Me and Gema.

This is Palm Island Park in Mt. Dora.  The lake is Lake Dora.  I love the trees and the Spanish Moss.

Gema, Marina and Me.  There's lots of wild life around.

Look who we found!  This is one of "Old Joe's" descendants.  This guy was hanging out, minding his own business.  Then some kids cast their fishing line on the other side of the bridge.  Joe Jr, heard the splash and he was on the move.  He swam over to see if there was something in it for him.  As Lisa said, you can't come to Florida without seeing a gator.

When we came off the bridge and headed in the other direction, we came to Grantham Point.  There was this big chair.  You can't pass that up.  Gema and Marina.

Lisa, Gema and Marina.

We all got our picture on the big chair.

We were going to have lunch in Mt. Dora, which is a super cute little town.  They have lots of shops and restaurants.  Unbeknownst to us, there was an art festival going on so not only was there no place to park, all the restaurants were packed.

Instead, Lisa found a cool little place called Fish Camp in Tavares on Lake Eustis.  The restaurant was on the water and they had live music.  More importantly, they had good food.  Marina was excited to see they had shrimp and grits.  Gema got some fish and chips that she said were delicious.  Lisa got lobster rolls that looked amazing.  John got a fish trio that was quite tasty and I got Mahi Mahi garlic parmesan style.  We also got some yummy fried green tomatoes and hush puppies.  We learned something new about Gema and that is she is passionate about hush puppies.  I know what you're thinking...where are the pictures?  Ha!  I was so busy having fun, I forgot to take pics.

After lunch, Lisa took us by DeLand, another cute little town.  We were going to get out and walk around but just as we got out of the car, it started to rain.  We hustled back into the car.  Right as we closed the door, the rain came pouring down.

By that time, we were all kind of tired so we headed back home.  Aside from that last downpour, it was a perfect day!  

What started out as a stressful trip turned into a great one.  Third time was definitely the charm.  

The only downside was that we didn't get to see Jorge.  Hopefully he's feeling better.  Thank you to Marina and the Sanchez family for showing us such a wonderful time.  Love you guys.  We'll be back!