Subject: High School Reunions.
I don't really understand the concept of reunions.
Firstly, 2008 was not that long ago. Therefore, no reunion is necessary. Nothing significant has happened in the last four years that would need sharing.
Secondly, what the hell is the point?
Idealists say: "Ooooh, it's for reuniting with your buddies from high school and sharing how much you've grown and how much you've accomplished!"
This is how I see it:
You leave each other for an indeterminate amount of time, usually about 5 to 10 years––something most people are almost crawling out of their skin to do, despite the tearful good-bye's at graduation.
Then, someone gets the idea of summoning you all back from remote corners of the world, only to have half the people show up. There are, also, the inevitable few who are forgotten, who find out about it after the fact. (These people end up being serial killers.)
After being badgered into going by high school "friends" who then leave you dry by not actually going, you don your semi-formal attire and meet in the smelly gymnasium to which fond memories of sweating like a pig are attached.
Then, when you're all drinking cheap wine and "socializing," meaning bragging about what you've accomplished (most of which are lies) or what you're going to do in the near future, you find out unsavory things about your classmates:
- Who has married who, which never really interested you anyway, since being married this early usually spells disaster.
- Who died. That's a really inspiring topic.
- Who's in jail or has gone off the deep end, the only topic of any interest at all, since you had bets on who would tank when you were still roped together as a unit.
- Who's made it in the world, which only makes you realize how little you've accomplished.
Then, after three hours of awkward half-conversations and way too much wine, you realize you hated all of these people anyway.
Of course, I didn't always think like this.
When I was in high school, the thought of a high school reunion was a happy thing!
I would come back and everyone will have changed significantly, and they'd all be mature and more well-rounded.
You see, then I went to college, and I kept my F*cebook. After four years, I went back and browsed through the photos of those people I knew in high school.
Turns out, they haven't changed at all.
The drunks are even more drunk, the stoners are now hipster stoners, girls who were morally aligned are now skanks, the skanks are wearing even less clothing and more spray on tan than they used to, and the geeks have leveled up into basement dwelling, blue-skinned WoW freaks who don't shower.
It's a crying shame. Well, not really. I'm not terribly surprised by this. Disappointed, but not surprised.
Of course, there are the select few who redeem the class, but those types generally avoid reunions or go for a short time to humor those who threw it.
Personally, I hope to end up in the "forgotten" category. I don't want the guilt of having to refuse a reunion of a class comprised of loathsome people.
So, if you hear a story about how a woman in Kansas snapped and there was a recent high school reunion followed by mass murder, then you know what happened.
Bleh. It seems like when I start these rants I know exactly where I'm going, but by the end, my brain shorts out, gets bored and whines about doing something else.
I'm going to go to bed now. This has been entirely too pointless and unnecessarily negative. But, a rant is a rant.
Peace off.
