Graduation

Tonight at 19:00 the graduation ceremony of Bas was on the agenda.

The school hall was filled with family and friends of all the graduates. Everyone came on stage separately for a speech of their mentors. The speech from Bas’ mentor was impressive.
She praised him for his modesty and never ending motivation and working attitude, his humor and social skills. According to her Bas is not a front man, avoiding the spot lights when possible, but always there as a steady silent force.
Every company/profession-group Bas will chose in the future will be thankful to have someone like him in a team. Somebody you can trust and depend on.
She mentioned his grades as well, several times. In two subjects of the exams Bas got the highest grades of the school, Dutch Language and Social Sciences. He was just 0,05 point short on Maths (6.45 instead 6.50) to receive the Cum Laude award. His overall average was an impressive 7.8.
She then wished him all the best with his English Language and Culture study at the University of Groningen.

That's my boy! Man, I'm so proud of him. And so is the whole family.

We were all there tonight of course, including my mother, my in-laws and Joke and Peter.

Afterwards we had a drink at our home, and when everybody left around 22:30, Bas also left. He went to an after-party with friends in Appingedam. I don't know what time he came home. By then I was fast asleep.

New times..... Both Annemarie and I are experiencing new things latelly in the 'letting go'-phase of him. He's almost 18 now, and doing and deciding things on his own.

We're so happy he's not moving out yet. Tonight we heard stories of several classmates who will be moving to Amsterdam, Wageningen, Utrecht, and even America and China for their new studies.

Bas will still be living with us at home for a while, thank God.