Gerry Regep: Borrowed keys: We graduate thanks to the grace of others

Editor’s note: The following speech was delivered during the May 9 graduation ceremony for the Indiana University Maurer School of Law.

Good afternoon! Thank you, Dean Ochoa, faculty and staff, fellow graduates, friends, families, and everyone here to celebrate the Class of 2026.

Before I get started, I promise to avoid a couple commencement cliches. First, I will not say that the “best days are ahead of us.” In fact, they might be behind us. Second, I will not quote any legal philosophers or try to impress you with the breadth of my knowledge about the law. But just know: I’d really like to.

What I will do is share a few stories. I’ll tell you about a song by the Talking Heads, a group of friends playing a card game and a borrowed pair of keys.

In 1981, the Talking Heads released the song “Once in a Lifetime.” If you don’t know the song, it’s about people who follow the path — earn the degree, get the job, build the life — and, after letting the days go by, snap awake and ask, “How did I get here?”

Good question, David Byrne. Here’s my attempt at an answer: Law school is like friends playing a card game.

It’s a winter night, and a group of friends gather to play a game of Uno. It’s intense: Everyone wants to win. A conflict breaks out over whether you can play a Draw 4 on another Draw 4. A debate ensues. Alliances form. Someone starts referencing the Geneva Convention.

There’s the Peacemaker: “Can’t we all just get along?” Mr. Checked Out, who stopped caring three rounds ago and just wants to go home. And finally, there’s the Keeper of the Rules — the one who takes the game a little too seriously and files a formal objection every time someone forgets to say “Uno.”

If you’re looking around right now trying to figure out which of your friends that last one is, I hate to break it to you. But it’s you. It was always you. The truth, however, is that every law student is a strange, slightly neurotic and beautiful mixture of all three.

Law school, it turns out, is not so different. It does something to you — or perhaps brings something out of you that was there all along.

There’s the intrusive thoughts. Classmate gets a job you wanted? I don’t know what they see in him. I’ve memorized the Constitution!

You spend weeks on a cover letter. Hit send. Radio silence. Three weeks later, a form rejection from an employer you forgot you applied to shows up in your inbox. Enter intrusive thought #2: If they won’t hire me, then it’s time to take drastic measures — forehead tattoo. Two words: “HIRE” — in Times New Roman — “ME” — in Century Schoolbook.” That shows creativity, commitment and attention to detail.

Then there’s the interview questions: “Why do you want to work for us?” The answer is simple: You responded.

And no law school description would be complete without reminding everyone that the Hoosiers won the College Football National Championship. That night, many of us found ourselves on Kirkwood Avenue, among thousands of fans scaling trees and burning couches. Two thoughts went through our minds: 1) I am so proud to be a Hoosier; and 2) it is absolutely time to go home.

But somewhere between intrusive thoughts and board games, life intervened. I once asked an attorney the hardest part about this profession. He responded: “Not letting it consume you.” I didn’t understand what he meant then. I do now, I think. Time will tell.

In the fall of 1L, I lost a hometown friend. We hadn’t spoken in years. I didn’t make it back for the funeral. That decision stayed with me. In the spring, just before finals, I lost another friend. At that time, I was juggling classes, extracurricular activities and that ever-present voice in the back of any law student’s head that says, “You’re not doing enough.”

A friend, a member of this class, handed me his keys and told me to go. When I returned, I had something I didn’t have before: peace. I don’t remember those finals. But I’ll always remember that friend. Although law school has taught us how to think like a lawyer, I think some of the deeper lessons have been about learning to live like a person.

I suspect all of us have a version of this story. Maybe someone offered you presence or grace when you didn’t deserve it; a friend made a challenging assignment bearable; or a parent gave you financial support when they couldn’t afford it. Small, easy-to-overlook moments — borrowed keys.

I can tell you about a classmate whose motto is simply “Be excellent to each other.” A CSO coordinator whose kindness carried our class. An admissions team that treats applicants like people. A professor who counseled a stressed-out 1L in the middle of the night, and another who ended a semester’s worth of privacy law with two words: “Spread. Joy.”

These stories aren’t exceptions. That’s Maurer. That’s just who we are.

There are families in this room — and those who could not attend — who rearranged their lives for us to be here. Some came from across the street. Others flew across the ocean. For some, no one in their family has earned this degree before. Others are here because their children or spouse carried the load while they studied. Some are witnessing a ceremony in a language they don’t fully understand, but they know what this day means.

And if the metaphor isn’t clear by now — to my classmates, the families, friends, faculty and staff in this room — allow me to be direct. Each of you were a borrowed key. All of you are the reason we are here.

One professor had a ritual before every cold call in Constitutional Law. He’d look out at the class and ask: “Who wants to play?”

I think he was telling us something about all of this. Not the Uno kind of game — where someone must lose and the joy is in winning. Something closer to what games were before we started keeping score. Where the joy is in the playing itself.

We spent our time here playing. Sometimes we forget. But we were always playing. And life has a strange way of reminding us: No one ever plays alone.

Now I return to the question I posed at the beginning — with one small edit.

Sorry, Talking Heads.

The question isn’t “How did I get here?” It’s “How did WE get here?”

The answer, as far as I can tell, is the same as it ever was.

We got here together.•

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Regep earned his J.D. from Indiana University Maurer School of Law in May 2026.