I have this theory that if you keep moving fast enough, your body will be so charged with trying to keep up with your speed of thought that there’s no room left for jet lag, or any kind of lag. I know, that’s like a totally unscientific theory, but I do find that no matter what time I land in any time zone or how long it took me to get there, so long as I go to sleep by 11pm the first night and get up by 6:30 the next day, my body will think I never left California.

Anyway, the last leg of my May Is For Family trip took me to San Francisco for my niece Z’s college graduation. It’s rather weird for me to write that because I still see her as a two-year-old, even when I’m looking at her 21-year-old face. Time waits for no one and before you know it, two decades have passed. Life happens so fast that I can only mark it by the height of my nieces and nephews. But more about Z in the next entry.

I’ve been to SF a million times and each time I tell myself I should move there because the climate is more suitable for Chanel tweeds. And then the rain or fog would set in and I go running back to sunny LA. That’s what air con is for, I tell myself. On this trip, I had just one morning to get in some loitering…

At Hermes I was shown samples of sweaters I could special order in my favorite scarf print:

I was told it would take six months to receive my top so I decided to wait to put in the order at my local boutique instead. And then it was time for the big event…

We all met up for an early dinner at the venue so we wouldn’t be late to the ceremony. If you’re from California you would not be surprised to see graduates wearing orchid leis over their robes:

My sweet Z standing with her sister M in front of her senior thesis:

I watched M running around vying for her big sister’s attention and teared up a little inside. Siblings are be the best gift your parents will ever give you. Well, most of the time this is true :D!

This was a very relaxed and enjoyable ceremony; more circumstance than pomp. But it’s a small department so they were able to pull together a very intimate celebration ahead of the graduation ceremony for the entire school the next day:

Once the diplomas were handed out, each graduate was given an award depending on class votes. I was so sure Z would win the “Most Fashionable” award but she ended up with “Most Likely To Become Famous” instead: