Thanks to this post, I can give you the transcript of the speech Grace gave on Jack and Bobby last night. It started off a little odd, but someone out there became a pretty good writer, because it's rather inspiring as you get on. For those of you who don't know, Jack and Bobby is a new show on the wB about two brothers, one of whom will be president (running independently of a party, go fig) in 2041. It's an interesting premise, and the guys in it are cute, so I watched it...and then I watched the second ep even though there were some weird things I'm not so keen on...I'll reserve final judgement until it gets farther on in the season. Until then...be inspired.

Grace addresses the students and faculty of her university at the Moonlight Address, which she has petitioned the new uni president to reinstate, to which he agrees only if she does the speech instead of him, as it had been done traditionally.

"Good Evening,
I would like to welcome all of you to a renaissance.
For some of you it marks the return to your college life, for some a new beginning.
So on the eve of the tremendous journey upon which you all are embarking, I would like to offer you a thought to take with you.
Okay listen carefully, you..will...fail here, all of you.
College is not the culmination of your high school career, It is a beginning of your adult life.
Only it's a slow sweet beginning.
It feels nothing like what life and all its attending obligations will eventually bring.
So Fail here.
Be bad at things.
Be Embarrassed.
Be Afraid.
Be Vulnerable.
Go out on a limb or 2 or 12, and you will fall and it will hurt.
But the harder you fall the farther you will rise.
The louder you fail the clearer your future becomes.
Failure is a Gift.
Welcome it.
There are people who spend their whole lives wondering how they became the people they became.
How certain chances passed them by, why they didn't take the road less traveled.
Those people are not you.
You have a front row seats to your own transformation, and in transforming yourself, you might even transform the world.
And it will be electric, and I promise you it will be terrifying.
Embrace that, embrace the new person you're becoming.
This is your moment.
I promise you it is now, now not 2 minutes from now, not tomorrow, but really now.
Own that, know that deep in your bones. And go to sleep every night knowing that, wake up every morning remembering that.
And then...
Keep going...
Keep going."

And the title of this entry comes from the song by John Hiatt which played at the end of the ep when they chronicled Bobby's unsuccessful run for the Republican (!) nomination and his subsequent turn to the Independent ticket. It's a good song. Thank goodness iTunes has it. I need an iPod.