Reunion

It's been forty years since I graduated from high school ... was graduated? ... what ever. About 60 of us from our class of 200 got back together this weekend. I'd not communicated with most of these people in the five years since our 35th reunion back in 2003. It was good to see everyone again. The image at the right is me (in white) with three guys from the old neighborhood.

Lots of water under my bridge since the last get together: engaged, married, and most recently learning that we'll be transferred from near London to Houston, TX in August. No one else I talked with had been through that sort of turmoil.

I'm pretty sure that I've travelled more and lived in more places than everyone else that was there. I didn't keep strict track, but most folks had not left the area. Several still lived in town, most at least lived in the state, a few were living else where in US. Of course, the reunion attracted those closest to town, so the survey is hardly scientific for the whole class.

Still, when I compared my last 40 years to most of theirs, I found I was out on the far tail end of the normal curve. On average since leaving home in 1968, I've moved house 11 times -- every 3-4 years: (1-2) Galesburg, IL for college (dorm/frat house and apartment when I got married); (3) DeKalb, IL (Rochelle, actually) for grad school; (4-5) New Orleans for my first job (two different apartments); followed by transfers to (6) California; (7) Tulsa (bought first house); (8-9) California again (two more places); (10) UK; and now (11) Houston. UK may have been longest stint in any one place - 6 years almost exactly.

Things get really complicated if you figure that for five years when I say I was in California (2nd time), I actually rotated to Kazakhstan every other month. I'm not sure whether to count that as living in California or living in Kazakhstan. I spent more days in KZ than in US those five years, that's for sure. Do you count each rotation as moving house? I guess not, but maybe I should at least count KZ as a place I've lived.

But back to the reunion ...

I was pleasantly surprised to see how many people had married pretty much after high school and stayed married. Another place where I was outside the norm -- got the "married right out of high school" part but divorced and now remarried. Other common denominators were: grown kids (though quite a few people had kids still in college), grandkids (I missed the boat there too, so far), talking of retirement or already retired (lucky them), aging parents or parents who have already passed away. In fact a couple people had parents who had died within the few weeks preceeding the reunion.

Not too many of us talked about our own health problems -- except me who had just taken a header down a flight of steps two days before and damaged hand and foot. Husband of one of our classmates had intended to come, but had by-pass surgery within the last month and couldn't make it from Colorado. (Get better quick, Kenny.) The list of "those no longer with us" grew by a few names. I wish they'd stop talking about that. Print the names in the program if they want, but please don't make a deal about it. We're all going to be on the list eventually.

Toughest part for me was remembering names. WHY do people expect that you'll remember their names at these things? I can't remember what I had for dinner last night. (Same thing happened at my college reunion.) I guess everyone's got a better memory than I do. I was just so shocked and pleased at the number of people that went out of their way to come up and say 'hi' to me. Mike, Junior, Steve -- all guys I ran track with and all asked if I still high jumped. Right. Most all of us have gained weight, some of us a lot, but others look like they could go right out on the basketball court today. (Darn you, Lon. Get old. Will yah?)

It was also fun to see how personalities had changed -- or at least our perceptions of personalities. One of us had this rep in school of a tough tough kid who ran with a tough tough crowd. Now: mister personality, happy to see everyone, smiling, helping out where ever he could. Other guys that were pretty rough with me and were, frankly, real jerks (I thought) in school were just great to me at this gathering -- pleasant, smiling, interested in what I had to say (or pretended to be), and happy to tell me about their lives. It was pretty cool.

And now a word about my wife: nice job, sweetie. Took some great pictures. Didn't get freaked by not knowing one person there. Fit right in. And, oh, by the way, looked 15 years younger than all of us ... and she's not. You go, girl. (Here wearing pompoms as hair ornaments. OK, so we had a few cocktails.)