2012 grads bid farewell to MCHS

“So I would like to take about 10 of them to say thank you,” said Resby, who has a wrestling scholarship to Truett-McConnell. “Thank you to my teachers for pulling me out to the side working with me one on one when they knew something was just not right or when I didn’t get something. One teacher that comes to mind right off the bat is Mrs. Melissa Yarbrough, who refused to give up on me.”

He also thanked all of his friends who kept him smiling, kept him out of trouble and gave him rides.

“Of course, there is my bro Andrew,” said Resby. “Also Mr. Justin ‘Cold Ankles’ Bishop — he is definitely the man. Even when his car blew up, he got another one, just so he could drive me around. I’d also like to give a quick thank you to the teachers I didn’t have – thanks for never giving me any homework. But seriously we at Madison county High school have a great staff.”

Resby said he plans to study criminal justice and to become a school resource officer.

“There are a lot of kids that are being tormented, picked on, or bullied in schools, and I’d like to do everything I can to help prevent this,” he said.

Resby urged his fellow classmates to serve as role models to kids who don’t have one.

“We can be that positive influence that kids need to be successful in life,” said Resby. “By taking time out of our days and mentoring kids, we can keep them motivated to go to school and to make something of their lives.”

Madison County salutatorian Julia Sims read the poem “The Way of the World,” which begins: “Laugh, and the world laughs with you, Weep, and you weep alone.”

“As we, the class of 2012, are about to leave here tonight and begin learning the ‘ways of the world,’ I thought it most appropriate to indulge my fellow classmates and all others present here tonight with a short poem from my youth so entitled ‘The Way of the World,’” said Sims.

Speaker Andrew McCannon remembered the first day of kindergarten and how everyone clinged to their mother’s legs.

“But, of course our mean mothers left us at that scary place and we sat down in our miniature kindergarten desks and began to play games and get to know each other,” said McCannon. “By the time we all went out to recess we had forgotten that our mothers even left us and we began to have a blast.”

McCannon said students are always looking ahead to the next thing, whether it’s getting lockers in middle school, or getting a driver’s license or graduating. He urged his fellow classmates not to just look ahead, but to take in every moment.

“I guess what I am trying to say is that we cannot always live your life for some distant goal,” said McCannon. “Yes, goals are important and they are necessary for each and every person because they drive you to achieve something but, sometimes if you focus too much on that one goal, you lose sight of making the most of each and every day and the days will slip through your hand like sand in an hourglass. So what I guess I leave you class of 2012 is this. On your journey to the rest of your life after tonight try to always look for the good in each and every day, because if you look hard enough you can always find it.”

Madison County principal Dr. Chad Stone took the podium after the student speakers and said the MCHS class of 2012 will always be special to him. Stone is leaving the school to take a middle school principal’s position in south Georgia closer to an ailing family member.

Each graduate had been given a rope Friday. And Stone explained why. He said that each rope is 13 years long, signifying kindergarten through twelfth grade.

He remembered the phrase, “when you get to the end of your rope, tie a knot and hold on.” And he urged the graduates, who are at the end of their grade school rope, to “tie a knot in the rope and hold on to every memory.”