The number was big, nice and round and unimaginable when spoken aloud. The time of year was wrong, June not August.  These things have always been held in August, in horrible heat and humidity, down on the river, so we could get our faces right into all that tropical, asthma-producing swelter. Held in August so we could work on those extra pounds, work on those tans, work on those outfits to show off those tans, show off those diets, the thinnest ones thinner still, as if to say, What? This old thing? As if they would themselves be surprised by how sleek and shiny their shins, how willowy their bare arms, should they be bothered to look in a mirror. 

They stood in little clusters back then, the adult manifestation of the high school clique, while my group did the same thing.  Not so willowy or tan, for that was never our thing. We were funny, or thought we were, and while we made stabs at sunning ourselves, eating cress, discussing ensembles, our true natures revealed themselves in those pale hours before the event when we negotiated arriving early to get a good table when the food was still plentiful.

Thus our first high school reunions passed in pleasant familiarity, each group staying within the boundaries of the school cafeteria or study hall, but venturing out to greet others, to catch up in happy delight with most of our topics of discussion centering on accomplishment, lifestyle, success. 

Those things were important then.  We measured ourselves by the yardsticks of others, or at least I did. We were adults out in the world.  Making our way. We could never have taken enough notes in class to make that easy or smooth. It was the time of striving. 

I cared about my old high school chums, the ones I walked part of the way home with, though we never hung out, the shiny girls whose clothes I envied and the shiny boys I had crushes on. Of course there was drama, and inadequacies, and self-consciousness and all the angst of being a teen. We stayed in our own tribes for the most part, although the winds that blew through the halls of OHS were generally benevolent.

When this reunion rolled around, I didn’t want to go.  I never want to go.  I can’t explain it.  Maybe it is the holdover from all my old anxieties and insecurities, although I am neither anxious nor insecure now.  But my pals were all going, a few traveling some distance to attend, and there is no getting out of it. I even hosted a small drinks do beforehand, but it was short because we all had jobs to do.

Beth had to deliver some last minute name tags. Julie and Janet had some set up to do. Margaret and Donna had to get there early to snag us a good table. Something central so we could work the room, just like at lunchtime when we hopped from cafeteria table to cafeteria table as we were frantically waved over to hear the hysterical thing that happened in English class, or art, or gym.

The shiny girls still shone, and the boys, too. The late arrivers still came late, wafting their magnificent coolness behind them as always. I mean, cool is eternal.  They have it and I admire it. 

Our classmates, Marc and Donna, created a beautiful video and memorial wall for those of our class who have left us.  So many now.  Some so young, a few months or a few years past graduation, car accidents, mostly.  But somehow, the ones who died with the sun overhead, in the bright midday of life, these broke my heart. The room quieted, every now and then a collective sigh, a soft moan, for someone especially liked. There were sniffles, wet cheeks, the boys working hard not to cry, but failing.  Wives putting  their arms around their shoulders, absorbing the sobs they didn’t want anyone to see. 

Marc said after working on the video he just felt blessed to be here, at the river, talking to old friends.  Suzanne, whom I last saw at the Sportcenter in her cap and gown, said we are now our parents, we are next.  

And we are.  

  Maybe that is why the evening passed in such sweetness. The years, fifty of them, slipped from each face and we were back in Spanish club, chemistry class, Rash stadium with cold noses and feet. And not even reminiscing, really because who can recall the ordinary days so far in the past? Snippets only, but important ones, just enough to remind us how we once belonged. And for a few hours on Saturday night, we were bound to each other again.

In that long ago Sportscenter parking lot we stood in huddles, hugging and crying because the crying seemed to be required,  but mostly we were excited and scared and ready for what was next. This weekend we stood in huddles, first this one then that, and hugged again, thinking of accomplishments and loss, and the soft landing that allowed us to be there, all in one place.  And maybe a little scared. And maybe a little excited. And maybe a little sad. And here we go, out into the unknown, once more.