A decision made

[cupcake_goth]

My 20 year high school reunion is this coming Saturday.

I decided I'm not going to bother attending.

There's no one I really want to "catch up" with. I didn't keep in touch with anyone from high school, which is a little astonishing when I stop to think about how "small town" Seattle (and Shoreline, which I still can't believe is a real city) is. I don't want to spend $75 a ticket to go stand around in the "community center" that used to be my high school and be stared at by people who stared confusedly at me 20 years ago.

This isn't really a "OMG my high school years SUCKED!" sort of post, because honestly? My school years were relatively trauma-free. I was a freak, but I was a well-liked freak. However, that doesn't mean I want to spend a Saturday night trying to make nostalgic chit-chat with people I've barely thought about in decades.

Comments

[kijjohnson.livejournal.com]

Amen. This is why I haven't made it back for a single high-school or college reunion.

[trystbat.livejournal.com]

I actually wanted to go to my 20th reunion in Sept., but the cost was too high, the date is inconvenient, & AFAIK from the elist, it doesn't look like any of the ppl I'd want to see are actually going. So I'd be also standing around at a hotel being started at by ppl who stared at me 20 years ago. Eh.

There are folks I'd like to catch up with -- namely the band-geek crowd I tagged along with even tho' I didn't play an instrument. There weren't other geeks, we didn't have a drama dept., & I was too smart for the stoner crowd. Lost touch w/most of 'em a few years into college tho bec. I suck at keeping in touch w/anyone, pre-Internet.

[trystbat.livejournal.com]

See, I did make it harder on ppl -- I legally changed my name rather significantly since high school. Not with the intention of hiding; just to better suit my personality. A couple ppl have found me, but they've had to work at it & have sent me "um, sorry to bother you, I don't know if this is really OldName, but if you are..." emails.

[torreybird.livejournal.com]

How beautifully put.

I teach at a high school, and I always warn the kids: "don't peak now." Life is better now in my 30s than it ever could be in high school. I don't need to revisit those days or those memories, because the lessons learned from them have been built and built upon.

And I always find myself sneering at the Jostens people. Parents shell out hundreds of dollars because "these are the best years" of their kids' lives. How's that for setting low expectations?

[torreybird.livejournal.com]

*nods in agreement*

Even more frightening? A huge percentage of the advertising we're bombarded with all the time is based on the premise or actively supports the idea that the first 1/4 of the lifespan is the best part... and it's all downhill from there.

Thank goodness for people who think.

[savannarama.livejournal.com]

The ridiculous claim that "these are the best years of your life" left me quite melancholy from time to time when I was a child. I felt that had to be a lie, but the weird, pervasive insistence of the idea made me doubt myself.

If anyone had taken me aside and said "Complete bollocks, all of it" I would've been loads more calm and confident.

[poh.livejournal.com]

I ended up rejecting that assessment when I realized: "I haven't even gotten laid yet, and I'm not a rock star. How in the hell are these the best years of my life again?" :D

[torreybird.livejournal.com]

Yeah, that's why I make a point of saying that out loud in my classes. Every one of them, every year! It makes quite an impact, actually. I think it's one of the most important functions of extended, age-ranged family: that each generation reminds the others that there are different perspectives.

[smu.livejournal.com]

I completely agree. I never understood the point of the rings and all that hoo hah. High school is basically meaningless in your life, it's a transitional period that can be particularly hellish. The rings and such have moved into colleges as well, I couldn't help but glare at the ring guy in my college student center.

[sistawendy.livejournal.com]

Biggest reason I skipped mine: my high school reunion was 3000 miles away from here. Second biggest reason: the people I'd want to see -- even if there are several -- are also on average about a thousand miles from there. That's what happens when you and your friends are smart kids in a smallish town.

[ocvictor.livejournal.com]

I skipped my tenth. Almost went, but the price was stupidly high, and I was having none of it. Ended up having dinner with an old classmate the week after, who walked right in near the end, and the only people around were the ones he actually was happy to see. (Which would have been the same for me.)

Still, don't much care, and don't see me headed back to California for the 20th in a couple years. If serendipity takes me there, sure. But I don't see the need to put any effort in. Besides, they all find me on MySpace anyway, which is fine.

Agreed

[apostle.livejournal.com]

My 20th is at the end of August as well. Not going. Complete lack of interest, or even curiosity.

At the 10th there was a huge drug bust that included the arrest of about half of the attendees. That pretty much put a cap on things for me in regards to my fellow classmates.

[savannarama.livejournal.com]

I went to my 10th, which was great in a number of small, strange ways...but I feel like it wrapped everything up.

[valerian.livejournal.com]

LOL!

Yep, sounds just like what I've been mulling over for the past couple of months. The one thing that just finalized my not going to my 20 year reunion this year is all these people from high school who have been relentlessly adding me on FaceBook. Most of them wouldn't give me the time of day back then, and frankly I couldn't give a bat's ass what they've been up to since. Not to mention that my reunion is happening about an hour's drive from here (nowhere near my old school even, in fact it's way out in the middle of redneckville-nowhere, since I think I'm the only one who lives in the BIG CITY) in a hotel ballroom with a built-in casino next door. Yeah, *NOT*.

[javagoth.livejournal.com]

This isn't really a "OMG my high school years SUCKED!" sort of post, because honestly? My school years were relatively trauma-free.

This was more or less the case with me when I decided not to go. There was one main difference though: In high school I mostly blended into the background. I drifted away from the few people I used to hang out with because I changed a great deal and we really didn't have much in common any more. Each attempt to re-connect with those folks ended the exact same way - a couple of emails and they stopped responding when they realized I am not at all the same person that I used to be and stopped responding to the emails for whatever reason. I decided long ago that I was not going to be the only one making an effort in a friendship so I let them go again.

I figured out that my only purpose for going would be to be a side show freak that gave them something to talk about while I would likely be bored much of the time. When I looked at the list of folks going, the few I had any interest in finding out about what's going on in their lives now were not on the list. Of course, I would be remiss if I didn't note I was also unemployed at the time so putting out the money for a ticket was no small thing.

Ultimately I decided that I was really only considering going to it out of tradition rather than any real desire to reconnect with people. And let's face it - if we aren't travelling in the same social circles (some of them anyway) by now, chances are we aren't likely to ever and so that would further reduce the time for any type of relationship to be built...

[effrenatus.livejournal.com]

For the record, you're *still* a well-liked freak. :)

I haven't been to a HS reunion yet, and for many of the same general reasons. Of course, I was more geek than freak.

-mls

I crashed one and it was enough

[maiaarts.livejournal.com]

I went with my older brother to his 10th Reunion (He was a year ahead of me)
and it was just like a movie. I did a total fashion makeover on him (he gained height and looks AFTER highschool)

When we walked in, everyone thought I was there for the reunion, and wondered who the gorgeous guy was who was my date. It was AWESOME. He was the picked on geek of the school, and he got to go back as the successful good looking guy to flip them all off. We ended up at a table of single women who tried to pick him up, and all the losers who used to pick on him had to stand on chairs to look up at him.

Now that my brother is dead, I vastly prefer to remember that time. It was a blast. I am having a lot of fun on the Classmates.com - I get to be in touch with the people I wanted to find, and I don't have to pay money or bore my husband who never even had a prom or graduation from high school or from college (though he has the degrees it was not important to him).

Now, I inherited my brother's highschool ring (my parents did not get them for me or my younger brother) and it has meaning for me, more than my own would have.

(and for the person above with the drug bust story :) the bust was at my highschool prom and what a drag that was.

I think that it might be fun to go to one of these things at 40 years or something like that....

[krypt-kitten.livejournal.com]

Mine isn't for a couple of years, but I can honestly say I have no intention of going. Didn't go to my 10th for same reasons not going to my 20th and everyone else, including you, has stated those so no need for me to add anything further.

[pvcdiva.livejournal.com]

I made exactly the same decision and have not regretted it...

[staxxy.livejournal.com]

last week I went back to classmates.com to look around. Of the 1200 people in my class (between two schools), and the 6000 people that went those highschools (they were basically one highschool with two campuses), I wanted to get in touch with 7 that were on the site. I emailed one, who emailed me back with is number and called him. Hurrah he is alive.

and have been emailing back and forth with another off on on since last week.

There are about 15 other people I would be interested in hearing from.

Of those 22 people - 3 *might* even know if there was a reunion. None of them would go though.

My class, to the best of my (or anyone I have run into's) knowledge is not having reunions at all. It just is not something we are interested in. Anyone who really wants to get in touch with anyone else, will just make the damn effort.

We were a weird group anyway.

and, there was a LOT of death around our class. Not in it, but the years before and after. And none of us wants to sit around playing "and who else is dead" for a few hours. :\

[wormtorturer.livejournal.com]

Not much point for me to go to a HS reunion, either. I didn't have close friends at school, and I'm not even on the mailing list because I dropped out after my junior year. Someone found me via Classmates.com and claimed to be a friend, but I remembered her as the Scary Gangsta Girl so WTF? If I want reunions with the people in fandom I hung out with, there's always Comic-Con. And that way I can see the Foglios, too!

Wow. It's been about 25 years since I first attended STAR San Diego. By the 30-year mark, I may have an impressive enough portfolio to go down there and parade my success.