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Cliques Crack After 15 Years
High School Reunions are No Longer Dreaded
I might be the world’s biggest proponent of high school reunions. I love
’em. I love ’em so much I go to one every year.
A few years back when the class in which Barb and I graduated met for its
45th reunion, we noticed that about 17 classmates had already gone to that
great reunion in the sky. At that point it was decided that we would hold a
mini-reunion every year, instead of waiting for the big 5-0.
So each year since then, 75 to 100 class members and spouses (and even our
old principal, Ben Hurt, now in his 90s, along with his wife Maria) have met
for a day-long picnic, jam session, songfest and photo op, along with a fair
amount of catching up and gossip mongering. I love it.
Our gathering this year took place in mid-September. When you’re holding
a meeting in Charlottesville in the fall, you have to be sure to pick a
weekend when the Cavaliers are playing out of town. If you happen to hit the
day of a home game, not only do you lose half of your attendees, but the
ones that want to come can’t make it through traffic to get there.
But our “regulars” are hardy and devoted. Each year we have a number of the
same folks (including at least half a dozen couples from Richmond), and then
there’s also at least one person totally unexpected, someone none of us has
seen for years.
This year’s surprise was a fellow named Jim Meem, who had arrived in town
from his home in Australia, coincidentally on the very weekend of our
picnic. Most of us hadn’t seen Jim since graduation, and we were delighted
that he showed up in what someone termed “native Australian garb.”
“Which one is Jim?” Barb asked when we arrived.
“Well,” someone responded, “look around. He’s the only one here wearing
knee-length Australian khaki bush shorts, black hose and very strange
shoes.”
And, sure enough, there he was, and he looked great. Jim was one of the
brains in our class—borderline brilliant, I would say—but here he was 48
years later, just one of the gang, full of stories about his five children,
his ex-wives, his interesting job history and his current Hungarian
girlfriend.
Oh, yes, I forgot to say before—when I was mentioning spouses who
attend—that some members of our group are still in the dating game. I was
sorry Jim’s lady friend could not make the trip with him, because there’s
always a dearth of Hungarian beauties at these get-togethers.
Barb and I had arrived late, having had some things to take care of in
Richmond that Saturday morning before we drove up. Not a soul had left
before we arrived, and the party was going strong.
We checked on old Doug, who was immobilized by foot surgery and who had been
seated in a prominent chair where all the new arrivals could greet him.
In our age group, there’s always somebody with an interesting new malady,
and we all want to hear about it with the expectation that someday soon we
may be laid up with a similar problem ourselves. Doug is mending
nicely—thank you for asking.
After our usual barbecue and fried chicken lunch (there’s a salad tray for
vegetarians like me), some of us broke out our guitars and banjos and the
singers in the class gathered round, and we sang our way into dusk. I love
these things.
If your high school is having class reunions and you’re not going, I’m
willing to bet that you’re missing something, especially once you get past
that dread 10th one.
At the 5th or the 10th, classmates still have all the liabilities they had
in high school. Life has not yet proven to the ones who were in the good
clique, the most popular ones, the smartest ones, the handsomest ones, that
now it’s a whole new ballgame.
But by the 15th and thereafter, we’re all the same. And the older we get,
the further we get from graduation, the more we’re all equals and friends,
united as we age, no longer judging or critical or snide.
In that spirit, I can guarantee you I will continue to attend all these
reunions, year after year, for as long as I continue to look better than
everybody else in my class.
Randy Fitzgerald is chair of the English and journalism department at Virginia Union University. He is a former Richmond Times-Dispatch columnist and University of Richmond administrator. His blog is www.randyfitzgerald.blog.com.
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