There will come a day when I will be forty. I accept this. What I'm finding harder to accept is the sheer span of time I've been an adult. That reality came into stark relief this past weekend, when I attended my twenty-year high school reunion. The last time I was a child I was in high school, and I've now been an adult for longer than I was a child. I cannot seem to accept this.
Anyway, at my reunion I was, not surprisingly, reunited with lots of childhood friends of varying degrees of intensity. The first few people I encountered, as a matter of fact, I had no memory of whatsoever. I then helped my friend check people in to the evening event; he knew everyone while I knew nearly no one.
That meant that this weekend was largely a blank slate. The folks I remembered I rediscovered; the folks I couldn't remember I got to know. All of the insecurities I carried with me throughout high school were still there--I'm not going to lie to you--but they were mitigated by this freeing notion that I am not the person I once was, and these others are not the people they once were.
I suppose, then, that "reunion" is a bit of a misnomer. "Reacquaintance" is closer to the truth. And I can honestly say, it was nice to make my childhood friends' reacquaintance.
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2 comments:
My 20th high school reunion, a couple of autumns ago, was a really good time of reconnecting. Since then, those old relationships that had gone away in college have been reignited - really cool. and since I'm two weeks from hitting 40, I would venture to say that i'm looking forward to the experience.
Look at it this way (as I sadly tend to with every birthday):
Double your age. Every minute after your birthday, you are now closer to that than being born.
Now sit down and have a nice cry at realizing that you will soon be closer to approaching 80 than you are to your birth. :)
You can thank me later. That thought will never leave you now.
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