The Leaving Cert exams will never define who you truly are
Today I am thinking about all the students who got their Leaving Cert results; not the ones who’ll be feted on the covers of tomorrow’s newspapers with their freakish bouquets of seven A1s.
No, this morning I salute the dreamers, the ones who ploughed their own furrow against the grain, the dancers and chancers, the schemers, the unsung heroes of the magical space between the classes, the bike shed kissers and smokers, the ones whose crooked branches could never be bent straight, the raconteurs of the school bus stop, the shy ones who’ll be beautiful late bloomers, the bullied ones, the ones who thought their leaking buckets were deficient, but it is only along a well-watered path that the most beautiful flowers grow, the boys and girls who held tight to their own song, whistling their own melody against the wind that blew hard for the last six years, the oddballs who rolled, collecting only the moss they wanted, the boys who’ve waited for years to walk out of those school gates for the last time and walk tall, the ones who were taunted and not taught, the ones whose songs were frozen and stultified by facts; there is no failure today ... the thaw begins today ... this is your spring ... your release ... your recovery ... your time ... take flight ... learn to forget ... and dazzle yourself by being who you truly are ... let nobody measure, weigh or assess you ... look up into the cosmos of your beautiful self and follow that star that winks at you, showing you the way towards the place that school never revealed to you ... somewhere way beyond what you thought was possible ... somewhere so close ... deeply lodged in you. Billy O Hanluain Kimmage, Dublin 12