I can count on one hand how many graduation invitations I have received this year. I miss them, too. I might be one of a few people who do this, but I save them as well as Christmas cards but like I said, I might be the only one. Because I’m old school I guess, I’m more inclined to respond to something I receive in the mail. I appreciate the effort to make sure that I received a personal invitation.
I can tell you that I have seen multiple posts on Facebook with graduates’ Cash App handles. Okay. (For those of you who may not know, Cash App is an app that allows people to send money electronically.)
Parents, if you are going to post such information, will you please make sure that your graduate acknowledges Cash App gifts? I Cash Apped (is that the lingo?) a young man for his graduation and he replied with a ♥️. I was glad because I had never sent him anything before and I appreciated the confirmation. Sending a check or other gift works the same way: I’d like to know that you received it rather than waiting for the bank to inform me that it’s been cashed.
Parents, please teach your children the importance of saying thank you. I’m not talking about a printed thank you card made for everyone. I’m talking about an old-fashioned thank you card that’s blank inside where you actually write how thankful you were to receive the gift and how you will use it.
I’ve said this before: if I’ve taken the time to send the graduate a gift, shouldn’t you (preferably them) take the time to appropriately thank me? I don’t do things to be thanked, but thanking people for thinking of you is just the right thing to do. This is something that must be taught. Cash App is cool, but I’m afraid it’s yet another mechanism to make us lazy. I get that it’s expensive to get the invitations made, but since y’all celebrate every dang milestone to the utmost from kindergarten “graduation” to eighth grade “graduation” you can save a little in your budgets for invitations for the “big” graduation, right?
The act of sending handwritten notes should continue throughout life: when you apply for a job, when someone does something nice for you, or just because you were thinking of someone.
I realize that this might be an unpopular opinion, but so be it. It was your choice to keep reading. 😏
Up next (probably): to the graduates, now that you’ve graduated, what’s next?
ksmithsays 