Hello My Name Is

This past weekend was J's 10 year, high school reunion.


He had debated during the previous few weeks if he wanted to go or not. It's one of those things we've probably all faced at one time or another.

The mixed feelings. You want to go so you can see a handful of old friends, yet at the same time you could care less about the rest of the people there.

I'm not being mean. Honestly.

Think about a get together, an office party, or any other social event. There were probably one or two people who you could have done without seeing.

So we went to J's hometown for the "big event". We passed on Friday's dinner because we wouldn't have gotten into town in time. Saturday afternoon there was a picnic, and J didn't really want to attend. It rained anyway, so they had the picnic inside. We don't think that we missed much.

J ended up getting together around 2:00 p.m. on Saturday to play basketball with some of the guys. That was one thing he didn't want to miss. I'm glad he didn't, because he got to see some of his old friends that use to play basketball and baseball together when they were growing up, and also in high school.

Where was I during this? With my wonderful mother-in-law, shopping of course! Actually she was shopping, I was just helping her out. I'm good at that.

Later that evening J and I went to dinner at the country club in town. That was the last "event" for the reunion. I met a lot of his old friends and saw a few people I originally met at our wedding back in 2003.

Everything went well until the organizers for the reunion decided to show a slide show of pictures.

You probably know what happened next.

We watched about 20 minutes of pictures that showed the same people over and over again, except they were in different clothes and poses. It was ridiculous, a bit boring, and much too long.


You know what I'm talking about. The groups of people who always got their pictures posted in the yearbook, almost on every page. They weren't any more involved in school events than you or I were, but they just so happened to be friends with the people working on the yearbook. Sadly, it's not about what you know, it's who you know.

After the slide show, it was like everyone was back in high school all over again. The funny thing is that I didn't even go to J's school and it felt that way to me as well! The girls and guys reverted to their old cliques. They formed their little groups at tables, or standing and talking, it didn't matter.

It was interesting for me to see this happen from the sidelines. As humans, we can be quite shallow some of the time. It's sad, but true.

I'll admit, in my high school I wasn't in the popular group. I wasn't a geek or unpopular either. I did however have a large variety of friends. Some were involved in theater, band, auto shop, etc., while others were skaters, jocks, preppy, or punk.

I liked having friends and acquaintances in different groups. The best thing was that I was not bound by a standard or title. I was my own person who didn't want to be labeled.

I figure that my 10 year reunion will be similar to J's, if I actually attend. Aren't they all pretty much the same? Everyone gets nervous about seeing old friends, and then in the end it wasn't a big deal at all. You only remember the people who really care about you, the ones who are true and honest.

J and I are glad that we were able to sit down to visit and really catch up with people. That's what made it worth going. Sharing some old memories, talking about new ones and the things to come.

Here are some parting words of wisdom.

"Never go to your high school reunion pregnant or they will think that is all you have done since you graduated." - Erma Bombeck


“There's a big world out there. Bigger than prom, bigger than high school, and it won't matter if you were the prom queen or the quarterback of the football team or the biggest nerd. Find out who you are and try not to be afraid of it.” - Unknown