Reunion

"You haven't changed a bit!" was the phrase I heard repeatedly at my 20th high school reunion. Really? I feel changed. Both deeply and superficially changed. But coming from people I haven't seen in twenty years, this was a comment I did not mind hearing. It meant they didn't see the gray I cover up in the salon, the lines I smooth over with retin-a are actually softening, the workouts I mentally and physically push through have kept the ever ready pounds at bay - how nice to hear.

This reunion was delightful. I saw friends I actively keep in touch with and miss desperately since moving and some that I have connected with through Facebook, and some that I have not seen since grade school. I've heard stories about reunions - people trying to prove themselves etc, but in my opinion, the SME '91 reunion was warm, embracing, and full of hugs and stories. Amy's fiance asked "How do you all not run out of words?" as he checked his watch over and over again. My own husband called a cab at 11:00 when he realized I might just be getting warmed up. Amy laughted and said "We never once ran out of words." She and I smiled at each other and remembered sleep overs where we fell asleep talking and woke up talking; for sure, we never ran out of words and to this day never have enough time to say it all in our brief visits. The night ended appropriately - Kellie and me sitting in her driveway talking deep into the night, crying, missing her mama deeply, giggling, belly laughing, and sharing like we've done as long as we've been alive. How is it that someone I became friends with at age 2 is still someone I would gravitate towards if I met her today? Reunion indeed.

Another friend jogged my memory with my very strange - and young - obsession with rock "star" Stephen Pearcy from Ratt. He remembers a day I was on the playground in 6th grade crying with Kellie over the fact that I would never meet the singer. I remember the day well. Kellie started the crying spree with her own wailing that she would never meet Peter Cetera, and I felt weird because I could never cry and she could cry on command. Crying really never has been my thing as I've mentioned a time or two on this blog, and to fit in with the crying crowd, I would have to force the emotion. The saddest thing I could think of, or was willing to confess to, was not meeting Stephen Pearcy, which should have been a testament to what an easy life I had; on the contrary, I had just found a letter my mom had written to my dad asking for a divorce. Me being me, I didn't mention to my mom that I read the letter she had stowed away in her purse - I was supposed to be fetching her wallet from the car when I found it. Since I was a little sister and highly trained in snooping, I sat in the driver's seat and read the letter word for word, placed it back in the purse, said nothing to my mom when I handed her the wallet, and went to school later and fake cried about not getting to meet Stephen Pearcy. The conjured cry was probably therapeutic and most certainly dramatic. And oh, the irony, when as an adult I did meet Stephen Pearcy, perfectly on accident in Olathe, KS. My shock at seeing him wasn't so much that I was finally meeting him but rather by how grotesque I found him.

You haven't changed a bit. How nice. I have though, far beyond finding Stephen Pearcy unattractive and wrinkled. Some of it makes me sad, some of it makes me proud, but I have changed, and more than a bit.