What you remember
I got a letter in the mailbox today asking for a donation to my high school's annual fund. I have supported these things in the past, it helped shape who I am today like it or not. The summer before last, I decided to go to my 20th high school reunion. I asked myself why I did this, to this day I am still asking myself why I did it. One often times ends up wearing their yoga pants and wearing "This is what Awesome looks like" T shirt down to the mailbox and nearly choking on that bag of cookies you are eating when they open a letter like this. You then break out the yearbook and wonder what happened to the one voted Most Likely to Succeed, and realize you did not live up to that and would be voted Most Likely to Wear PJ Pants During a Late Night Trip to Wal-Mart. This letter today asked me, the alumnae they are asking a donation from, to reminisce about their favorite memory from high school. Here are some of the questions they asked:
1) What traditions do you like best?
Traditions I suppose would fall under some of those nostalgia trips. Did we have them? A few, I guess. The one I remember the most was Senior Pound Down, where all the seniors got together and told tales of their debauchery at different points, sometimes involving people in other classes a year or two older or younger. They were hilarious, raunchy stories that teenage girls like telling one another because they are/were emerging Bad Girls. I didn't tell a tale. Instead I stayed silent, because I wasn't one of them. That is, I didn't socialize with them much. I just didn't have friends in high school, at least, ones that I actually attended high school with. We just didn't make a connection. I wasn't a Slutty Bad Girl, I wasn't a Goth Rocker, I wasn't a Nerd / Brain, I wasn't a Trekker / Trekkie, I wasn't a Jock. My title, I guess, was, Miscellaneous. As such, I remained in the shadows. I really had no choice.
2) Do you remember the words to your favorite song in the song contest?
This was perhaps the most humiliating experience of adolescence (and there were a lot of those). Should I ever return for that alumni holiday lunch (and I have once or twice), I always leave before that song thing. I know that somewhere there is another gal who is thinking the same thing and I do her the courtesy of leaving so I will spare her at least one audience member not seeing it. The theme here is to come up with hilarious songs to sing for all of the alumni who return about the trials and tribulations of attending said institution. This is not a bad thing, by any means, it's sweet and nostalgic. Couple that fact that there were some hilariously bad song writing that was at the hands of The Bitches who had to control everything. And they didn't control it well. But I think we were so apathetic once the power had been passed to their hands once again, let them have it.
3) Were you a Green or a White?
My mind's a blank. Sorry.
4) What was the subject of your senior speech?
Once again, mind's a blank. Maybe that's a good thing.
I suppose there is nothing to be happy about. I went to my 20th summer before last, expecting something but was disappointed. One gal, an asshole if there ever was one, decided she was going to host a party for everyone to bring their spouses and/or kids to; and, in a classic move, she threw some kind of tantrum and canceled the whole thing barely 48 hours before and left all hanging. Classy. Some, if they knew the truth, did not repeat what the drama was about. I had a faint glimmer of hope that maybe some changed for the better, but no dice. Instead I ended up hugging a few people hello I didn't really want to hug hello but I felt that they did it for the same reason. And I brought my Handsome Fake Trophy Husband with me just to show those Bitches (and only one showed up and she gave me some weird hello as I walked from the bathroom back to the dinning hall). It made a statement, which was "You all see THIS? You're all old and fat and divorced and I'm hitting THIS sweet piece of ass, TEN YEARS MY JUNIOR! Don't say I never accomplished nothing!" I left a few going "Huh?" and scratching their heads a bit, but C played it to a tee without even trying. Perhaps the greatest moment was when I overhead him talking to the gal on the other side of him, when she asked him what he did. He said "I'm an actor. And I'm a personal trainer and a lifeguard." She said "Oh ..." I couldn't help but laugh to myself, and everyone at the theater company thought it was hysterical as well when I repeated it weeks later.
Disappointment seems to be the theme that this brought out in me. In some ways it is kind of refreshing to see The Bitches who are living boring, ordinary existences. One was first to get married, first to get divorced. And the Goth Rockers no longer wear their asshole Hot Topic clothes over their uniforms and vampire make up on a daily basis. At the 10th reunion, the same people showed up, we were seemingly happy that we were able to drink alcohol now. Legally that is. In some ways I was unhappy that I didn't go to a coed school, because I would have liked to have run into some guy that I always wanted to screw at the 20th reunion, have our one night of longed for passion and then walk away the next day. But that came under other circumstances, of which I won't get into detail here because I AIN'T CRAZY. Next is the 30th reunion which is in another eight years. By the 30th that's what Spanx was invented for. Our hair will have gone completely grey and we will have gained nice middle aged bellies by then. Some will have grandchildren and the party will be over by 10 pm. I'll have to make a bigger statement by then. I will ask my army of fags to come with me, young and cute and full of pep. Or maybe I will turn into one of those who live ordinary existences. After the 20th reunion letdown, I went to my friend E's house where he was having a party, then into Tremont and sat in the back with the other outcasts who are now the Cool People who make the world an exciting place for other people's ordinary lives.
1) What traditions do you like best?
Traditions I suppose would fall under some of those nostalgia trips. Did we have them? A few, I guess. The one I remember the most was Senior Pound Down, where all the seniors got together and told tales of their debauchery at different points, sometimes involving people in other classes a year or two older or younger. They were hilarious, raunchy stories that teenage girls like telling one another because they are/were emerging Bad Girls. I didn't tell a tale. Instead I stayed silent, because I wasn't one of them. That is, I didn't socialize with them much. I just didn't have friends in high school, at least, ones that I actually attended high school with. We just didn't make a connection. I wasn't a Slutty Bad Girl, I wasn't a Goth Rocker, I wasn't a Nerd / Brain, I wasn't a Trekker / Trekkie, I wasn't a Jock. My title, I guess, was, Miscellaneous. As such, I remained in the shadows. I really had no choice.
2) Do you remember the words to your favorite song in the song contest?
This was perhaps the most humiliating experience of adolescence (and there were a lot of those). Should I ever return for that alumni holiday lunch (and I have once or twice), I always leave before that song thing. I know that somewhere there is another gal who is thinking the same thing and I do her the courtesy of leaving so I will spare her at least one audience member not seeing it. The theme here is to come up with hilarious songs to sing for all of the alumni who return about the trials and tribulations of attending said institution. This is not a bad thing, by any means, it's sweet and nostalgic. Couple that fact that there were some hilariously bad song writing that was at the hands of The Bitches who had to control everything. And they didn't control it well. But I think we were so apathetic once the power had been passed to their hands once again, let them have it.
3) Were you a Green or a White?
My mind's a blank. Sorry.
4) What was the subject of your senior speech?
Once again, mind's a blank. Maybe that's a good thing.
I suppose there is nothing to be happy about. I went to my 20th summer before last, expecting something but was disappointed. One gal, an asshole if there ever was one, decided she was going to host a party for everyone to bring their spouses and/or kids to; and, in a classic move, she threw some kind of tantrum and canceled the whole thing barely 48 hours before and left all hanging. Classy. Some, if they knew the truth, did not repeat what the drama was about. I had a faint glimmer of hope that maybe some changed for the better, but no dice. Instead I ended up hugging a few people hello I didn't really want to hug hello but I felt that they did it for the same reason. And I brought my Handsome Fake Trophy Husband with me just to show those Bitches (and only one showed up and she gave me some weird hello as I walked from the bathroom back to the dinning hall). It made a statement, which was "You all see THIS? You're all old and fat and divorced and I'm hitting THIS sweet piece of ass, TEN YEARS MY JUNIOR! Don't say I never accomplished nothing!" I left a few going "Huh?" and scratching their heads a bit, but C played it to a tee without even trying. Perhaps the greatest moment was when I overhead him talking to the gal on the other side of him, when she asked him what he did. He said "I'm an actor. And I'm a personal trainer and a lifeguard." She said "Oh ..." I couldn't help but laugh to myself, and everyone at the theater company thought it was hysterical as well when I repeated it weeks later.
Disappointment seems to be the theme that this brought out in me. In some ways it is kind of refreshing to see The Bitches who are living boring, ordinary existences. One was first to get married, first to get divorced. And the Goth Rockers no longer wear their asshole Hot Topic clothes over their uniforms and vampire make up on a daily basis. At the 10th reunion, the same people showed up, we were seemingly happy that we were able to drink alcohol now. Legally that is. In some ways I was unhappy that I didn't go to a coed school, because I would have liked to have run into some guy that I always wanted to screw at the 20th reunion, have our one night of longed for passion and then walk away the next day. But that came under other circumstances, of which I won't get into detail here because I AIN'T CRAZY. Next is the 30th reunion which is in another eight years. By the 30th that's what Spanx was invented for. Our hair will have gone completely grey and we will have gained nice middle aged bellies by then. Some will have grandchildren and the party will be over by 10 pm. I'll have to make a bigger statement by then. I will ask my army of fags to come with me, young and cute and full of pep. Or maybe I will turn into one of those who live ordinary existences. After the 20th reunion letdown, I went to my friend E's house where he was having a party, then into Tremont and sat in the back with the other outcasts who are now the Cool People who make the world an exciting place for other people's ordinary lives.
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