Monday, October 14, 2013

Selective Truth Telling

I heard through the grapevine that some people from my high school graduating class may be planning a fifteen year reunion. When I heard about it, my initial reaction was, Jeez, I'm getting old. And then I ran to my bathroom mirror to see if I needed to get Botox yet. (I don't need to, but I kind of don't want to anyway; I'm afraid I'll look like the female version of Bruce Jenner.)

I have mixed feelings about going to the reunion. I don't really keep in touch with anyone from high school anymore. On the one hand, it might be nice to see everyone again, and I am curious to see how everyone is doing. I did Google a few of them years ago, and I found out that at least two classmates married each other, one of them became a farmer, and another person may or may not have gotten arrested (though that may just be someone who has the exact same name as my former classmate and happens to live in the same town).

I'm not on Facebook, which would probably be a more reliable source of information. I have little interest in joining Facebook, partly because I'm not photogenic; I would probably just post pictures of food, my favorite books or authors, and stuff like Buckingham Fountain, the lake, and independent bookstores. I'd also post pictures of my loud neighbors (with their faces blurred) when they're drunk and passed out in the hallway (I have found more than one of them using the hallway as a bed and/or as a place to throw up) and captions that say stuff like, "This is your brain on drugs." (Incidentally, the last time I saw my classmates was at a wedding several years ago, where several of them got very drunk AND loud.)

I don't know if I want to go back though. There were at least one or two other reunions before this upcoming one, and I didn't go to those either. I figure that at a reunion, everyone will be reminiscing and saying, "Do you remember when..." I also figure that everyone will remember all the embarrassing things that I did. Then they'll have a lot of laughs at my expense, just like they did all the time when we were teenagers.

If I did go back, I think I'd probably engage in what some people call "lying" but what I call "selective truth telling". Here are a few examples:

I live in a really great apartment in Chicago. There's a lot of space and I get along really well with my neighbors.
The truth: I live in a tiny studio in a building with neighbors who may or may not have sold their souls for beer.

I'm not married, but I am dating. I've dated several amazing guys that I'm still friends with.
The truth: I'm married to my work. I've dated a guy who flirted with the waitress right in front of me, a guy who turned out to be at least thirty or forty pounds heavier than he looked in his profile pictures, a guy who insulted me for working in retail, and a guy who told me that I reminded him of his ex-girlfriend, the one who he still had nightmares about. And those are just SOME of the guys who are on my NEVER DATE AGAIN list. If I ever saw any of those guys on the street, I'd buy a Chicago hot dog (or better yet, a nice, big, greasy piece of Chicago-style pizza) that I could then throw at them.

It's so great to see you! We should totally keep in touch from now on. 
The truth: I'm still mad at you for making me cry/mocking me/excluding me/believing the lies your manipulative boyfriend told you about me back in high school, and you'd better run fast before I start throwing pizza and hot dogs.

My career is going really well. I make a lot of money, and I'm like those teachers in those inspirational teacher movies.
Truth: I have to work additional jobs just to make ends meet, like retail jobs where I get bossed around by twenty-two-year-old supervisors on power trips. I also have finally inspired my students to stop texting during class, partly because I turn into the neurotic, female version of Mr. Hyde when I catch them taking out their cell phones.

I've changed a lot since high school, and I live a different life now. But there's a part of me that's afraid that if I go back I'll become the person I was before. I'm afraid that they'll judge me for still being in school, even though it is graduate school. I'm also afraid that I might head butt one or more of the people who bullied me, especially if they start up again. I really wish I could be like this girl in what I think is the coolest film preview ever. Then no one would DARE mess with me at the reunion:


Maybe they've changed too, at least some of them. Maybe it wouldn't be like when we were teenagers. Or maybe not. 

I don't really want to go. Like I said, I don't keep in touch with anyone from high school anymore, so I'm not really motivated to go back. And anyway, it hasn't quite been fifteen years yet, so I still have time to make up my mind.

What about you? Did you go to your high school reunion? If there hasn't been a reunion for your class yet, do you think that you will go if there is one?

14 comments:

  1. I went to my high school reunions, but only to see a few people who I care about but no longer live near. The rest I don't really care about. ;)

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    1. Hi Rachel,
      It would be good to see the people I was friends with back in high school. I don't live near most of them anymore, so we lost touch.

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  2. I haven't been to either of my high school reunions. Mostly I don't really care enough to go back. My life now isn't perfect or what I expected, but it's a great life and I don't want to feel like I have to feel like it might not be as good as somebody else's! I still keep in contact with the friends I want to from high school, so I'm good. :)

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    1. Hi Shallee,
      I know what you mean; I feel like if I go to a reunion a lot of us will be comparing ourselves to each other. And that happened too often when we were in teenagers, so I don't want to go through that again now that I'm in my thirties.

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  3. I have no desire to go to any high school reunions. I am totally different than I was in high school and I have no desire to return to that version of myself, silly girl that I was. I also keep in touch with the ones from high school who are worth it. Plus Facebook provides me with enough information about the ones that I sometimes wonder "what's so-and-so up to these days?"

    High school is just so far away. And I was a child! I did enjoy the first few of my college homecomings since it'd only been a few years and yet the most changes happened right after that, what with getting jobs and being in "the real world." Those were fun. And I look forward to times when I'm in New York and get to catch up with college people and hear gossip about other college people.

    But high school... that was a billion years ago and so irrelevant.

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    1. Hi mmarinaa,
      You're right that high school is not as relevant anymore now that we're older; back when I was a teenager, it seemed like high school was practically my whole world. But I've experienced a different life and a different world since then; I don't really want to go back.
      It is interesting to find out what other people are doing now; I don't really know what most of my former classmates are doing, though, since most of them don't live in Chicago (at least I don't think they don't).

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  4. Who knows- you might (re) meet the one you've been waiting for. It happens all the time.

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    1. Hi Melanie,
      It would be cool if I met the one I was waiting for at the reunion. But I think that most of the guys I went to high school with are married with children; it seems that I'm one of the few single people left from my graduating class. Maybe I'll (re) meet the person I've been waiting for somewhere else, like at Starbucks. At least then he'd share my love of coffee. :)

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  5. I don't really think I'd go to one either. More of a forward looking person and I moved cross country to study for a reason: To not bump into any of them on campus.

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    1. Hi Misha,
      I think it's cool that you moved cross country; I moved away because I wanted to be in a city where I didn't know everyone. When I a kid, I couldn't even imagine what it would be like to attend classes or work with people I hadn't grown up with.

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  6. The word reunion makes me shudder. I am a completely different person back then, and I'd prefer not to go back to that!

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    1. Hi Annalisa,
      I'm glad I'm not the only one who's not enthusiastic about reunions. I'm kind of afraid that people will say I haven't changed at all since high school, because I know that I have and I wouldn't want to be perceived in the same way that I was back then.

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  7. I've heard it can be fun to go to the 25th or 30th, because people seem to have less to prove. Maybe you should hold out for that.
    I went to my 20th and it was pretty depressing. The same cliques re-formed and it all seemed pointless. In part that's because I was in a very low place emotionally.
    Already missed my 30th and 35th reunions. Would I go to my 40th? Possibly, but I'd have to line up another reason to go all the way back there, e.g., visiting my dad or getting face time with editors or business contacts. I'd also be ready to bail as soon as it got boring.

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    1. Hi Donna,
      Maybe I will go to my 25th reunion, because at least by then I'll finally be done with grad school. I don't know if the cliques are still intact among my former classmates, though I do know that a lot of them have kept in touch. I'm curious to see how many of them have changed and how many haven't changed at all. And thanks for the advice! It helps to get other perspectives from people.

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