This past May, I reached a milestone in my life.
It was the 20th anniversary of my high school gradutaion.
It is a tradition in my town that all of the classes who are celebrating reunions do so during the 4th of July.
I remember as a kid seeing the graduated classes every year in the parade. It was always a good time of water fights and heckling. You know, all the stuff that made high school so great.
I first want to say that I really enjoyed my classmates in high school. I feel that I have memories with almost everyone. Since our town is so small and our schools were tiny - I grew up with these kids from 1st grade on.
I feel that my class was kinda cool about accepting everyone. Now, I know this may not have been everyone's experience. We had our cliques, and at some point and time we were all punks to each other. Come on, it was high school for goodness sakes. But, like all good brothers and sisters we fought, we made up, we had some sad times, but we had some good times.
So I was excited for this reunion. I haven't been great at keeping in touch with my classmates. So this was a nice chance to see everyone again.
Here we are getting ready to ride a float in the parade.
Here is our group shot of most of the people who rode on the float.
And here are the trouble makers.....
We had a long wait. We were kind of at the end of the parade. So we had to entertain ourselves. Trini was doing a dance? I don't know, but any time I can catch people in compromising positions I will do it.
This is another class float. The class of 1974 who was celebrating their 40 year reunion. The mom of one of my classmates, DJ, was on this float. She was yelling at us to throw her some candy.
Instead, DJ shot her in the face with a water gun.
She yelled at us that we were all grounded. I was grounded as well for posting the pictures. Hahaha. Some things never change.
We also kept ourselves entertained by getting into water fights with other class reunion floats.
Then finally, the parade started and the water fights began in earnest. We had water balloons, water guns, buckets of water for refills, and cups to throw water on people as a back up.
But the crowd was ready for us as well and we were all soaked within minutes.
Here are the father and brother of another one of my classmates, Trevor.
Mr. Bingham was the assistant principal while we were in high school. So of course we attacked him pretty good. You heard shouts of:
"This is for all those lunch detentions!"
and
"This is for that swat you gave me!"
He was soaked. But he took it like a man.
Others were prepared for us.
Like Danny.
Notice he didn't protect his wife. Hahaha. He knew we were after him.
Some of our classmates, like Dennis, had to work during the parade. So we made sure he was able to participate in the fun as well.
Towards the end of the parade, when the crowds were thinner, we had no one really to get wet.
And so we turned on each other.
After the parade we had a family BBQ at the park. It was nice to visit with everyone and catch up. Everyone got a chance to stand up and say what they've been up to. It was nice seeing everyone's families.
The next night we had an adults only get together. We played a game and again we were able to just talk and enjoy each other's company.
People were getting up and sharing funny stories from high school. Some people (who shall remain nameless) got off track and told awkward stories about medical school that made us all yell at him to give up the mic.
It was a good weekend.
I enjoyed seeing my classmates.
I missed the ones who weren't able to make it.
But what I loved most, is that most everyone has reached a point where there is no competing. People were glad to see each other and accepted each other for who they are and I think everyone felt comfortable. We laughed until we cried and that is what makes these things a success.
Well class of 1994, see you in a few more years!
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