In Heaven with the Class of '87

Almost a week has passed since my 25th High School Reunion. I knew I was going to have to write about it eventually, but the problem is that many a handful of my old classmates read this blog so I can't exactly talk dirt about people. (Not that I was actually planning on doing that. Me? Talk behind someone's back? You should be ashamed for even suggesting such a thing!)

And even if I don't name names, it might still be obvious about whom I'm writing. Which would just be mean. And that's not what the night was all about: it was a fun evening of dancing, drinking, good conversation, and laughs. The jocks, cheerleaders, burnouts, drama nerds, and band geeks all put aside their teenaged differences and partied.

Partying like it's 1987

No, I did not spend my night sizing people up and passing judgement. Okay, that's a lie. I definitely sized up; no judging, though. But just like my reunion manicure that's starting to chip and peel, I need to strip off the pretty surface layer and look at the naked truth hiding underneath.

So, without getting specific...

For starters, why do the women (on the whole) look fabulous, while the men--again, in general, because there were a handful of guys who've aged wonderfully--seem to have given up? Half of them look like they are vying for Stanley's or Kevin's job at Dunder-Mifflin. There was baldness. Pastiness. Doughiness. Hey, you can't help going gray or losing your hair, I get it. But you can help getting fat and out of shape. Again, no judgement--it's your lives, do what you want--but DUDES, you were so cute back in high school! It's just a bummer.

The women were much better groomed, way more stylish (though there were some bleh suburban looks as well), and just healthier-looking overall. In fact, my main concern with the women is just how darned perfect--too perfect--some of them seem. No, I didn't see any evidence of plastic surgery. But what is up with the sweet girls who have become Stepford Wives? I definitely had a couple of conversations where I was searching in vain for a pulse. With most people, I could get a glimpse of the six- or ten- or sixteen-year-old I once knew but with one or two of these ladies, it was like, "HELLO IN THERE?" Where did the adorable, spunky girls I once knew go? It was weird. But at least they looked great.

Drowning in the Past

I've been spending too much time in the past lately. Facebook can do that to a person. Daily cyber-stalking-spying on your high school crush (Is he gross now, or pretty cute for an old guy?) or the mean girl who made your middle-school years a living hell (Please, PLEASE let her be fat now.) can take one's focus away from the here and now (Crap, my kid's bus will be here any second!). Facebook makes it really easy to lose yourself in the minutia of someone-you-haven't-seen-in-25-years-and-never-really-liked-to-begin-with's life.

But even before Facebook (the horrors!), my brain spent too much time dwelling on the past. I'm one of those people who like to pore through old photo albums--other people's as well as my own. Over and over again. I'm strange like that. I've always dwelled on the past, even when I was too young to have a past of my own. Then I would just obsess over previous eras and the people who glamorized them (Elvis, Marilyn Monroe, Charles Manson, etc.).

Would 15-year-old me
say I made the best
choices in life so far?

But Facebook makes it much easier to regress.

I'm not sure why I do this. My life these days is pretty ideal, if I do say so myself. It's just as I'd hoped and imagined it would be...well, pretty much. No one gets everything they've ever wanted in life. I'm a little less rich than I'd hoped. But I have a lovely husband who makes me laugh, two super-adorable, smart, healthy kids, and a pretty house in a nice neighborhood. The American dream, baby.

I'm happier now than when I was a teenager or young adult, so why do I find myself reliving the past so often? Am I trying to reassure myself that I chose the correct path? Am I testing the waters? Dipping my toes in Lake What-Could-Have-Been in the hopes of finding the water horribly cold and brackish? That sounds about right.

I just hope I don't fall in and drown.