I’m feeling a little queasy anticipating my 40th high school reunion on Saturday. There were 686 people in my class…organizers say they’re expecting close to 400. Yikes! I was very shy in h.s. and hardly knew any of them. My best friend was a drop out (now deceased, sadly, and despite his drop out status, he had the finest mind of anyone I’ve ever known.) I thought I was over all that and I am, really…but I’m still queasy. Any words of wisdom from folks who have gone through similar reunions?
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Sounds very interesting.
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Just went to my 40th reunion 3 weeks ago and really had a good time. It is a bit scary just before you enter the reunion but , once you’re in, just start talking. Remember, everyone feels like you. I don’t think that there is anyone who isn’t nervous coming into a reunion. I talked to people who I didn’t speak a word to in high school. But, heck, we are all 58 now and we all have something in common. If there are any other activities going on for the weekend, try to go to those, especially if there are the day before as it will break the ice a bit in a smaller group. For example, we had a special tour on Saturday morning of the old high school and I went. Much smaller crowd there and way easier to start talking to people. 400 people expected? Wow, that is alot. We had a class of 500 and about 125 attended which is considered pretty good. Ours was such a success that no one wanted to wait until the 50th for another reunion and one is already being planned for 45. Just start looking at nametags and strike up a conversation.
Thank you. Yes, we’re all 58 now. I know, 400 sounds very optimistic. I’ll be surprised if half that many actually show up. But there has been an awful lot of interest, e-mailing back and forth, I notice. Name tags. Hadn’t thought of that. That will be a GREAT help! Our high school had sororities and my father wouldn’t let me join or even go to rush. I remember he told me, “Anything that discriminates socially is immoral.” Now, I think he was right, but at the time, I felt like an out cast and keenly lonely. Thank the Lord those social clubs (the boys had fraternities too) were finally outlawed by the time my kids went to the high school. Thanks, Jackielee. MM
Martha Maria, I clicked on your picture and you not only look beautiful, you said right in it that you’re a late bloomer. I was the same way, discovered myself and what I could do with my hair, etc at age 27. I’ve discovered when I go to my class reunions now, the “early bloomers” who were in cliques don’t look anywhere near as good as me now.
I just had my 40th class reunion in July. It was extremely small, because I live in rural Illinois and my school was extremely small – but I had a GREAT time just chatting away with everybody. I think you should go there not intending to impress anyone, but to just have yourself a good time. Jackielee gave you good advice – just say “Hi” to people – and chatting will naturally ensue. I bet you’ll be surprised at how few “in casts” there are now from those ancient cliques.
I hope you have a GREAT time. Please let us know how it went – I’ll be watching for another post from you Sunday or Monday. (Oh yeah, and if there’s music, don’t forget this – “Dance like no-one’s watching!”)
Make sure that those nametags have your high school graduation pic on them. Really helps jog the memory.
No one will look like you remember them…..we have all aged in our own way, some more gracefully than others…..don’t go with any pre-conceived notions about who was popular etc. back then….life changes and mellows most of us….just go and enjoy the memories.
My 40th is next weekend but I am not going, other obligations. But, I am on the email list of the committee updates, who is going, logistics, etc. Well, in one of the emails, there was a picture attached of the committee. The committee is maybe 20-22 people. I did not recognize but one and only because he is a FB friend! I enlarged the picture, squinted, imagined but still had no clue!
But to be honest, I haven’t been back in some years, but did go to the 15th and 20th and even then, I just had forgotten who people were. No one thought to have name tags available and I was embarrassed to have someone rush me and greet me and then I am struggling to try to remember who he/she was. Not just in recognization but in remembering, my class was huge. Most on the committee, however, were ones I remember and well, just did not recognize.
This time, one of the committee members is making tags or buttons and using the HS graduation picture as identification so maybe it will help. Should be funny too, some of the hairstyles and glasses have made the circle and are back in style, who knew??
Thanks to all of you for responses, suggestions and encouragement. My husband has to work on the river this weekend (he’s a white water raft guide on the Ocoee) so I’ll be flying solo. But there’s no law that says I have to stay for the full four hours….I can leave any time I want. I didn’t sign up for the party in the evening either, just the social in the afternoon at the church. At the very least, it will be interesting and if I’m lucky, it might even be enlightening and fun. I’m going to try to remember what Lisa says on here, Todo bien, it’s all good.
So how did it go? Tell all, Martha
I attended our 9th reunion (we combined it w/the kids a year ahead since we were so close in H.S.) Had a great time & my husband enjoyed it even though he didn’t know a soul. Made it to one more along the way and then our 40th a couple of years ago.
Very fun time. A couple of our H.S. teachers came and that was so special. (One is my mom who taught English.) Everyone is so over the cliques and trying to impress. We were all down to earth and real and sincerely interested in each other’s current lives. Since then we’ve lost another classmate and I know in years to come it will be more precious to keep in touch.
One of our classmates started a round robin email since this and we’ve been keeping up to date better w/each other. Bless her for taking the time to re-connect us.
I responded to my 50th HS reunion by saying “I have not seen anyone in all these years, moved away and want to remember them as high school students. No thank you, cannot come.” Why angst over something like this. And, my attempts at a joke when I started the conversation by saying “I don’t want to be around all those old people” was met with, “oh, they are all your age…” I figured, why bother with such a low sense of humor from the organizer.
Dear Martha,
I attended my 40th class reunion this summer. I traveled 3,000 miles to get there and then thought about not going. Nerves! Well, it was one of trhe most fun times ever. We all grew up. You will have a blast. Don’t let this opportunity go by. Have fun and God bless. Tina
My 40th is in November and I was losing my nerve. Your post helped me remember the point. I’m going to have fun! Thanks, Martha.
At the time of our 10th reunion, I was still an angry feminist who was still disgusted with my high school experience. So, I sent a scathing 10 point letter to our class, ripping them and the high school to shreds and telling them it would be a cold day in hell before I ever went to a reunion. Turns out the coordinator read it aloud at the reunion (class of 134 students). By our 30th reunion, I had worked through that anger and found I wanted to return to a reunion just to find out if anyone else had been as unhappy as I had been back in the 60s and early 70s. They were surprised I came and related how even more surprised they had been when they heard that 10th year rant. Everyone said, “Why were you so angry? We remember you as a sweet, out-going girl, full of school spirit.” Just goes to show you how little we often know of our classmates;most are just hoping to make it out alive! LOL. Don’t be afraid to go back because it will not be the same, you are not the same, and this may be a golden opportunity to lay your sour memories to rest and make some new, happier ones.
Martha, go and have fun. I didn’t recognize most of the people and we all had to rely on photo name tags and eyeglass cheaters. It becomes a laugh for everyone. You will be happy to learn that EVERYONE gained weight, got grey, went bald and most grew up. Those who were haughty in high school are still haughty; the nice people are still nice. You’ll learn that nobody really led a charmed life. Everyone took turns under that black cloud at some point and some spent more time there than others. Unfortunately, some no-shows will be deceased. So, celebrate that you’re able to attend and have fun looking back. Remember, you can always leave if you aren’t having fun. My money is betting that you’ll stay. Good luck!
Last year I not only attended, but also almost singlehandedly, put on a 40th high school reunion. As the web moderator of our hugely successful website which allowed former classmates to “re-meet” each other beforehand by previewing bios and photos, I was privy to hearing many of their own pre-reunion angst like yours. Probably the most poignant one came in written form and, as the speaker for the reunion, I chose to read it (without divulging who’d written it) to the class.
The writer confessed that he wouldn’t be coming because he’d always felt invisible to the class. And, as a shy, quiet guy, he really had been. Not many of us knew him. And by his written words, it was apparent that that had hurt him deeply.
I told the classmates (we had about 120 attend), as I looked around the room, “There are a number of people who felt just like him, but they decided to suck it up and come anyway. For some in this room, it took nearly all the courage they had to come back and ‘re-meet’ people who might have teased them, thought less of them, bullied them. Let’s make a concerted effort that NO ONE goes home feeling ‘invisible’ tonight.”
That set the tone for the entire evening as I watched classmates connect in ways richer and more profound than I’d ever imagined. I also reminded the class that at our advanced age, this might be the LAST time we see someone. “So let’s make our memories of one another fond ones—even if they were birthed in the chaos of those teen years,” I added.
I encouraged the group that we could finish strong by forgiving one another and viewing each other for who they are NOW. Who they always probably were (but we were maybe too immature to realize it). A person of value. A person who never should have felt invisible.
What the class DIDN’T know about the shy, quiet writer of the letter was that he’d grown up to become a 10-time Emmy-award-winning story-teller, a television producer who’d interviewed presidents and celebrities and whose career, frankly, had outshone just about everyone else’s in the entire class! He couldn’t be with us (even if he’d chosen to come) because that day he was interviewing astronauts who had walked on the moon!
So my advice to you as you approach the dreaded 40th reunion?
Think outside yourself when going to your class reunion. Think about all those people for whom it’d taken all the courage they had to come. Then seek them out like a heat-seeking missile.
You’ll be able to spot them clinging to a quiet spot in the room, maybe holding up a wall with their spouse and/or a cocktail to give them artificial strength.
Give them what you know YOU need, what EVERYONE needs—a welcoming hug, a loving “I barely-knew-you- but-how-have-you-been-all-these-years?” And just listen. You’ll hear more than just their answers. You’ll hear the cry of all human beings–whether 16 or 60—-to be cared about, to be recognized, accepted, and, perhaps above all else, not invisible.
Ronna Snyder, author, Hot Flashes from Heaven
http://www.ronnasnyder.com/
Great advice, and not only for the reunion. I applaud what you did for your class, Ronna, and I’m sure they do too. Thanks.
It was truly a labor of love. AND repentence. And atonement. I likely wasn’t the kind of person I should have been in high school to many of them. And I wanted to make up for it—show them the “power of change”—the gift of midlife, so to speak.