It's reunion time

I always thought old people had 15 year high school reunions. Turns out I was wrong because mine is this fall and I'm far from old. Live and learn!

Reunions do make you think. I haven't stayed in touch with anyone, so I don't actually have any desire to go. [Now if I was ridiculously famous and strikingly gorgeous, then of course I'd go!!! But as I'm pretty much the exact opposite of both of those things, I think I'll just stay home and study.] To be a fly on the wall, perhaps. After all, who doesn't want to know what's become of all of their classmates? I certainly do. I want to know who's done what and who's doing what and who's where and all that stuff. Lucky for me, they're going to be sending out a class directory so I can find all of that out without having to go anywhere near the reunion! Now I just have to hope that most people sent in their information for the directory. After all, they had one for our 10 year, too, and I didn't even respond to that one (or receive it).

Of course, the only directory information they asked for was family and professional. Nothing about schooling. And since pretty much the only thing I've done is go to school (I'm getting pretty good at getting those degrees!), I didn't have much of anything to fill out on the information form. Oh well. I guess that's what happens when you graduate from a rural school. I'm sure the form would look quite different for some perky little city prep school.

Reunions do get you thinking. Both about life then and life now. Distance hasn't really made the "then" part any different for me. I existed on the fringes in high school. I got along with everyone (well, for the most part, there was an exception or two), but didn't really have friends. Sure there were a couple. But they didn't stick. That's always made me a little sad. I'm so jealous of the people I know who have close friendships from their childhoods. I don't even know anyone from my childhood anymore. I don't care about the lack of dating in high school. It's the lack of lasting, life-long friendships that I miss.

Overall though, high school was okay for me. Middle school was Hell. But I survived that (didn't think I would at the time and occasionally look back with some surprise that I made it through) and made it to high school and things there were… well, they were fine. No high drama. Again, I just kind of existed. No one was mean to me. I've never been able to decide if that's because I just didn't encourage meanness in people (that would be the best explanation!), if they didn't notice me enough to be mean, or if people just didn't want to be mean to my brother's sister. Who knows. And really, who cares. Does it really matter? It was 15 years ago and has no bearing on my present life. But sometimes I just wonder about it.

And life now. Having a reunion makes you take stock, see if you're where you thought you'd be, and if not, whether that's okay. Am I where I thought I'd be? Well, to be honest, I never really knew where'd I be. I still detest the "where will you be, what will you being doing in 5/10/x years from now" questions. I don't know. I'll be where life takes me. Granted that sounds rather aimless and unambitious. And I don't feel I'm either of those things. It's just that we can't see the future. We don't know what's going to happen in a year or two or five or even tomorrow. I don't want to have such a rigid life plan that I miss out on the opportunities outside that plan that arise for me. I also don't want to set myself up for the inevitable disappointment. After all, what ever goes entirely by plan?! So I'm in law school at the moment and the plan is still to work in the government (somehow, somewhere, some way). I don't know what opportunities will actually come along by the time I graduate. I want to remain open enough in my plans that I don't miss out on a once in a lifetime type chance to do… whatever! I'm easy. As long as whatever I'm doing makes a difference in some way then I'll be happy.

After all, my overall life plan is really rather simple: I want to save the world. That's not so tough. It's all about the butterfly effect. When you look at it that way, we all (every single last one of us) have the absolute power to change the world. We just have to be careful to use that amazing power for good. If I can look back at my future reunions and be comfortable in the knowledge that I have made some positive difference, then it'll all be good.