Duane, you've only just begun. I am 12 years ahead of you. The first time I walked into a high school reunion, I seriously thought I was in the wrong place. No lie!

Enjoy your get-together.

I was in the class of '65, too, dedtired. First reunion I went to was the 45th. Duane, you ain't seen nuthin' yet! A lot of the faces look just the same, but OLD! Others look just great. Most of the relationships hadn't changed a bit.

One amazing girl arrived with an entourage - husband, fawning friends - wearing a flowing gown, and looking exactly as she did the day we graduated. I'm not kidding. Still thin, beautiful, unlined. She was the talk of the reunion, and boy, did she love it. She knew what she was doing. I don't know how she does it.

What's really odd, if you remain in the community in which you were raised, is to have your children taught by your former teachers and classmates. Somehow, it just feels weird.

Enjoy reminiscing.

Boy do I know about that looking the same thing but OLD! LOL. Too funny....but true. Yes, I live in the same area as growing up as did my parents and grandparents. I remember raising my hand in high school in a class called "Trip Talk"...the entire premise of the class was the teacher showing her home movies of her summer travels. All of the other kids took this class to get a good mid-day nap in...but I was enthralled....got my bug about traveling from this teacher. The moral of that story is my dad mentioned that he had Ms. Sharkey as a teacher when he was in school....so when I raised my hand to tell the teacher that my dad had her as a teacher she got this horrific look on her face and said that she vowed the first time she heard that she would quit and retire on the spot....then she sighed...became quiet for a few seconds and said: Okay, I'll stay, but the first time a student says my grandma/grandpa had me as a teacher I am DEFINITELY retiring! True story. And my dad said when he was going to school she was the hottest teacher there va va voooooooooom LOL.

Duane

Graduated 1949....and you can do the math. I don't go to reunions. No one is ever there except old people!

jude

LOL Jude!
I had my drivers license photo ID retaken this week. That was depressing, to watch yourself age like that. My last photo was pretty darn good, oddly. This one is just OK. I am getting more and more aware of lighting.
Actually, I enjoy hooking up with long lost pals, if they don't get too much into "remember when." I find that in many cases we can pick up right where we left off and still have fun. That is, after the initial visual shock! I'm sure they all still feel 20 something too. I know I do and it is so cruel that the photo and the feeling don't match! I can still stay active, I don't get aches and pains, but my body is so touchy, I get sick more, have headaches that last longer, my tummy is touchy, my skin is fussy. At least you don't have to suffer menopause. All of the problems of adolescence and none of the benefits!!!!!

Not to worry - Judgement Day is just around the corner - May 21, with the end of the world in October of this year! And I thought we had until December 2012.

(Note: I thought the site I linked to was rather humorous.)

Lars

I have saved all of my drivers license since they started requiring photos. At first I improved a bit, but it's been all downhill since then. That reminds me that I have to have my pic taken this month. Sigh.

Jude, my mom is 93 and finally stopped going to HS reunions a few years ago when she realized there was no one even close to her class. She won the prize for oldest every year. She is class of 1935!

Think I'll go take a nap.

Lars,I didn't need to know about Judgement Day.LOL That's my anniversary which I hope to share with Annie's daughter, Ashley.

Lpink,I was bemoaning the fact that I had to have my picture made again when I liked the one I have and my daughters said "renew it online" which I did. That's in Tn, don't know about other states. They gave me the option of keeping the same photograph. Anymore, you sometimes have to have 2 forms of picture ID so DL and Passport are all I have.

jude

I did renew online, but that's only for paying. They sent me something I had to take down to get the photo. I don't think I had the option of saving the old photo. TN has it right, lol!

Since I was a grandma at age 38, time is not at all, at all, at all, relevant. (I was 19 when son was born, he was 19 when his son was born, I was still "young".) I didn't feel old then and now that that grandson is 25,I think I look great for "a woman of my age". The big secret is that inside I am still 33!!! But, don't tell anybody - there are definite advantages to being a "cranky old lady". My grandma was 104 and still played cards twice a week (in her own apartment, serving oodles of appetizers and nibbles she made), other grandma was 99 and made bread and doughnuts every Saturday for the retirement home she lived in - for 25 years straight, because someone told her that she could not live alone at 74 - pshaw. That is my goal - to still be a fruit farmer and be making homemade jam well into 40 years past retirement -- that's started 10 years ago as I retired at 55 so I could get out of the stifling corporate workplace to sell my jams and baked treats at my local farmers market every week, making people happy with "old-fashioned" so I still have 30 years left.

I'll be 66 come June and have wrinkles galore - every single one I've earned. I went to my 25th reunion in 1988 and saw such despair that I vowed never to go again. They all, like, stopped living past high school or college. Could not relate. They had no "present tense".

I greatly object to obituaries that cite from whence and where someone finished high school or college as if that made them who they were and then -- they stopped. I much prefer the obits that say he/she loved their family and what they did to show that, or took in strays, or painted murals, or knitted hats for preemies, or grew gorgeous roses, or volunteered at soup kitchens, made great casseroles, or knew how to prune bushes and trees, or drove cross country with 3 kids, or helped out at a preschool, or whatever REAL THING they did AFTER they graduated umpteen years before. Those people I can relate to, not the ones whose ONLY accomplishment in life was that they graduated.

Nancy

Nancy, I love your outlook on life and could not agree more! It's funny, high school was really more of something I had to get through...I went to a huge school with almost 4,000 students! Can you believe that? There were kids I went to school with for 4 years that I never met nor even passed in the hallway! However, as I look at my yearbook I see so many clubs and extra-curricular activities that make me a bit meloncholy that I didn't participate more. But in 1975 my mom's mother passed away (my grandma of coures) and it upset my mom so much she became suicidal and many times I had to run after her and drag her home before she jumped in the river etc. While other kids were having fun I was trying to keep my mom from killing herself. Not asking for sympathy..just stating what was happening. In any case I suppose I'm a bit jealous of the kids that had a great high school experience....I did but not to the degree of others but what it is is what it is.

I have to really agree with the obit stuff. When I get the paper delivered I find it my duty to read the obits...I feel I should honor those folks by at least reading the few lines that summarize their lives. I can't stand the ones that are 10 inches long that only dialogue their corporate accomplishments...blah..blah...blah...so they were work-a-holics that spent all of their time in corporate american.blah..blah..blah....gosh..what is on their tombstone: I wish I could have spend more time in corporate boardrooms!???

I had to laugh at one not long ago that cronicles an older lady that at 13 years of age jumped into her daddy's car (Model T?) and when caught said 'The hobo's did it" and got a nickname that was very colorful but escapes me at the moment - something like hobo-jane! Anyway, this young girl went to Europe and participated in road races in the 40's and just lead a very colorful life. That is what I want to read...not that Joe-Blow head up committee 10434334366 - 1994-2004 and blah blah blah.

Good job Nancy and keep up the good work you young wild child you!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Duane, I don't know some of the people I went to high school with too. I worked 60 hours a week all the way through high school, and was a farm kid in a college town, so high school was something I got through, not something I enjoyed. All I wanted was for them to give me a diploma and get out of my way! I haven't attended a single reunion and don't intend to, and now I know I'm right in doing that, I won't notice that everyone else has gotten so old.

Nancy, my grandmother used to tell me that you're only young once, but you can be immature forever. I try to live up to that, LOL.

and I thought of you last week, my rhubarb is actually about 4 inches tall. The weather was so cold that everything is about 3 weeks behind, but it's finally coming along...

Annie