This is the weekend of my 20th high school reunion. Unfortunately I was unable to make the trip back to my little hometown in upstate New York to join in the festivities. From what I understand there is a weekend full of opportunities for long ago friends to catch up on where their lives have taken them and I am a bit disappointed that I was unable to join in the fun. As I sat here this afternoon looking at some of the pictures that are starting to make their way on FaceBook, I find myself squinting at faces and wracking my brain to place names with faces.
Everyone is an adult now!!!
For twenty years my memories of my graduating class were as we were as teenagers. Now I look at these grown up versions of everyone and it strikes me just how much can happen in twenty years' time. I know I for one have gone through several careers, earned two college degrees, gotten married, had two wonderful little boys, bought four cars and moved to three different states. And it seems like only yesterday that I crossed that stage in the hockey rink/communtiy center/war memorial building and accepted my high school diploma!
Now I watch my own son go off to his little "nerd school" as we affectionately call his summer enrichment program and have begun to plan for his future.
Every one always say that they want more for their children than they had. I am no different. I never made it to Cornell like I spent years dreaming for so now I have a new dream- my son will attend Virginia Tech and become a world class building engineer! OK, maybe I need to give him a little say in this but I figure if I start planting the seeds now....
My youngest child informed me yesterday in no uncertain terms that he will one day drive a police car and be a police man just like Daddy. He even wants to work at night like his father. This is not the first time he has told me this and from what I understand my husband made up his mind for a life of civil service as soon as he could vocalize the words so I am prepared for at least one of my children to follow in daddy's bootsteps.
When I was five like my own baby I wanted to be a grade school teacher. When I was thirteen I wanted to be a pediatric hematologist oncologist (yes, I was that specific!). When I graduated high school twenty years ago, I never wanted to get married, I did not want children and I was going to cure childhood leukemia. By my senior year of college I thought forensic science was pretty cool and went on to get my MS in that so I could finally solve the Jon Benet Ramsey case. Then I met this guy who wanted to be a cop who I didn't really like but agreed to go out with just once so he would leave me alone. Three years later we were married and thinking about a family. Someone offered me the chance to teach a chemistry class and I thought "Why not?"
A few years later we decided we had had enough of the cold New England winters and now we are "Beach People"!
I wonder how many of my fellow classmates, who were so certain of their future paths on the day we said goodbye to old GRB for the last time have found themselves in some distant land or a different part of the country doing something they love so different from what they thought they loved? That's what I will miss the most this weekend is hearing everyone's stories.
I did not love high school- I will not even try to lie about that. I was awkward in social situations, lacked self confidence and was not at all athletic or even the least bit coordinated. I got picked on terribly on the school bus and didn't date much. I skipped the ten year reunion and resisted joining Facebook for years because I was pretty certain that no one was interested in what had become of me.
I was still viewing things through the eyes of a teenager.
As a much older adult now I see things differently. I wonder if we weren't all a bit awkward socially. As a high school teacher I have learned that teenagers are nasty to each other as a general rule- it must be all those raging hormones- so I realize now that I was probably not the only one getting picked on on the school bus. As I finally gave in to the social networking craze a couple of years ago, friend requests starting popping up daily and I realized that more than one or two people might actually have remembered me. I am far more confident and happy with myself in my thirties than I ever imagined I could be in my teens or even my twenties. I have found all these hidden talents I didn't know I had, I have some of the best friends anyone could ever be lucky enough to know and I have one heck of a great life going on here.
So, I wish just the tiniest bit that I was able to make it to the reunion this year. There are so many people that I would like to talk to, to find out what paths their lives have taken them on and to hear all the wonderful things they have accomplished. I hope that you all have a terrific time getting reaquainted in ways that social networking doesn't allow for- with face to face conversations, a little bit of "remember whens" and a whole lot of fun, well-wishing and congratulating.
Twenty years is both a long time and a mere drop in the bucket of time. As we graduated from high school twenty years ago, the valedictorian and salutatorian gave speeches about the great things we were off to accomplish and the opportunities available to us and we all sat in our chairs, fidgeting with anticipation just waiting to get out of there and on with our lives. I hope that each and every one of my classmates has found their lives to be full of blessings and love and great things. I promise that I will do my very best to make the next reunion- 25 years maybe?
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