One of the many great things about May is the college graduation season. We are on the receiving end of a tidal wave of reports regarding the great, and the not so great, commencement speeches.
The great commencement speeches include the famous Steve Jobs’ 2005 “Stay Hungary Stay Foolish address at Stanford University; movie producer and director Jerry Zucker’s My Five Rules speech at the University of Wisconsin in 2003; and then there was Navy Seal Adm. William H. McRaven’s inspirational address at the University of Texas at Austin in 2014. They were all magnificent in their own way.
Let us not forget the famous — or infamous — Kurt Vonnegut talk at the 1997 commencement at MIT. At the time it was considered by some to be one of the greatest commencement speeches that was never delivered.
Because these words are now such an important part of our “pop” culture, I want to share them with those of you who never had the pleasure of reading them when they first appeared. For those of you who did read it, let this serve as a reminder of an important eternal truth: you that everything you read on the Internet is not true,
At the end, I will share the rest of the story, for those who do not remember.
Here is the text in its entirety.
Ladies and gentlemen of the class of ’97:
Wear sunscreen.
If I could offer you only one tip for the future, sunscreen would be it. The long-term benefits of sunscreen have been proved by scientists, whereas the rest of my advice has no basis more reliable than my own meandering experience. I will dispense this advice now.
Enjoy the power and beauty of your youth. Oh, never mind. You will not understand the power and beauty of your youth until they’ve faded. But trust me, in 20 years, you’ll look back at photos of yourself and recall in a way you can’t grasp now how much possibility lay before you and how fabulous you really looked. You are not as fat as you imagine.
Don’t worry about the future. Or worry, but know that worrying is as effective as trying to solve an algebra equation by chewing bubble gum. The real troubles in your life are apt to be things that never crossed your worried mind, the kind that blindside you at 4 pm on some idle Tuesday.
Do one thing every day that scares you.
Sing.
Don’t be reckless with other people’s hearts. Don’t put up with people who are reckless with yours.
Floss.
Don’t waste your time on jealousy. Sometimes you’re ahead, sometimes you’re behind.
The race is long and, in the end, it’s only with yourself.
Remember compliments you receive. Forget the insults. If you succeed in doing this, tell me how.
Keep your old love letters. Throw away your old bank statements.
Stretch.
Don’t feel guilty if you don’t know what you want to do with your life. The most interesting people I know didn’t know at 22 what they wanted to do with their lives.
Some of the most interesting 40-year-olds I know still don’t.
Get plenty of calcium. Be kind to your knees. You’ll miss them when they’re gone.
Maybe you’ll marry, maybe you won’t. Maybe you’ll have children, maybe you won’t. Maybe you’ll divorce at 40, maybe you’ll dance the funky chicken on your 75th wedding anniversary. Whatever you do, don’t congratulate yourself too much, or berate yourself either. Your choices are half chance. So are everybody else’s.
Enjoy your body. Use it every way you can. Don’t be afraid of it or of what other people think of it. It’s the greatest instrument you’ll ever own.
Dance, even if you have nowhere to do it but your living room.
Read the directions, even if you don’t follow them.
Do not read beauty magazines. They will only make you feel ugly.
Get to know your parents. You never know when they’ll be gone for good. Be nice to your siblings. They’re your best link to your past and the people most likely to stick with you in the future.
Understand that friends come and go, but with a precious few you should hold on. Work hard to bridge the gaps in geography and lifestyle, because the older you get, the more you need the people who knew you when you were young.
Live in New York City once, but leave before it makes you hard. Live in Northern California once, but leave before it makes you soft.
Travel.
Accept certain inalienable truths: Prices will rise. Politicians will philander. You, too, will get old. And when you do, you’ll fantasize that when you were young, prices were reasonable, politicians were noble, and children respected their elders.
Respect your elders.
Don’t expect anyone else to support you. Maybe you have a trust fund. Maybe you’ll have a wealthy spouse. But you never know when either one might run out.
Don’t mess too much with your hair or by the time you’re 40 it will look 85.
Be careful whose advice you buy, but be patient with those who supply it. Advice is a form of nostalgia. Dispensing it is a way of fishing the past from the disposal, wiping it off, painting over the ugly parts and recycling it for more than it’s worth.
But trust me on the sunscreen.
Bravo. What a great talk/essay.
Now here is the back story.
“These words really came not from the distinguished Mr. Vonnegut but from a column written by Mary Schmich for the Chicago Tribune
about a speech she would have liked to give to a graduating class. It includes this famous line: “If I could offer you only one tip for the future, sunscreen would be it.”
Somebody decided to post it on the Internet as the MIT address Vonnegut gave at MIT and it became an urban legend.
In reality, MIT’s commencement speaker in 1997 was Kofi Annan. Mr. Vonnegut had never been a commencement speaker there.
Despite a follow-up article by Schmich on August 3, 1997, the story became so widespread that Vonnegut’s lawyer began receiving requests to reprint the speech. Vonnegut commented that he would have been proud had the words been his, according to Wikipedia.