It's Like High School All Over Again

We stayed in Seattle for over two months this year so I could attend my 50th high school reunion. On the day of my 30th reunion I was on a 50-mile hike at Mt. Rainier National Park with the family, and was nagged by the thought I was supposed to be somewhere else that day. The 40th reunion I just completely forgot about, not sure why, so I felt an obligation to myself to at least try and remember the 50th reunion.

As a baby boomer, I remember always going to schools with large classes and with extra portables outside, and whose schools were splitting to form new high schools. I attended Curtis Junior High School in University Place, then transferred to Wilson High School in the north end of Tacoma. It was a solid, middle class high school (I believe we had one black student, a travesty by today’s standards), but all-in-all it was a great high school. Wilson was famous for one thing:  a state championship swimming team that was undefeated for seven years.

Oh the stories these three could tell: "You see officer, the tires are just a little under pressure and that's probably the cause of the squealing sound you heard . . ."

As a transfer student I knew exactly two kids at the school, and remembered feeling so relieved when I met Scott McRae and Tom Teitge in my gym class. We stayed lifelong friends to this day. I guess I was a typical student, active in clubs and student council, played on the football team, and dated a cheerleader. My big passion was skiing at Crystal Mountain, which had recently opened. I remember when Tom and I were walking across the Commons before class one morning and gazed out to Mt. Rainier beckoning to us in the distance. It took us about 40 minutes to rush home, give our mom’s excuses, get our ski gear, and enjoy one of the most incredible days of skiing I’d ever had. When the school attendance clerk called my mom she said I was home sick. When they called Tom’s mom (standing on a higher moral ground, I guess), she said Tom was up skiing with Walter Conner. Since we were both in Student Council we caught hell from Mr. Beers, our advisor, the next day. It was kind of hard to hide those sun tans and turtleneck lines.

I had a lot of trepidation about attending the 50th reunion. During high school you never quite knew what other students thought of you, or how you’d fit in with the others. We had an exceptionally large class at Wilson, just under 700 students, and I probably knew about 20 kids somewhat closely, another 30 loosely, and would say hi to a wider group from my classes and athletics. But that still leaves a huge number of kids I didn’t know.

Ironically I’d just started getting reconnected with a group of about 10 former classmates via Facebook. It was great to hear about their lives, but not always great to learn about their politics and obsessions with cats.

The reunion was held at Fircrest Golf Club in Tacoma, a club that my parents had been members at when we lived in Tacoma. It had changed a lot over time, with a beautiful new club house set among towering Douglas Fir trees.  It now felt a little out of my league.

I wasn’t sure what I would tell people when they asked what I was doing and where I lived. Sailing around the world on a sailboat that is currently in Tahiti seemed a bit much for a high school reunion (especially in Tacoma), so for many I just said we were doing some traveling. We’ve learned that most people simply don’t understand our strange lifestyle and don’t know the right questions to ask. The first question is always “Aren’t you worried about pirates?” To which my standard reply is “only the salesmen at West Marine.”  We’d love to talk about the many unique experiences we’ve had, the fascinating people we’ve met, and what crossing 3,000 miles of ocean is like, but that’s usually saved for a relatively few friends who truly understand what we’re doing and why.

It was interesting to see people I hadn’t seen in over 50 years, some were vaguely familiar, some I didn’t recognize at all, and a few lucky ones didn’t seem like they had aged a day (a stunning red dress showcased one beautiful former cheerleader). It was great hearing their stories, and seeing how various classmates turned out after all those years. Some were still married, but many were on second, third, fourth, and in one case, a fifth marriage (which I wouldn’t have suspected of her at all of this particular woman). Overall, people were all genuinely friendly and Meryl got a chance to meet some of my friends and to commiserate with other spouses who got dragged along to the event. 

We left with a nice feeling that although we made some unconventional choices in our lives, we were content with the direction those choices led us and hopefully we’ll have some great stories to tell when we’re maneuvering our wheelchairs around the retirement center.