Several weeks ago when Dean Sage asked me if I would like to give this commencement address I readily agreed to do so. I thought giving the address would be a fun thing to do. What I didn't really count on was how hard it would be to write such an address. Perhaps this is why so many of the commencement addresses I've heard are informal extemporaneous talks.

My own graduation with my B.S. was 25 years ago ... My Ph.D. some 22 years ago. Needless to say I haven't a clue as to what those commencement addresses were about or, indeed, who even gave the talks. I did tape record the one from my Ph.D., however, because I had just bought a new cassette tape recorder. I never again listened to the tape, but taping it seemed like a very good idea at the time. I suppose the lesson is that I can relax about this talk since whatever I say you are unlikely to remember it for any significant amount of time.

Some of you may read the comic strip "Shoe". Those of you that do will know that the " Perfessor"-the big, old, rotund bird who is a feature writer for the Shoe's newspaper has been invited as the commencement speaker at the graduation ceremony for his nephew, Skylar. A week or two ago, Skylar volunteered the following sound advice to the "Perfessor": "Draw upon your vast experience about life and give us the benefit of your wisdom about the meaning of life ... and keep it to about 4 1/2 minutes!" This seems like good advice to me, so I will endeavor to follow all of it.

I would like to share a few thoughts on three themes: Passages, Caring, and Celebration.

While I was in college and graduate school, I often felt as if I were in a temporary holding state and when at last I graduated, I would finally get to start my life for real. I expect more than one of you will mark this event tonight and the one which takes place on Saturday as one of those rights of passage which will allow you to start life for real. Let me tell you that this is a passage, but I dare say it will be only the first of very many.Your life will change as you bid farewell to your college days, but you will experiencemany other passages. Life is an exciting event filled with meaning and, I guess in manyways, I am still waiting to start life for real.

I would like to share with you a passage of my own. Over the last 18 months or so my mother has been unable to live alone and so has moved in with my family. The home she left behind had been hers for some 50 years and was filled with the accumulation of a lifetime. My mother and father were young adults during the Depression and so seemed constitutionally unable to part with anything that might conceivably have even the slightest utility at some time in the future. So over the last 18 months, I have sorted out her possessions. What was truly striking, and to be honest,somewhat depressing, was how little value most of this stuff had. Here were the thingsmy parents worked so hard to accumulate, and in which, truthfully, most people includingme would see little value. That house is sold now and in the hands of a young couplebeginning their lives. Most of my parents' stuff is now either at a homeless shelter oranonymous landfill somewhere. The things I saved were not the things that were most expensive to begin with, but the little things: toys, furniture built by my father, school papers; the things which carried meaning. The things which evoked memories of the relationships of my childhood, my parents, my brother, my friends.

I am more and more convinced, having gone through many such evocative passages, that the things I value most are the warm, caring relationships I have with the people who have passed and are passing through my life. These things are eternal and the rest is like dust before the wind. These relationships are the things to value and so I strongly encourage you to measure your success in this life by the quality of care you give to those around you.

This brings me to the third theme- that of celebration. I want you to know that I am not here to celebrate the event of your graduation. I am here to celebrate you. All too often we focus on the event. But again, this event, these moments will soon pass. They are not the real stuff that we are here to celebrate. I celebrate your work, your effort, your cleverness even your indolence and your good fortune when the prof asked just the questions for which you knew the answer. It is you, all of you, who bring us here tonight. It is you and those who will follow you who will make this engineering school great. It is you and those who follow who will make George Mason University great. So it is you who I wish to celebrate.

We all read of and see the problems of the world around us and, perhaps, the lessons you learned in the courses of study you have now completed at this University will allow some of you to address these great problems. I hope you will carry one additional lesson with you. Our president, George Johnson, speaks of George Mason University being an internationally great University on a regional basis. That is, by servinglocal needs extremely well, the University will be internationally distinguished. Momentsago I urged you to measure your success by the quality of your caring. To most of youit will not be given to have an impact on a global scale. It is hard to care for people inthe abstract. Perhaps the last lesson to learn at George Mason is the one not taught in the classroom. By caring for the people around you extremely well, it may very well be given to you to have an impact on a global scale. But, value the people around you first, value them more than the things around you. I do hope you will understand the wisdom of this lifestyle.

And so with these thoughts, I bid you, the SITE Class of 1990, hail and farewell.