45th class reunion

The post card came in the mail two days ago. "Save the date for the NCHS 45th class reunion" it said. I immediately put the date on the calender. I will not miss it. We were the class of '65, the first big baby boomer class -- the rebellious, disco dancing, dope smoking, love making, risk taking kids, rebelling against our parents rules and expectations. For some reason, our class is special, we've reconvened every five years since '65. Something always draws me back.

At the 40th, Diana rented a convertible--we envisioned ourselves as Thelma and Louise willing to drive off the cliff. If reality we just drove through our home town -- now more than gown up, trying to remember what was there before the restaurants, the Gap, William-Sonoma and the rest of the upscale shops that had woven themselves into the fabric of the old town. The stone library and red brick YMCA building still face Washington Street , deying modernity to take them. But, the old department store and 5&10 cent store have been obliterated. The bank is now a happening now cuisine restaurant. It is could not be different, but we remember and tell stories.

At the 40th, twelve of us girls stayed at Dottie's for the weekend, sleeping in beds, bags, sofa beds and anything else Dottie could conjure up. As we sat on the deck in the morning after the initial get together at the VFW the night before, we nursed our coffees, acting as if we'd just gotten together the weekend after the graduation parties. Time had not passed despite that fact that time had passed and had taken a toll on our lives. We've been married and divorced, lost husbands to heart attacks, grandmothered, reinvented ourselves and played out our fantasies or not. We couldn't believe how the years had passed. We looked at each other as we were, not as we are. It gave us great pleasure to once again smoke cigarettes without guilt, tell wild stories, drink too much wine, and make each other double over in laughter.

Those years of wanting to be popular and never quite being on the A list have given way to a pleasant acceptance of who I am. What was important then, no longer matters. Nerdy guys have become handsome. Cool guys have lost themselves to invisibility. Average guys have become outstanding and class clowns have become powerful capitalists. We'd like to think any success was was our choice, but mostly it was a matter of luck. Who knows why one of us fell into depression and lost his future or another who saw no future became a dynamic success. Who knows why, after 40 years, I still wished Billy had kissed me when I crawled up the tree in his front yard and only at that reunion could tell him what a crush I had on him.

Everyone has a story to tell, a story that is worth listening to whether it's sad or happy in the end. It's a nice place to be. Most of us still refuse to admit to our encroaching elder status, but we gain strength from knowing each other, for what we were to each other and what we continue to be. I hope to see so many classmates on the weekend of July 30 and 31st.