If Only High School Was As Fun As The Reunion

 

Despite the childish insecurities that reared their freakish heads here days before the event, I walked away from my 30^th high school reunion wishing I could do high school all over again.  I wanted a do over!

You read that right.

I know.  It’s strange.  Particularly because when I was in high school I could not wait to get the hell out.  I spent hundreds of hours daydreaming about moving away and starting my life fresh and the summer after graduation, I packed my luggage and with the few mementos I held dear and off I went. 

I never looked back.

Yet, years later, here I was having the time of my life with the very people I couldn’t wait to escape and judging from the youthful squeals, tight embraces, and toothy smiles, everyone in the room was feeling the same way. 

Thanks to Facebook the rough edges of the reunion-rite-of-passage were smoothed over before we got there.  The social network provided a safe, casual forum for us to reacquaint and reveal so that by the day of the event internet familiarity quickly turned into genuine intimacy. Thirty years had knocked the wind out of the puffy chests and tugged away at the coats of armor, leaving behind a congenial and forthright group who, for at least one night, all drank happily from the same nostalgic kool-aid.

I liken the friendships made in high school to those made during summer camp, natural disasters, even war;  all products of battle creating bonds perhaps easily forgotten but never broken. With only a few exceptions, I have rarely been in a room where I felt a deep connection to so many.  I know this was, in part, an illusion.  These people don’t really know me now, they didn’t really know me then, but they know where I’m from, they know how I began, and having lived 30 years and thousands of miles away, I realized that night, that counts for a lot.

It’s a curious feeling but in the week that followed my reunion, I felt more grounded.  Rooted.  Whole.  Like missing pieces of an unfinished puzzle had finally slid into their rightful place. Corny, I know.  But true. I also felt sad, regretting friendships and fun that could have been,  time I wasted misunderstanding and being misunderstood. 

But I  have no regrets about going to my 30th.  In fact, I highly recommend it.  If nothing else, it can serve as emotional closure.  It’s enlightening.  It’s fun.  It’s a chance to focus solely on you (the single you, the you sans obligation) which in my world, and I suppose many of yours, is a rare opportunity indeed. 

I look forward to my 40^th.

I Ramble Because All I Really Want To Do Is Sleep - Dammit!

I wanted to finish up and publish my final post about Japan today. 
I tried but my brain wouldn't cooperate.
I know, I know, it's taking waaay too long and you probably don't give a crap anymore about how I peed on my foot or how I ended up in the ER.
I don't BLAME YOU.  I should stop crying wolf already. 
OKAY!

BUT I'VE GOT LEGITIMATE EXCUSES, PEOPLE!

My kids are sick. 
My dogs are sick.
Merlotdad's back is sick (meaning I've been doing MORE THAN USUAL IF THAT'S EVEN POSSIBLE in the Merlot household.)
And me?  I'm sick. 
(Thank you so much for asking.)

So, I haven't had it in me to finish my final (sure-to-be uproariously funny) photo chronicle of Japan because writing it is a huge time commitment that, frankly, doesn't garner that many responses from my fans bloggy friends so I've lost a bit of my mojo.

In the midst of my meandering train of thought, let me just be clear:

Comments are good, people.
Comments are the sustenance without which I'll die and it will be on your head my validation, people.
Comments are the paycheck for this FREE therapy, neuroses dump, cheap attempt at making friends entertainment I deliver to you every day week, PEOPLE.

But hey, I'm a girl of my word, so I will complete the chronicle and share it with you later this week. 
I know you're going to LOVE it.  (There goes that wolf crying again.)

But, in the interest of getting to know me better, and feeling as if I've delivered a legitimate post, I thought I'd let you in on a little story that ran through my head earlier today as I was overdosing on cold medicine considering moving my family into a safer, germ-free environment.  A plastic bubble similar to (but a more modern version of) the one John Travolta lived in in The Boy In The Plastic Bubble.

Another dated movie reference...Anyone??  Anyone??

For those of you born after 1970, THIS is what I'm talkin' about.
Only one of the BEST tv movies of all time! (I should know I spent way too much of my adult life working on them.)

And thinking about John Travolta brought back a memory of a Friday night in 1976 when my best friend, Missy, and I sat in a suburban Long Island bedroom with two of the most popular boys in school.  The dark room lit only by the blue ray of the 13" television set and the debut of JT in The Boy In The Plastic Bubble.


I remember wondering how we, not members of the most popular girls in school, ended up in these exalted quarters.  I didn't think to inquire too much of Missy when she informed me of our plans, I'd dreamed endlessly about such a night and wanted to believe we were worthy of it.  I brushed aside any feelings I had once I got there that something was amiss.

Halfway through the movie, while watching John Travolta and Glynnis O'Connor steal their first kiss, I turned to my friend to see if she too felt stirred; To giggle and silently bond as we had so many times before over wishes for someone to want us that same way. 

I discovered that my friend was indeed sharing the intimate moment  - but not with me.  While all eyes were supposedly on lips locking through the sterile plastic of an adult sized incubator, I enviously watched as a fist-sized lump maneuvered it's way under my friend's shirt and up to her eagerly awaiting breasts. 

Suddenly, I understood how we got here.  Why this night was not as heady as my fantasies.  The sensory shift, the revelation that Missy had abandoned me by secretly using me to get her to this moment.  It would mark the end of our friendship. 

I spent the rest of the night with my eyes fixated on the television.  Stirred.  Unsated.  Sickened. Unwanted.

Envious of the boy in the plastic bubble.


(I have no idea how I ended up writing about this.  I blame it on the drugs!)
Good night sweet peeps.