Reunions

Romy and Michele's High School Reunion

For an old guy, my travels have been keeping the Arab world financially solvent this past month or so.

After enjoying 36 degrees in June up in the tundra around Mackinac Island I spent 9 days at Tennessee’s Fall Creek Falls State Park for my wife’s family reunion. This past weekend was devoted to my high school reunion in Chattanooga, the ‘Land Where the Sun Shines Bright and the Moonshine’s Delicious.’

You may not consider it of too great a consequence but, despite all of the great cooks in my wife’s family, I gained but one pound over that span of time. That qualifies as a miracle.

I did discover that a brother-in-law is a regular reader of this blog. His interest may be more a matter of keeping tabs on me, as he adroitly avoided making any comment that I could use to promote my little publication. He also avoided any comment that might cause familial strains. He may have missed his true calling, as a diplomat. (Smile, Richard)

Missing my necessary time at the YMCA, I ventured out to the pool one day. Two of my grandchildren were already in the pool. I was greeted by the three-year old with the observation, “Grandpa, your belly is full.” He is no longer in the will.

The class reunion was less of an affront to my self-image. Class reunions are always surprising. After all these years there have been a few changes. I felt somewhat the stranger among all of those old people. Perhaps, the next time I will treat everyone to a case or two of Grecian Formula.

There were several people there who made me regret that we had failed to keep in touch. Having spent so much time traveling throughout the world, this is only the third reunion I have been able to make in more than half a century.

Although our class was large, over 400 members, it was close-knit. It was also surprisingly accomplished. I probably should not have been all that surprised.

Arnold sat down at the piano and played a few selections. They ranged from honky-tonk to real rock, that from the fifties. He did a more than fair take on old Jerry Lee Lewis. I had forgotten that he had played trumpet in the school’s Swing Band, as well as a little rock band. With his shiny pate he doesn’t really look the part of a rocker but he has much more talent than those three chords and a guitar guys that assault our ears daily.

On the other side of the coin, we had lost Bill Byrd a couple of years back. He was terrific on the clarinet and sax. He spent his life living the dream of a lot of us. He played mostly with the Stan Kenton Orchestra but also several other big bands.

I, on the other hand, having given up on my own musical pursuits, can only claim to live a block or so from the grave of Johnny Cash. That’s not a lot to brag about, particularly for someone whose musical tastes may be broad but not sufficiently inclusive to cover the genre of country music.

One classmate who shall remain nameless used to manage Greg Allman. Traveling in those circles, he assured me that he had seen Little Richard recently, and that he was almost alive. Paul (oops) is more than competitive with Little Richard in flamboyance.

Given my own need to keep up the pace, I shouldn’t have been surprised that so many of my fellow classmates just keep on keeping on. One, after retiring from NASA, had begun another career as a college professor, retired from that and informed us that he had just signed on for at least another year.

There isn’t any recourse for those who left us far too soon but the reunion could have been a much richer experience if more members of the class had shown up. There was a lot more to do than compare our maladies and surgeries, although there was that too.

There is no way to fully relay all that one benefits from reunions, whether of family or classmates. I would encourage everyone to take advantage of every opportunity to do so, however. Perhaps it is a matter of one’s appreciation growing with age. That certainly could be argued in my case but I regret all of those reunions I have missed over the years. I think you should regret that too.

Crawford Harris - Polymath