Valedictorian Vinny Castle's 2015 graduation speech

Thank you all for coming here today. Will anyone with small children or sensitive hearing please cover their ears.

(Jim lash says runners to your mark, get set, bang)

I want to apologize right away for the vast use of symbolism, analogies, or allusions, along with many pop culture references and any inside jokes that we as a class are apart of. I will do my best to keep it appropriate and comprehensible for all: for example the symbolism behind the starter pistol has many different approaches. Some could look at is the start to the next chapter of our lives, others see it as life being just another race in which education is the practice that prepares us for that race. I for one do not see it as any of these things, I just thought it would be cool to shoot a gun off inside the school and not get in huge trouble for it. However when looking online to find ways to write a graduation speech nearly every template said the same thing "You need an introduction that will start out with a bang" and I thought what better way to start out with a bang than to actually start out with a bang and get everyone's attention. Some of you may have been extremely scared and that Is very understandable, but as far as scary things go could you imagine doing what I am doing right now? The number one fear amongst American adults is public speaking. Heights, drowning, snake bites, clowns and ghosts all rank under public speaking. People would rather die than speak in front of a large group. This is the reward Dakota and I receive for our years of hard work... this system seems kind of flawed but oh well. Anyway, many of you are probably ready for the heart warming, touchy feely type of stuff that I am known for but first I have a short story wrote by our very own Orrin Quinlan. Unfortunately due to time constraints I have had to summarize some parts.

RANDY BO BANDY

The Once Impossible Feats Made

Possible By Randy Bo Bandy

(Orrin starts off by shedding some light on the early life of Randy Bo Bandy, like he was born with a temperature of 200 degrees no arms, legs, or blood. He had a virgin mother, and a father with no reproductive organs and a second father who gave birth to him. His crying could be heard in the soundless vacuum of space where he played with the event horizon of black holes and bench pressed the sun. When he went to school Randy grew a pair of arms and legs and could lick his own elbows before knew it was unnatural. In school he learned how to spell his name without the letter N and counted to infinity twice. Randy wanted to be a vampire when he grew up, but he could bite his own neck so that would be a bad idea.)

In middle school, while skateboarding one day without a skateboard, Randy caught a level 80 pikachu with a regular pokeball, and taught it Italian. Randy never knew Italian. In high school, Randy was negative 7 feet tall, negative 288 pounds, and could run at negative the speed of light. Many expected him to play sports, but Randy was more intrigued in the chess club. He could get out of any checkmate, and still won the Heisman Trophy as a senior. He always knew what to say to girls. After high school, Randy had trouble finding out exactly what he wanted to do. He was kicked out of culinary school for uncracking eggs.

Then Randy became a doctor and cured HIV, genital herpes and Alzheimers but there was nothing else to cure so he lost his job and then became a politician. His greatest accomplishment was he legalized gay marriage in Georgia.

When he was 19 he took his first drink of water. It was later revealed that he swallowed Salt Lake. He didn't even get heartburn.

Orrin then tells us that Randy became homeless and would often times get bored. So he would steal the Lincoln Memorial, recite all the numbers in pi and slam revolving doors for fun. Randy also beats brick walls at tennis and is the touchdown king of hockey but his greatest achievement was finding a woman who was completely satisfied with her life. She took his breath away, which was odd, because Randy hadn't taken a breath in 38 years. He loved her with all his heart, and four other people's hearts as well. Two months after they moved in together, she died suddenly when Randy spontaneously combusted. Of all the eggs Randy could uncrack, all the firewood he could unburn, and all the words he could unsay, he could never unlove her. Consumed with tragedy, Randy Bo Bandy disappeared one day. Legend has it that he ate himself with his mouth glued shut... for dessert.

Thank you Orrin Quinlan for that well written masterpiece, (round of applause for Orrin?)

Although Randy Bo Bandy is a ridiculous and humorous story it can teach us that life itself is an absurdity that never quite makes sense. Randy teaches us not to be held down by the limitations of mankind and shoot for the stars. Randy Bo Bandy is the human version of the bumblebee.

Based off of the calculation method used for airplanes, bumble bees should not be able to fly. Yet the little bee gets its wings going like a turbo jet and flies to every plant its chubby little body can land on to collect all the nectar it can hold. Bumble bees are the most persistent creatures. They don't know they can't fly so they just keep buzzing around. Randy Bo Bandy doesn't know that his feats are impossible instead he just continues right along with life doing impossible things.

Unfortunately there is a common mistake in both the bumblebee myth and the story of Randy Bo Bandy. This mistake being that they both are not real. Obviously bees can fly but they do not fly like planes therefore calculations based on the plane method are misleading. In order to calculate bees ability to fly the effect of dynamic stall is used, dynamic stall is a really long subject that basically says that wings with varying pitch and oscillation behavior very differently from fixed wings like that of a plane.

Anyway, just yesterday Mr. Bradley Morrison told me something that really caught my attention. He said the more struggles you have to overcome only make for a better success story. No one cares if you do things you are supposed to, you are not going to ever be applauded for wiping your own butt. Its doing things that you should not be able to do that make people pay attention. When people are able to look at you and say "You shouldn't be here," that is truly great success. This has been said several times about our class already like: "You shouldn't be in the Ron Thon finals you are in 2A", "You shouldn't be playing college football next year, or college volleyball next year, you shouldn't have placed at state wrestling, or you shouldn't have been at the track classic," but because these people don't settle for mediocrity they have done these things. I have no doubt that it will continue to happen, someday you might hear "How are your paintings in the Louvre? How is it that I hear you on the radio every day? You are the greatest nurse on the planet. Wha... How did that happen?"

Class of 2015, here is the essence of what I am saying.

You can be the bee. Continue to strive for what others see as impossible and don't let anything hold you back from greatness.