Can it possibly be 50 years?

50^th High School Reunion

“I wasn't very involved in school functions at La Habra High, and was happy to leave campus as soon as the 3 o'clock bell rang. In the 50 years since we've graduated, I've learned some things that make going to our 50^th reunion an important thing to do...”

Bernie Haraldson

I'm going to my 50^th High School Reunion this weekend. I have every sort of ambivalence imaginable, but I'm going because there is something important about it that I can't quite name. I have not kept in touch with classmates. I see their posts on Facebook, and know sooner or later when someone has died, but we haven't reconnected otherwise. There were good friends in my class—people I truly cared about. But after graduation, we simply dispersed in different directions. Some folks went to war and never returned. Some of us came home after college. Some never left home. Some of us, who had few good memories of High School, put it behind us and never looked back. I was one of those.

But here's the deal—I still dream about my classmates. After 50 years, they still pop up in my dreams! It's stunning. Many of them, I haven't spoken with since 1964, but there they are, characters in my sleep dramas. So I know there is not only unfinished business, but bonding of a nature that I didn't understand in High School, and want to understand now.

One item on the list of important things written by Bernie Haraldson for his 50th reunion is, “The High School you is not the real you. That was the pre-you. You're still a work in progress.” That rings very true to me. In High School, I was morbidly shy; to the point that giving a book report or reciting in front of the class gave me full blown panic attacks. I'm not that me any more, thank God.

It also holds that my classmates are not their High School selves either. Our days of preening, and trash talk, and putting one another down for fun are way behind us. Now we're senior citizens, we're grandparents, we're retirees—who are we going to impress? Peer pressure to be “cool” is long gone. Now we can relax and just be people who know each other well, who have a shared history, and shared memories of when we were young and crazy. This is a milestone, and I'm looking forward to it.

                                                      In the Spirit,

                                                             Jane