Spring cleaning and I found these high school "diplomas" — brand new, never used.
…As for me I went to "Circus Magazine" and bought two diplomas for $30 from a classified ad so I could get a job. When I received them I felt like I had a ticket into the working world… but a day or two later I was too afraid to use them. I feared humiliation and being databased.
Some kids spend 12-years in school and get a "rubber-stamped" diploma just for showing up. Other kids put in the work and are upwardly pointed enough to go to college and become something. Ultra "brainy" kids "leap-frog" into college or by passing a G.E.D. exam. Show me a 10th grader that can pass a G.E.D. exam and I will show you an introvert that worked really hard in junior high.
I spent 13-years in school and didn't make it. I showed up when I was suppose to, save for 10th grade whereas I was so overwhelmed and disenfranchised I would force myself to show up 2-days a week. I told them at the end of year I would never come back… What went wrong? I was placed into catholic school after the third grade that did not have the patience nor the resources to educate me. Though I had a heroic single mom as my de facto parent, she was not educated herself. Consequently by the fourth-grade (two tries) everything was way over my head so instead of boredom I chose day-dreaming, drawing and looking out the window.
So where do misfits go who don't graduate high school or college? — Simple! — Trade schools, minimum wage hell, or the arts. I chose the arts and the best thing that came with that choice were like-minded individuals who were supportive, patient, motivated and intelligent.
One other thing about choosing art as a profession is that a diploma is secondary to a solid portfolio. This applies to fine art, design or even graphics.
Look what happened to this guy:
"... A self-taught artist, [He] began drawing at an early age on sheets of paper his father, an accountant, brought home from the office. As he delved deeper into his creative side, his mother strongly encouraged to pursue artistic talents.
[He] first attracted attention for his graffiti in New York City in the late 1970s, under the name "SAMO." Working with a close friend, he tagged subway trains and Manhattan buildings with cryptic aphorisms.
In 1977, [He] quit high school a year before he was slated to graduate. To make ends meet, he sold sweatshirts and postcards featuring his artwork on the streets of his native New York. .."
Hi name was Basquiat!
[Link]
Never to late start.