Graduation Party

Last night I had the honor to attend the Jerusalem Center dinner for graduates. Some students put together this party since people who are graduating this semester are missing out on all of ths parties and stuff going on at BYU. Somehow I was qualified to attend this party.

We all found our own "caps" to wear, some went all out and even found gowns. Caps were made out of kippahs, boxes, scarves, and cardboard. I wore my Egyptian headdress that I bought in Egypt. I knew it would come in handy some day!


We ate separate from everyone else in our lounge, formally known as "The Dan Jones". We made a "procession" to the cafeteria where everyone could admire our caps and gowns and be jealous of the graduating (or close to graduating, in my case) students). We all shared what we were planning on doing with our lives after graduating.

After we ate our dear Brother Whipple who is here on a service mission spoke to us. The first slide of his presentation looked like some kind of painting, and I thought he wsa going to give us some kind of "just like this painting, life is only what you make of it" type of speech. But I really should have known better. Brother Whipple starting talking to us about how the painting was actually done by a cat, and unbeknownst to us there is actually a market and culture of paintings done by cats, otherwise known as non-primate art. He went way back and showed us pictures of cats from Egypt and other ancient cats. At first I wasn't sure if it was a joke or not, so I was trying desperately not to laugh. Which of course made my laugh even louder and more embarrassing than normal, which led to me crying from holding it all in.

According to Brother Whipple these two cats (whose names I can't remember but I do remember that they some kind of chinese influence) are the dynamic duo in the cat "non-primate" painting world.

The only time Brother Whipple cracked and laughed was when he was telling us the story of "Bootsie" and how he came into being an artist. Just like any other genius artist, Bootsie encountered tramatic experiences as a young kitten, including being neutered, left by his family when they moved, and getting is his tale stuck under a car. But he rose above it all, according to Brother Whipple, and came out victorious.

Brother Whipple, completely straight faced.

Eventually we all realized (after many confused looks at each other) that it was a joke. But joke or not, the presentation lasted for 35 minutes! And the whole time Brother Whipple kept a straight face. So funny. So random. Definitely a graduation commencement speech I will never, ever forget.