It’s the Final Countdown!

Get your air guitars ready, because there are only 6 days left until this whole reunion thing jumps off, folks. As part of the somewhat neurotic countdown to my high school reunion, I pulled out my yearbook last night.

Once I got over the initial shock of facing my senior photo (really, why did people let me get that haircut?), I began reading the various dedications from acquaintances, long-lost junior high classmates, teachers and best friends.

Most of the people who signed my yearbook, I actually remember (apparently the memory advantage of waiting to smoke pot until college) and many I recalled fondly. Several made me feel a tinge of disappointment that we had lost touch almost instantly following graduation, even though they had given me their home phone numbers. A small part of me considered playing detective and calling their parents for current information, but I’ll wait until after the big day.

As I thumbed through the pages, a few common themes emerged. One, I’m super sweet, loud, fearless and should always stay that way. Two, I’m funny (No, really. I won most sarcastic in my class and everything.) . Apparently, I took this one to heart and have spent the past 9 ½ years building on that concept so I could produce this blog for your general amusement. Three, people seem to think I will achieve some modicum of success in this world.

Even though I had no idea where I was going to college as of graduation, my classmates still sensed that I would “go far” in life. Maybe they just meant the approximately 2400 miles separating my New Jersey address from my mom’s house in Arizona. My signers took it more literally – one suggested I would become a newspaper editor and another said I was “destined to be a wonderful, outspoken woman of the 21st Century.” Granted, she is now a lawyer.

So can people really figure you out in high school? If so, what do we spend all that money on therapy for in our 20s and 30s? Maybe we need to revisit a teeny taste of the past every once in a while to get a little guidance for the future. Or maybe these long-lost voices of encouragement (plus my best friends and a little liquid courage) are all I will need to get me through for another 10 years.