Ten Years Later: My High School Reunion

My high school reunion was this past weekend. I graduated in June 1998 from a small, Catholic high school with a class of 95 students. Although I spent a lot of time as a stressed-out overachiever, I always felt grateful for the community where each person had a unique niche. While people had loose identities as “popular,” “jock,” or “brain,” the school never felt cliquey to me. Here’s the scoop on the reunion events.

Friday: Casual pub night.

Reuniting with my classmates was much less of a big deal than I’d imagined it to be. Almost everyone looked the same, with the exception of a couple of people. Thankfully, no one seemed to care about impressing anyone with status or material success. In fact, we hardly asked the question, “So what have you been up to for the last ten years?” It was like we were used to seeing each other all the time and were just having beers and enjoying each other’s company.

Saturday morning: Tour around the school.

Same:

  • Lockers, desks, curtains, the smell of the halls and classrooms. The statue of Mary with broken fingers.
  • The white boards in Mr. O’Toole’s history class, updated regularly with quotes like, “Once you learn to read you are forever free.”
  • Mr. Riley’s neat cursive in the Spanish room.
  • Mr. DeShazer’s biology room.

Different:

  • $3 million gym, which was in the fundraising stages in ’98.
  • Stronger programs and space for art, music, drama, etc.
  • State-of-the-art technology, including smart boards in a couple of classrooms and new computers.
  • Beautifully remodeled library with new computers. Strangely, the new library was designed with few bookcases, so the school unfortunately got rid of around 1,000 books.
  • New murals around the school.
  • Community garden.
  • Extra counseling staff and offices.

It felt strange to be back, feeling the memories float back to me — doing homework in the hallways, changing for P.E., eating lunch on the steps of the quad. Seeing how many resources the school now has made me wish that I attended it now instead of in the mid-90s. I suppose I’ll get my wish in a couple of months, when I return to my high school classrooms. Since only a couple of my old teachers came for the tour, I was glad that I’ll get to see the rest soon.

Saturday night: The official reunion at an upscale Italian restaurant.

A few more than 56 people, including partners, showed up. We mingled over cocktails, sat down to dinner at small tables, and danced to 90s hits. The whole evening, I felt grateful to have such a strong, supportive community. Just as in high school, everyone pretty much talked to everyone else. The reunion reminded me of what a warm, interesting, and talented bunch of people my classmates are. We are all in very different places in our lives. Some have spouses and children and own homes; others are traveling the world or are in between projects; still others are in graduate school. Everyone, I felt relieved to find out, seemed to be OK with the different paths we’ve each taken, never even considering whether one was “better” than another.

Today: Watched the graduation video.

The “Top 5” students in the class — Top 6 in our case, as a class of overachievers — all gave speeches or read a poem at graduation. I gave the welcome, and my closest friends spoke as well. Today I watched the video. We all look the same, except for our 90s haircuts and round babyfaces.

My speech focused on the unique, welcoming spirit of our class. I said that I’d miss everyone so much that I was already looking forward to our first reunion. I hoped that instead of focusing on how much money we made, or how far we’d climbed the corporate ladder, I wanted us to talk about what was really important: what obstacles we’d overcome, what we’d learned in the last ten years, and what events had changed us forever.

Watching the image of myself at age 17, I felt content that my hopes for the reunion had come true, that we care who people are and not how they look on paper. At the same time, I felt tears welling up as I thought about how much potential the future held at that ceremony — the commencement of a life full of possibility. I sometimes think that possibility is so much better than reality could ever be.

Katie, my best friend through high school and college, said in her speech that if she could leave us with only one thing, “it would be the courage to decide what in this life you really care about. What is it that is really important to you?”

Ten years later, I’m still figuring this out. I think I’m seriously asking myself this question for the first time. Many things come to mind. My closest friends and family. Meaningful work that makes positive change in the world. Making the most out of my short time on earth, every day, every minute.

Until now, I’ve considered “making the most” of life to mean striving to maximize each experience, to have it be the best version it could possibly be. Lately, as the striving and pushing and maximizing have exhausted me, I’ve started to rethink my approach. I’m trying on the attitude that enjoying life comes from taking it in stride, and allowing it to unfold without trying to control it.

I can only hope that ten years from this moment, at my 20th high school reunion, I will know what I most care about in life, have devoted most of my time to that very thing, and — most importantly — have enjoyed the process.

IMG_0597.JPGIMG_0598.JPGIMG_0600.JPGIMG_0602.JPGIMG_0603.JPGIMG_0604.JPGIMG_0606.JPGIMG_0608.JPGIMG_0609.JPGIMG_0610.JPGIMG_0611.JPGIMG_0613.JPGIMG_0615.JPGIMG_0617.JPGIMG_0618.JPGIMG_0619.JPGIMG_0620.JPGIMG_0624.JPGIMG_0628.JPGIMG_0625.JPGIMG_0627.JPGIMG_0634.JPGIMG_0635.JPG

Comments (4)

  1. Mr. Hsu

    Glad to hear your reunion went so well. As I read about your weekend, I began contemplating what my reunion will be like, as it is coming up in 2 years. To find out if second impressions are the same as the first, and what kinds of effects a decade can have on our beliefs about each other. Facebook has been great in finding out the basic facets of people’s lives, but to hear it and see it live from the source will be quite an experience.

    I went to see Garrison Keillor tonight with Shannon, and he said some things that I thought might stir some reflection.

    “Writer’s block is caused by over-ambition.”

    “You pay homage to the rules by breaking the rules.”

    “Live in perpetual hope, keep moving from one thing to the next, and don’t go down the narrow road.”

    You continue to amaze me with everything you do and the way you live and strive for your own archetypal form of nirvana. Seriously. Cheers to you! 🙂

    And I like the new picture posting feature and the recommended books. Awesome.

    Reply
  2. Brian T.

    We can only imagine what utterly life-changing knowledge would have come from the speech-that-wasn’t from #7 in the graduating class …. 🙂

    Reply
  3. Margaret

    “I sometimes think that possibility is so much better than reality could ever be.” … But sometimes the opposite is true! I’ve reflected on this some, and I believe that we overachievers dwell a lot on possibility, the future, improvement, performance- and that we leave little time for absorbing, reveling in, glorying in what all that hard work produces. We aren’t trained in that. But we do have to find our own way of honoring our efforts, both as they happen and looking back, being proud. That’s where friends may be helpful… but we can’t do it all!! ;o)

    Reply
  4. Ben Cannon

    “My speech focused on the unique, welcoming spirit of our class. I said that I’d miss everyone so much that I was already looking forward to our first reunion. I hoped that instead of focusing on how much money we made, or how far we’d climbed the corporate ladder, I wanted us to talk about what was really important: what obstacles we’d overcome, what we’d learned in the last 10 years, and what events had changed us forever”

    Melia, you’re truly living the dream 🙂

    I’ve enjoyed our conversations on letting go of perfectionism too, I often dwell in the space of ‘possibilities’ and one of my lifelong struggles is to take possibility into reality.

    Lastly, I am becoming more and more aware of just how special our class was, and how lucky I am to be a part of it. I too always felt that though we had our ‘cliques’ they were all open and I could move about freely. I was humbled and amazed at how easy it was to get together again after (in some cases) a full decade apart; like you said it felt like beers with friends.

    I left our reunion, and now I realize our high school experience as well, with a great satisfaction for all we had achieved with one another, and a boundless appreciation for all the potential that still awaits us. What’s surprised me is how deep it all goes, how many layers to our relationships and how deep into ourselves we would look. I get the sense that I am still just scratching the surface, and I like what that allows for our 20th and beyond!

    Reply

Leave a Reply to Mr. Hsu Cancel reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *