Water Under the Bridge - Post Reunion Blog

I started writing this blog as I sat on the plane traveling home from my 20^th High School Reunion.  I finished it 6 days later.  If you read my previous blog entry, then you know I went to this event with a great deal of apprehension.  The prospect of going home after twenty years and being thrown into a social situation with people with whom you first developed your social “self,” with whom you developed your life goals and dreams, with whom you shared all of the awkward and embarrassing moments of adolescence was terrifying.  It brought to surface all of my insecurities and doubts.  And then I wrote about them in a very public blog and asked people to read it.  It was, in a way, a defense mechanism.  Kind of like making fun of yourself before others can make fun of you.  It was cathartic and disarming and apparently not so unique.  The feedback I received both directly on the blog and later in person was overwhelming.   It turns out I was not alone in the feelings I had.

I hoped that the weekend would provide some great epiphany, or that some outrageous events would ensue to give me fodder for a full recap, or at least for a semi-cogent bookend to the prior entry.  But as I sit here in seat 5C, I don’t see them yet. I will say my brain is not working optimally at this moment as I am working on very little sleep and my liver is in a remotely familiar place trying to process out the alcohol which served its purpose as a social lubricant.  I think the best approach is to start with a play by play and see if as I write and recollect anything compelling percolates to the surface. (Click here if you want to read that more detailed trip report – some funny stuff here)

Is the 20^th high school reunion the great equalizer? Has enough water passed under the bridge?  Have wounds healed? Have crushes faded? Have we toughen up enough?  Have we softened up enough?  Have friendships that were based on ‘real’ things stood the test of time?  Have petty differences built on youthful ignorance faded away?  Have we had enough life experience to understand what is truly important?  After an extended highly scientific analysis I have determined that we can say with some confidence that for 97.43% of people the answer is YES. 

Below you will find a few random insights that I ended up taking away from the weekend.

5^th and 10^th year reunions are about sizing other people up.  It is still about me.  How do I stack up?  How do other people view me?  Will people see me as successful?  We still needed that external validation.  But now, with 20 years under our belts, I felt we were more concerned to find out how other people were doing.  We needed to know others were in a good place, happy and healthy.  We no longer needed or were looking for validation, we know where we are without anyone telling us.  We have made our mistakes, we have had our successes and we survived both.  We have had our own children and we have moved from being young parents to being parents of teens and preteens who we are trying to guide through their insecurities, rather than being concerned with our own.

I will openly admit I was concerned with my appearance.  I did put in the hours in the gym and I did get my hair cut (the little I have left) before the reunion.  Maybe I haven’t out grown my vanity.  I know I was not alone in wanting to see who had put on a few and we all sized up the spouses of our middle and high school crushes.  But let’s all also admit that there were some late bloomers who turned some heads when they walked though the doors.  We wanted to look good, but we didn’t need to be cool.  Maybe our concern for appearance is more stress over aging than it is about fitting in and looking cool. 

One thing I learned this weekend is that there is growing up and there is growing older.  We have all grown older, except for Billy Coulter and Meredith Meadow both of whom must have made some deal with the Devil or have possession of some high tech time machine that allowed them to turn up at the reunion looking like they just walked out of graduation.  We all have added a few pounds, wrinkles, and spouses.  Many of us have lost hair, jobs, and … spouses.  With every year gone we have gained life.  We are accumulating experiences both good and bad that we build upon. 

Growing up is different.  I don’t think everyone grows up.  I think we all know someone we wish would grow up and others that we are glad never seemed to.  Keeping a young outlook, staying spontaneous and playful are all the good parts of not “growing up”  or maybe I should call this staying young at heart.  I feel that teaching has -- on some level -- allowed me to stay young (though my aching back, knees and shoulders would disagree).  But refusing to take responsibility, living in the past and holding onto those youthfully ignorant perceptions, that is the bad kind of not growing up.

The other thing I was reminded of this weekend was that we don’t always know the affect we have on people.  I had more than one conversation over the weekend in which someone recounted a story -- that I hardly remembered -- where something I had done or said had affected them in a fairly big way.  To me at the time, it was no big deal (thus the vague memory).  And I am sure that some of my big deal moments in life barely registered for people who greatly affected me.  And while the recollections recounted to me this weekend were positive in nature, it makes me wonder about the times I hurt people and didn’t even know it.  I am glad to know that a moment of courtesy or kindness over 20 years ago was remembered.  I just hope that there were more of those moments than ones defined by callousness or insensitivity.  The lesson I take away is to always be kind and never discount how the small things can affect those around us -- even when we are not aware.

I wish the weekend would have provided me with something more provocative, something more insightful.  But from my personal experience, which is all I can confidently speak from, I will say that it was nice.  It was not terrible.  It was not scary (after the fact).  I had some great conversations with some great people.  It was wonderful to reconnect with old friends.  I really had regretted that I had lost contact with a few of my very good friends.

I love my life in Dallas, Texas, but I could still see myself living back in Columbia.  Could I go back home?  Do we ever leave?  I know I will always have a place where I belong there and part of me has never left.  But home?  Home is where my family is.  Home is now a small corner in west Plano, and I am happy to be landing soon to the hugs of my wife and kids. 

I wish I had a bit longer to visit, and I hope it will be less time before I return.  To my fellow classmates, the Spring Valley Vikings Class of 1990, I wish only Love, Peace and Happiness.  Cheers.

Three quick postscripts: 

1. A big kudos to Kelley, Ferris and everyone else who helped plan and pull off the reunion. THANK YOU!

2.  For a much more witty Post Reunion recaps visit the blogs of my very good friends The Other Kevin Ginsberg and Marty Simpson

3.  Please feel free to comment below.  I know that many of you are much better equipped than me to expound upon this weekend and what it meant.