"It's hard to dance with the devil on your back"

The funniest thing happened when I arrived at my high school class reunion, Saturday. Nervous as a long-tail cat in a room full of rocking chairs, I knocked on the door. When it opened I beheld a room full of faces I did not recognize. Now the last time I saw most of these folks they were wearing blue graduation gowns and wiping away tears as the strains of Alma Mater faded into the collective memory of 1963. Only one invitation to a reunion had arrived in my mailbox during the ensuing years, but a schedule conflict prevented me from going.

They made me try to guess who everyone was, but I couldn’t even identify me. My speech and drama teacher was mistaken for someone’s spouse. My English teacher told stories about me, but I could not recall ever being in her class. There were three Carolyns in the room, but I couldn’t guess a Carolyn. Yearbook photos to the rescue!

Under my arm were two yearbooks. I opened the one from my senior year and began trying to match names and faces. There were none, except of the teachers. Then one of the Carolyns gleefully announced that I was looking in the 1964 book. Duh, that’s when I graduated. Double duh. These folks all graduated in 1963. I never was any good at math.

It seems that the girl who invited me was in my class from elementary school through 10th grade and we remained friends until she graduated. After 10th grade, my family lived overseas for a year and when we returned I entered 11th grade while the rest of my class became seniors. They graduated in 1963, leaving me at the mercy of the class of ’64.

One of the Carolyns asked me if we had known each other.
“Not yet.”

Everone was so friendly and gracious and there were dozens of funny, and a few sad stories told. But even 24 hours later, I cannot for the life of me, connect the people who showed me such a wonderful time Saturday,  with the years spent at that classic building that stands “on our city’s western border, reared against the sky.”

If high school had been half as much fun, maybe I’d have remembered more.