August 28, 2007
How I Spent My High School Reunion
Saturday was my tenth high school reunion. I wanted to go badly, and yet, I didn't want to go, also badly. In a reunion-inspired moment of reflection on the decade past, examining the choices that have brought me to this point in my life today, the single major conclusion I came to was that instead of going into book publishing I should have made a career in spy technologies, which would have helped with the small matter of installing high-definition cameras and sound recorders throughout the reunion site. Because while I don't really want to talk to (lest I get involved with) most of the people I went to high school with, I really really really want to know what they look like, what they're doing, who they married, how many kids they managed to have (because it's a competition, you know), where they live, what they drive, what gets them up in the morning, what keeps them awake at night, what lies in their heart of darkness, and what they really think of me. If only there were some sort of networking tool, perhaps on the Internet, that would enable users to upload pictures of themselves and publish intimate details of their daily lives for me everyone to see. That would be great, wouldn't it?, although it would only fulfill its intended purpose if registration were mandatory upon graduation. Threat of Orwellian dystopia aside, I want gossip!
You might not know it by the I'm-too-cool-for-school-reunions act I've been putting on for the last week, but I've actually been inordinately interested in the prospect of a reunion for a good long while. For months (and maybe years) I've been pumping my old high school connections for info on whether we were even having a reunion, so when highschoolboyfriendDavid finally came through with a forward of a forward of the invite, I may have shrieked a little.
The invite was sent via mass email--a list that included approximately one hundred people. My graduating class had over seven hundred students. Apparantly, the only people who were invited were the people who had lived (and maybe still live) in what was known as the "rich-kid neighborhoods," where resided the children of lawyers and doctors and self-employed anesthesiologists, not to be confused with the children of legal secretaries and RNs and Costco cashiers. While I was friends with people from across the social spectrum of the school, including more than a few rich kids, I can't say that I wanted to fly nine hundred miles for a night of spongy steak consumed over conversations fueled by either pregnancy hormones or 3.2 beer buzz when I wasn't even on the original invite even though I've had the same email address for eleven years and my parents still live in the same house and I even participated in a phone survey that listed my name and email address in the directory of everyone who's ever gone to my high school since it was established (1967).
Whatever. It's not like I care or something.
The email was full of perplexing details and creative punctuation. For an example of both, I offer this: the organizers split the reunion into two sections--the traditional evening dinner party and something described as a "scramble style tournament" with a "shotgun start" to be held at "7:30 a.m." I had to look that up because I'd never heard of such a thing. I mean, it's been rumored that there were hours before 8 a.m., but I sure as hell haven't seen them.
As it turns out, "scramble-style tournment" (hyphen courtesy of this author) means golf (not eggs? really?). Golf. Wow. Is that what we've become ten years later? Golfers? Golfers who get up at 7:30 a.m. on a Saturday? Perhaps California has made me soft, but I can't think of a single thing that sounds less pleasant, except for maybe getting up to golf at 6 a.m. In December. In Siberia.
The mass invite at least gave me a cursory peep into what people are doing and who they've become. According to their email addresses, Adam works for a mortgage lending company (figures), Annette works at a dance studio (of course), there's at least one "hotmama@email.com" in the bunch. I also now have the personal email address of a guy who regularly shows up in commercials and feature films now that his network sitcom has been cancelled. A lot of last names were unfamiliar, but there were still two dozen Jenny/Jennie/Jennees on the list, and that makes me feel right at home.
I probably didn't miss much, right? I mean, there was mention of an "open bar," but it was followed by "so bring cash if you want to drink," which is evidence that (1) the organizers don't know what "open bar" means and (2) no one would be drinking since they'd have to use their own money to pay for it. And what's a reunion without getting tipsy with people who were probably getting tipsy back in high school but keeping it under wraps lest their bishop/seminary teacher/future mission president find out? (For those of you just joining us, I grew up in Utah.) The only thing comparable with getting openly, legally drunk alongside people who were doing it ten years ago in secret would be having open, legal sex alongside people who were Doing It ten years ago in secret and LET'S NOT GO THERE, OKAY?
So what did I do last weekend instead of attend my ten-year reunion? I watched the Miss Teen USA Pageant (comedy gold). And the Teen Choice Awards (who are these people and why is it okay to talk like that to an audience that includes seven-year-olds *shakes cane*?). Simon also won tickets to an 80s Prom Night concert featuring Cure and Duran Duran cover bands. So what if I was almost born in the 80s? It was the night of my high school reunion, the air was heavy with corsage stench and whiskey breath, and I knew most of the words to "Hungry Like the Wolf." Well, I know most of them now.
Posted by Leah at August 28, 2007 11:50 AMHa, in Utah, yes, it does seem to be a competition to see who had the most kids. "Only" two kids will surely mean you get the knowing "fertility problems, eh?" look.
Posted by: Janssen at August 28, 2007 12:09 PMI plan to miss my 30 year reunion very soon.
Over all these years, I'm sure that a great many of those folks have turned out to be wonderful people who I would be happy to know. I'm betting though that the best of them will not be going to the reunion. Most likely they'll stay away to avoid the clique'sh and cruel types who are wont to organize and attend this sort of thing...hoping perhaps for another shot at self-aggrandizement at the expense of the rest of us.
wow, that's *weird* that it was only sent to 100 people from your class... although reunion organizers in general seem to be some of the least-resourceful people on the planet when it comes to finding their classmates. if you haven't signed up on classmates.com, they can't seem to find you.
I laughed about the scramble, though; as someone who golfs (yes, even when I lived in lazy California!), I knew what that term (and shotgun start) meant, even if I only played in my first scramble-style event last month. our start was at 1:40pm, though, which was more my speed.
Posted by: Lori at August 28, 2007 12:30 PMI didn't get invited to mine either. But it would have been a completely different atmosphere since I went to a pretty notorious public high school in MA that I like to call Overachiever's Academy and would have featured more lines like "Aren't you the woman who was recently given a Fullbright?" and I would have been all "who am I to blow against the wind?"
Except, seriously. A lot of my high school classmates are Fullbright Rhodes Scholar winning cardiologist kitten shelter owners so it would have been totally unbearable.
Posted by: monkey at August 28, 2007 12:34 PMGolf? At 7:30am? An open bar? That you have to pay for?
Was the title of the reunion X High School, Class of 1997: Let's keep it awkward, people!
I don't even know how these reunions are planned. Is it the class president's job? Because last I heard, ours had left her first husband and two children for some dude she met from Germany and they're currently living in Amsterdam. Might pose a problem, unless she gets her act together by 2009.
Posted by: Clink at August 28, 2007 12:45 PMIt gets better: I just got off the phone with highschoolboyfriendDavid, who said the location of the reunion was changed at the last minute and the only people who knew about it were the rich kids via word-of-mouth. A bunch of people probably showed up at the original location, having pre-paid their $45 dinner ticket, and wondered why no one was there. Also, the golf tournament was cancelled due to lack of interest. Go figure.
Apparently there was A LOT of beer left over.
Posted by: Leah at August 28, 2007 12:59 PMwow, what a coincidence, i had a high school reunion last week too!.
. . ours was in four parts, friday nite was the informal meetup at a
bar, saturday afternoon was a tour of the campus, saturday nite was
the "formal" reunion (i said, "fuck if i'm wearing a tie" and instead
wore a gaudy hawaiian shirt), and sunday was a picnic. . .
now i dunno if it's just berkeley (we had malcolm x's birthday as a
holiday!), but that reunion was *nothing* like how they're depicted in
the movies/tv - it was actually pretty fun. . . i really only keep in
touch with one person from high school so it was pretty cool talking
to some of my old friends (and a few enemies). . .
it's just kind of interesting to see who's doing well, who's not so
well, who died, who had kids, who came out of the closet, who put on
some poundage (most everybody), who looks the same (a few), and who
aged poorly (even fewer). . . and i don't mean in a "haha!, you're
fat!" kinda way, i mean in a, "huh, that's interesting, didn't expect
that" or a "yeah saw that one coming" way, 'cuz really, by this time
anyone who still gives a shit about high school in a, well,
"high-school" manner really needs to put it behind 'em. . . unless, of
course, they just had a life-defining freakin' horrible time in high
school. . .
but yeah, like i said, my experience with the reunion might've just
been 'cuz i went to berkeley high where, while cliques existed, they
weren't particularly exclusive. . . for example people who were jocks
didn't really pick on people who were nerds 'cuz there was always
overlap (good example is i was on the rugby team and in the chess
club). . . in the end, the people who were too cool for school reunion
not only missed out, but were missed as well - only not all that much
'cuz there were so many others to talk to. . .
oh, and to answer clink, apparently reunions are supposed to be
planned by the people who were in the student government (not
necessarily just the president), but sometimes nobody in that crowd
gives a shit, at which point it falls on whoever feels like doing it.
. . if nobody wants to do it (personally i've never understood who
*would* want to do it) then it probably doesn't happen. . .
I had my 10 year reunion this year and it almost wasn't going to happen because I didn't know how to get in touch with everyone! Granted, we had only 180 kids in our class, and I managed to contact only about 70, of which only 25 people came, but at least something happened and I got to fulfill my sick interests in what the "cool kids" had been up to over the years. And it's true: babies, golf, weddings. It nearly made me sick all over those same cool kids. But I'm glad I went. Because I think I have a pretty good life and I just wanted to show it to the people who thought they were better than I was ten years ago. (Those people didn't show up and in fact, the "new" cool kids did, so that's another reason I'm glad I went.) blah, blah, blah, ramble, ramble.
love your writing!
Posted by: gina at August 28, 2007 01:43 PMokay so fyi, that weird line-breaking thing in my above comment?. . . not my fault!. . .
Posted by: bloopy at August 28, 2007 02:04 PMI missed my ten-year HS reunion because I was on my honeymoon. Thank God. I mean, I was curious in the exact way you describe, but had I gone I know it would have been horrid and awkward and stupid. I did get to see some photos online afterward, so I had the satisfaction of gloating over how crappy most people looked. Because I'm shallow.
Posted by: Lawyerish at August 28, 2007 02:25 PMCrap I'm five years late for golf. I skipped my ten year because I really am too cool for reunions.
Posted by: will at August 28, 2007 03:16 PMHave been reading you on and off for the past month safely thinking I am voyeuristically viewing this strange girl who writes so nicely and wham! Am more than shocked to realize you grew up in Utah. Because I did too. And my ten year reunion was last year. Um? Wow! And Yikes!
Posted by: TheGirlWho at August 28, 2007 03:30 PMOf course I meant strange as in stranger, not as in weird. And all Utah reunions are awful. Mine? Held in the school cafeteria in broad daylight. Like, we should all recreate the hideous table heirarchy of our past? And no liquor to grease the wheels of awkward small talk? Also, everyone was pregnant. Everyone!
Posted by: TheGirlWho at August 28, 2007 03:34 PMHow was it that the mormons couldn't find you? I thought they knew the whereabout and happenings of everyone whose family was ever involved in their faith.
My 10 yr reunion would have been last year but no one organized anything. I grew up in a small town of 25,000 where the school was pretty much split between rich kids and hippies so I thought it would have been interesting to see what everyone was doing. But lately I've been finding that out through facebook, what did I ever do without that site.
The Mormons most certainly know where I am. That's their job, after all.
Posted by: Leah at August 28, 2007 04:21 PMA perfect commemoration of your high school reuniuon, methinks.
Posted by: Kristen at August 28, 2007 05:05 PMI missed my 10-yeas because Matthew's brother got married that weekend. I wasn't heartbroken, but I would have been interested to see everyone. We had a grad class of 200, so I knew a lot of them.
The Internet networking tool you speak of? It's called Facebook. People from ELEMENTARY SCHOOL have found me. And I'm on there with my married name, no less. It's definitely interesting to see what everyone is up to :)
Posted by: Angella at August 28, 2007 07:13 PMI'm with you; I want to know what everyone's up to without actually having to talk to them.
Posted by: Nicole at August 28, 2007 07:33 PMDamn. My name will haunt me forever.
Posted by: Jennie at August 28, 2007 07:34 PMWow -- having read this post and your update about how the party got moved without telling anyone but the rich kids compelled me to delurk. That party needed to be crashed a-la Rodney Dangerfield and the Caddyshack caddies, or someone like John Belushi. What repulsive behavior to be so elitist and exclusive, even 10 years later! I think you're glad you didn't go!
Posted by: elgoodo at August 28, 2007 07:49 PMElGoodo--The party had to be moved for financial reasons. I think the fact that the organizers didn't tell everybody was 10 percent rudeness and 90 percent don't-have-their-shit-togetherness.
p.s. "The Ballad of El Goodo" is perhaps my favorite Big Star song, which is a tough call because I love them very much.
Posted by: Leah at August 28, 2007 08:40 PMWow, it kind of sucks that they only invited 100 out
of 700 people. I'm friends with the people who
organized our 10-year last year, and I think they did a great job trying to find everyone - they even tried to find people who didn't graduate with us but who had gone to our HS at some point or another.
I was apprehensive about my reunion, but ended up
having a good time. Granted, my graduating class was 70 and I already knew (through keeping in touch or through the grapevine) about what probably 30 of them were up to. That's what secretly reading about classmates on myspace is for!
Nothing like carrying the pointless cliquishness and elitism of high school over into the real world. Well done, Rich Kids, well done.
The Reunion People mailed an invitation to my parents' house. My mom gave it to me when I went up to visit. I laughed and threw it in the trash. It didn't occur to me for a nanosecond that I might go.
There are a couple of old high school friends I'm sorry I lost touch with. I couldn't care less about what 99% of the people I went to high school with are doing or what they're like today. For a depressing number of them, the answer is probably, "Still insufferable, married with kids and still living on the Hellmouth."
Posted by: Doola! at August 29, 2007 06:30 AMI didn't learn all that stuff about my former classmates at my 10-year reunion, so you might have been disappointed anyhow. I learned that they had lived fairly normal lives up to that point, gotten older, gotten fatter/skinnier, married/divorced/kid-blessed and that was that.
They probably thought "open bar" means somebody else takes the caps off the beers. You can assume that the invitation-writer is fat, drinks a lot, plays golf and is most certainly not an editor of any sort.
Posted by: Texas T-bone at August 29, 2007 07:50 AMMy 10 year just passed me by a few weeks ago, I didn't go but was hoping friends who did go would have fun, juicy gossip to pass along but apparently it was pretty uneventful and poorly organized. I had some mixed feelings about not going but as with most people, there are only a few people I'd really love to reconnect with and yet the vast majority of the attendees were probably the people I care least about. This does not stop me from being insanely curious about some people (and Google can only do so much!)
Originally the reunion tickets were so expensive that someone started organizing a private party and looking at the invite list, it was a pretty clear set of the popular folks only. Bleagh.
Posted by: watersign at August 29, 2007 09:40 AM
