Reunion Time

Picture: 1997...

• Titanic is #1 at the box office
• Michigan is the NCAA Football national champion
• The Hale-Bopp Comet prompts the Heaven's Gate cult to commit mass suicide
• The Detroit Red Wings defeat Philadelphia to win the Stanley Cup
• Brett Favre win his first and only Super Bowl
• O.J. Simpson is found liable in a civil suit
• Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone is released in the UK (it comes here a year later)
• Celine Dion and her smooth grooves take home the album of the year with Falling Into You
• Tony Blair becomes the Prime Minister of the UK (ironically, yesterday was his last day)
• I graduated from Concord Community High School

Yes, this Saturday is my 10-year high school reunion, and I'll admit that I'm approaching it with a little apprehension. My biggest fear is that no one's going to show up, and it will be like 10 losers and me. You know what that would make me, right? Oddly enough, it's being held at Covaleski Stadium (aka The Cove), home of the South Bend Silverhawks. We get to take over the meeting plaza thing and watch the epic showdown with the West Michigan Whitecaps, but all in all I think it would have been fun to hold it in the school gym, all decorated with streamers and stuff like a standard high school dance. I hope they'll at least play some good 1997-era music!

In all seriousness, I am looking forward to it. There are a lot of people I would like to catch up with, especially some of my friends that I haven't seen in years. Through the magic of MySpace I've been put in touch with a lot of folks, but there's nothing like getting everyone in one spot! It'll be fun to learn where everyone lives, interesting to hear what they do for a living, and terrifying to see pictures of their 8-year-old children. 10 years is a pretty long time!

But what about the main thing you go to a reunion for: to see what everyone looks like. I mean, I look in the mirror and think "I basically look the same, right?" But then I see a picture of myself from the late 90's and I think "Who's that kid?" Conversely, the other day I was looking at pictures from Carly's wedding, and I saw myself and thought "Who's that old man?" I have wrinkles around my eyes, for God's sake! Plus, back in high school I had hair, so that may throw people off. In a related note, as I was standing in the bathroom cutting my hair on Sunday about to finish up, I thought "Wait- this may be one of those times I should've sprung for an actual haircut."

Anyway, I'm going to keep a mental tally of the goods and bads from the reunion so I can recount them here. It should be a regular hootenanny! Then, since I'm going to be back in the Northern Indiana area, I'm going to take some time off work and head up to the cottage for a few days. Maybe if I take a week off now I won't have three weeks of vacation I have to burn at the holidays again! So you might not see anything from me for a while, but I'll be back eventually.