We attended a sweet, small ceremony for Kelle and Jim in a place not far from our house. (Bonus!) We also got to help decorate.
I enjoy finding my current-day counterpart. I don’t think I would have been this styling, but I for sure would have tucked myself away with a good book. (I never caught what book he was reading.)
After the ceremony, we got to hear the happy couple make some music together.
Friends Heidi and Kevin had their annual White Elephant Gift party and Matt came home with a toilet paper air gun.
He took to it right away.
It was satisfying having wads of wet toilet paper hit the fence, or recycling bins.
Huzzah for dumb present fun. (The present was an actual gift from one of the party goer’s mother.)
Friend Kelly sent me not one but TWO postcards from her Louisana trip. She reports that this was a plantation run mostly by women, but also had slaves.
Also that the trees were amazing.
Friend Kelly asked if I wanted to see Quentin Tarantino’s new film at the Hollywood Theatre. The answer was: sort of? I’m not much of a fan of Mr. Tarantino’s movies. But this did have Leonardo DiCaprio in it. And Brad Pitt wasn’t looking too shabby either.
The Hollywood provided us with these cool tri-fold brochures to commemorate the night.
I didn’t love the movie (review here) but I did enjoy the setting.
There was a torrential rain falling, so we took photos inside. Here, Sara’s cousin takes a picture of Shawn & Sara
Kathy and Al take pictures.
More pictures with Sara’s dad, stepmom, and sister.
Sisters.
Shawn’s mom and dad.
Sara’s aunt and cousin
Sara’s aunt and uncle
Pictures taken, we headed out in the rain.
The next few hours weren’t great for me. I got lost on campus (because I never would ask anyone for directions) and sopping wet, and I was cold and eventually I found my way to the delightful meet-up area where we were scheduled to have dinner.
I bought some hot tea, read, went from sopping to damp, and bought some Pho when everyone else showed up. That warmed me up from the inside. Thus the day ended on a good note.
The defense finished, we moved to the graduation ceremony, which took place on the very next day.
Shawn holds Sara’s robes.
The graduation took place in the hockey arena and was for the College of Education and Human Development (CEHD). This was all the future teachers, who sat on the house right side, and then a bunch of psychology-type (ish) majors. All the majors are listed here. The Human Development people sat on the the house left side and took much longer to seat themselves. Teachers know how to form an orderly line.
Looks like this graduate has a job waiting.
The nice thing about the hockey arena is that there was a big screen where the happenings were projected. That made this ceremony slightly more intimate.
After a long wait, we got to see Lee, Sara’s writing partner, hooded.
And then Dr. Sara Sterner herself.
Here’s the program:
You can see it has many pages. Look how many people also received PhDs at the same time as Sara. And this is just in the College of Education and Human Development!
There she is, on the next page.
While Sara was doing Defense Part II with the members of her committee, friends and family wandered over to the building on campus with the performing arts hall, and waited at a coffee shop.
The building was gorgeous, and lovingly renovated.
It was a long wait (I think there was also some paperwork processing in there) and I had time to catch up with Sara’s family members, which was nice as I hadn’t seen them in a very long time.
Behold! Dr. Sara Sterner (alas, not the best photo of her)
Three of Sara’s professors had traveled to Minneapolis to be present for the defense, so photos were taken.
After photos, some catching up, and Sara’s stepmom Barbie snuck around for a different angle.
Sara booked the biggest room available for her defense and it was full! She had a lot of friends and family visit. When I sat down, I introduced myself to the woman sitting next to me. She turned out to be a fellow PhD candidate. Her observation: “I go to these things all the time and usually there’s like four people watching.”
Sara’s adviser introduced Sara and the defense. He had a special message from Hogwarts and also pointed out that a royal baby waited to be born until Sara was ready to defend.
Sara explained the work she had done on a post-intentional phenomenological exploration of reading whitely. There were handouts.
At the end we got to ask questions.
Once the public defense was done Sara stayed behind for another hour of questions. After that, her committee voted though we weren’t there for that part.
Sara K, whom you might know from her regular comments on this blog, is almost Dr. Sara K. She’s spent the last few years working toward a PhD, and I’m in Minneapolis to see her defense.
After navigating myself from the airport to my AirBnB, (thanks light rail!) I used the app on my phone to find a Nice Ride. Those would be the bike share bikes in the Twin Cities.
There was a bank of bikes not far from my place, and I rode about 25 minutes to Lake Nokomis, where I locked up my bike at another station. Easy as pie!
One thing I enjoyed about Lake Nokomis, was that they had seperate paths for walkers and bikes. The path in the foreground is for walkers; the one in the back is for bikes. Very smart, Minneapolis!
While it was full-on warm spring in Portland, it was still early spring in the North Star State. I would call what I experienced mid-to-late-March weather.
A variety of Sara’s relatives (and Sara herself, plus Shawn) arrived and we ate and chatted.
Shawn and Sara gave me a ride back to my place, which was also nice, as I was not wearing a mid-to-late March coat and I was a bit chilled when the sun was going down.
What a great start to my trip!
Kelly hosted the Oscar-viewing party and we had a good time (despite my disappointment with the Best Picture outcome.)
I prepared my Happiest Oscar Viewer game, and I was the second happiest Oscar viewer. Laurie beat me out, but also because she had two things listed for some categories.
Kelly prepared a BINGO sheet, but nothing shook down in a way that caused any of us to win. If only one person had told their kids to go to bed! Or, if only I had looked more closely at my BINGO sheet instead of taking the one on the top.
The night of the Academy Awards remains my favorite annual TV event. I learned that when there is no host, things clip along. And also it’s awkward at the very end when there isn’t an official person to see us off the air.
