We are approaching that time of year when many young people's thoughts are turning towards graduation, and their entry into the "real world" after high school.
Plans are underway for continuing education into universities, technical schools and trade schools. Some will choose apprenticeships or entry-level jobs with prospects for career enhancement.
Some will float for a bit. They may not have a clear idea yet of what they want to do with the rest of their lives, and in an increasingly rapidly changing world, it's not hard to sympathize with their indecision. Many of these young people will opt for a transition period, with perhaps some travel or other form of intermission - a few decades ago, it was commonly referred to as "going off to find yourself."
Whatever plans may or may not be formulating in those young minds as they approach the milestone, between then and now, most of them will celebrate.
Not many years ago, that celebration was almost certain to include consumption of alcohol - immodest quantities of alcohol, in fact - as if that were some sort of proof of coming of age. Grad parties - "grad drunks," they were often called - were held in a back corner of a woodsy park, in an abandoned gravel pit, at a lakeside retreat or in any secluded location with limited accessibility ... because the organizers and participants all knew that the gatherings were illegal, irresponsible and downright dangerous.
Grad drunks are still organized, some with complicity of some of the parents of kids involved, and they're still illegal, irresponsible and dangerous.
We dread the almost inevitable police press release during grad time detailing how one or more young lives were lost due to a momentary lapse of judgment fuelled by alcohol.
Thankfully, in recent decades, most such illicit gatherings have been replaced with alcohol-free celebrations: "dry grads." It's a way for young men and women to "bust out" at the end of their secondary school years without endangering their own or others' lives. And, you don't end up with a hangover to boot!
It's a much better way to mark the end of high school and a much better way to mark a new beginning.
And that's something all of us, even if we graduated decades ago, can get behind.
