1) everybody is growing old at the same time and at exactly the same rate as you are, and as i am. this includes james franco.

2) take photographs of women in floral dresses, men in linen. some will ask, some won’t, but they’re in the background, like it or not, and you can’t ask them all to move.

3) rachel maddow will not give a stirring commencement address, straying from her topic to talk about jack abramoff midway through, and it will get cloudy near the end, which you shouldn’t confuse for a bad omen, and james franco will get up and leave before people start clapping.

4) at these things, it is customary to drink more coffee than you can without making your teeth look yellow in all the pictures.

5) when a famous person videotapes you, your life becomes divided into those moments james franco’s camera is recording you and all other moments. this, in itself, isn’t good or bad: it only becomes pathetic when you try to ascribe meaning to either category.

6) when considering for whom a graduation- any graduation- is really meant, remember that it is literally impossible for humans to possess time.

7) while james franco videotapes you, it is customary to appear to be waiting, impatiently.

8 ) a bag of block candy, one quarter pound, in the left pocket of your suit coat, will make you of greater value to your young cousins, provided you are generous and not hungry (see item 9).

9) eat nothing but block candy all day.

10) when considering the party sitting directly behind james franco, it is important that you remember that they might not actually be thinking of their disappointed childhood ambitions, but that you definitely and for sure just thought those words, “disappointed childhood ambitions,” and that to a psychotherapist this would be meaningful or at least a pleasant distraction.

11) it is important that you do not run out of block candy or money.

12) fight the urge, while taking a quick photograph of your parents with your aunt and uncle, to point the camera at james franco, who is videotaping you as you take this quick photograph.

12a) also resist the temptation to speculate about the reason why james franco would videotape your taking of your family’s photograph over the thousands of other photographs being taken simultaneously.

12b) concede to the possibility that james franco’s camera was not on.

12c) discourage your younger cousins for asking for james franco’s autograph. if you need block candy for this, you have failed.

13) exit without being photographed. at all.