This may be the Year of the Snake for the Chinese, but for me it’s the Year of the Re-, as in re-assess, re-calibrate, re-boot, and this past weekend: reunion.
I didn’t go to the big soiree that reunited students from the first three classes of my high school’s history. From a practical perspective, accommodations and travel expenses, plus the time expenditure to make the 2340-mile round-trip, would have been disproportionate to the actual event. However, it really wasn't practicality that deterred me. It was reluctance to reacquaint myself with the long-forgotten teen-aged me.
I didn’t go to the big soiree that reunited students from the first three classes of my high school’s history. From a practical perspective, accommodations and travel expenses, plus the time expenditure to make the 2340-mile round-trip, would have been disproportionate to the actual event. However, it really wasn't practicality that deterred me. It was reluctance to reacquaint myself with the long-forgotten teen-aged me.
I was quite unworldly when I transferred into the large public high school from a small parochial school. My new classmates, whose shared history dated back to elementary school, initially perceived my social insecurities as snobbishness, and despite knowing a number of kids from my neighborhood or previous schools, I struggled to find where I fit in. I remember my high school contributions as 1) anonymously submitting an appallingly pithy poem about teenage angst to the school paper, and 2) being a swim timette (a role that did not enhance my social standing, but did allow me to wear very, very short shorts that my mother would not otherwise permit.) I graduated among the socially and academically anonymous middle of the 500+ students who comprised my class. Reflecting on those years of school-related experiences doesn’t generate a lot of inner warm fuzzies. I know I had friends, chased boys, and must have had fun, but I can’t recall specifics. What I do remember was feeling that I fell short of whatever was desirable, that I just wasn’t enough: cool enough, smart enough, pretty enough, witty enough, popular enough.
I likely wouldn’t have known about the reunion if I didn’t keep in touch with a dear friend from those years, who also happened to be part of the organizing committee. She had been active in choir, chorale, pep club, sports clubs, and student government; for her the event would be (and was) an exhilarating dance down a brightly lit memory lane full of long-ago friends. For me, however, the idea of mentally stepping back into that time kindled sparks of anxiety, as if the ghost of my teen-aged self was somehow a threat to the person I am now.
Such thinking is silly, of course. Who lives fifty-some odd years without experiencing the contrasts of highs and lows, successes and failures, joys and heartaches? I’m sure most of my former classmates – like me – have outgrown their teenage personas and found contentment in the lives they’re currently living. Ironically, the smiling faces in the Facebook party pictures could be people I see daily – in church, at work, in my social circles. They look like people I would enjoy chatting with.
So, if the opportunity presented itself again, and finances and distance were not challenges, would I go to a high school reunion? I don’t know. But I do know the ghost of my teen-years-past will not factor into the decision.
I likely wouldn’t have known about the reunion if I didn’t keep in touch with a dear friend from those years, who also happened to be part of the organizing committee. She had been active in choir, chorale, pep club, sports clubs, and student government; for her the event would be (and was) an exhilarating dance down a brightly lit memory lane full of long-ago friends. For me, however, the idea of mentally stepping back into that time kindled sparks of anxiety, as if the ghost of my teen-aged self was somehow a threat to the person I am now.
Such thinking is silly, of course. Who lives fifty-some odd years without experiencing the contrasts of highs and lows, successes and failures, joys and heartaches? I’m sure most of my former classmates – like me – have outgrown their teenage personas and found contentment in the lives they’re currently living. Ironically, the smiling faces in the Facebook party pictures could be people I see daily – in church, at work, in my social circles. They look like people I would enjoy chatting with.
So, if the opportunity presented itself again, and finances and distance were not challenges, would I go to a high school reunion? I don’t know. But I do know the ghost of my teen-years-past will not factor into the decision.
