My Ten Year High School Reunion

My Ten Year High School Reunion

• 7.18.2013

also known as: 

the weekend I spent three days in California sans husband and children.

All this hype leading up to my ten year high school reunion last weekend brought back so memories and feelings to the surface I'd long since forgotten!

One afternoon as I swept the floor, my mind suddenly became so cluttered with thoughts about my childhood that I stopped what I was doing to climb into the attic to retrieve an old black and red box.  I opened the lid to find the box stuffed to the brim with memories: pictures from high school and college, nick-knacks, and notes.

The notes were the best part.  There's at least a hundred of them from various friends (and one particular boyfriend) all folded nicely into triangles and hearts and little squares with a pull tab.  Nobody does that anymore; technology has taken over.  Better yet, many of these notes are at least a page long!  I stayed up late one night reading them, completely taken back to another time.  I winced at our awkwardness, laughed at our silly banter, and glowed in the memory of those long-forgotten friendships.  Our needs and insecurities were so transparent.  Why couldn't I see it then?  High school was awful, but it was also really really fun.  If I could be seventeen again for a week, I'd jump at it!  If only I knew then what I know now.

Posing outside.  If that sign doesn't take you back ten years, I don't know what will!

Nicole and Chelsea looking fabulous in black cocktail dresses

Tiffany, Carol, Kelsey, and Kelly

Michelle and Me

Kindall, Ashley, and Lauren

Nathalie and Jen with their husbands

I may have had a small anxiety attack on the elevator up to the floor of the RBHS Class of 2003 reunion.  Luckily, I was greeted with equally nervous old friends and lots and lots of smiles.  It floored me to suddenly see so many familiar faces!  Honestly, it was weird.  I had an easy time recognizing the girls; they're just mature versions of their high school selves.  I wouldn't say they even looked any older!  Haha  The guys, however, well some of them have put on weight and have grown facial hair.  I felt like an idiot staring at them trying to figure out who was who.  Thank goodness for name tags!

But that's when we starting talking and talking and talking.  I had so much fun catching up with everyone that I forgot to eat!  The reunion felt so surreal.  It was good hearing what people are up to, that they're mostly happy.  Some are highly educated, some have families, some are still single, some live on the other side of the country--it was all expected.  What I didn't expect, however, was for everyone to be exactly as I remember them: the way we talk, laugh, interact--essentially nothing has changed.  I think that's what was so cool.

I came away with a feeling of love, just plain love for people.  There is something about growing up together, being goofy teenagers together--the free time, the same classes and homework, getting into trouble, the sports and dances--that binds people together.  It's a unique comradery.  I just wish the other three quarters of the class showed up!

Till next time, RB!