A poem, a first hit, a painted parking spot: Merrimack Valley’s class of 2026 graduates with plenty of memories

When he looks back on high school, Andover’s Nathan Bain will remember the evening during freshman year when he finally built up the courage to ask out his now-girlfriend, fellow graduate Tessa Lynch. (Bain recited a poem, and Lynch “squealed and ran around in circles.”)

Lorenzo Guzman, also of Andover, will remember two milestones: driving himself to school for the first time as a sophomore in his mother’s Nissan Rogue, and getting his first varsity hit a year later, a line-drive single.

And Rutger Gilliland, of Loudon, will remember Saturday morning, when he and 162 of his classmates threw their navy blue caps in the air as the newest graduates of Merrimack Valley High School.

“It’s a surreal feeling seeing everyone at one place at once that I’ve seen over the last four years or 12 years,” said Gilliland, who has been in the district since kindergarten.

Those years have been marked by moments both idiosyncratically personal and universally shared.

Addressing his class on his birthday, class president Nicholas Gelinas recalled parking spot painting day (“Some spots looked amazing, and some looked like they were painted at 7:40 on the first day of school”), senior sunrise (the number of people who showed up at 5:45 a.m. was “probably our class’s most amazing accomplishment”), and the petting zoo unveiled for the class’s senior prank, which featured both the highly pettable (dogs and cats) and the slightly less so (20 goldfish).

Now the class will disperse to pursue their individual journeys.

Carter Garland, of Boscawen, will head to the University of Oregon to study biochemistry, in hopes of ultimately working on pharmaceuticals that can help people.

Bode Wood, of Boscawen, will enlist in the U.S. Marines before hopefully becoming a state police officer.

Some students, meanwhile, are still charting their next move, a period of transition and reconsideration that graduation speaker Lily Moser endorsed.

“With new life experiences and opportunities, sometimes new paths are discovered,” said Moser, who used to want to be a veterinarian. “You can’t always know where you want to go until you know that option exists.”

No matter how far they travel from Merrimack Valley, special education teacher and coach Robert Mullen, in his 36th and final graduation, reminded the students that they will always have a community in the Valley to fall back on.

“No matter where your path takes you, or how far you are from here,” Mullen said, “I hope that you can look back and continue to feel the support from all of those who have helped you to get to where you are today.”