The Absent Uncle: The plus one observer

As part of our trip to California, one of the chief reasons for the timing of this trip was the 55th class reunion of my wife’s high school in San Diego. She had not attended any reunions since their 10-year reunion, and the reunion committee had lost communication links with her over the years. But a persistent classmate – one of her best friends and neighbor kids – forwarded to her the information about the event, so we planned around it. 

I have been a regular attendee of my reunions back in Minnesota and have not missed any of them. Our graduating class numbered 202, and at the last – our 50th – we had just under 100 classmates in attendance. 

Her class had approximately 1,000 members! As explained to me by one of the reunion committee members, keeping track of the whereabouts of all the classmates would be almost impossible without a full-time staff, much less a few volunteers that have tried to catch up with the advent of information age of the last 15 to 20 years. Only about a quarter of the class had responded and of that number about 100 were in attendance. I saw a lot of time being spent scanning the high school annual (that my wife and a friend had edited!) and the list of classmates that had passed away.

Originally, I wasn’t going to attend the reunion, as we thought my wife’s younger sister would go with her. She graduated a year later, but as sisters they had many of the same friends, so it would be a natural fit for her. Their schedules didn’t mesh so I ended up being the “plus one”.   

She and I graduated in the same year, so all of the classmates were my age as well. I somewhat laughed at myself as I was taking pictures of the room and seeing all of these old people having a great time reminiscing, then remembering I really was one of them as well. 

The night was a success with her catching up with two of her closest friends from high school, one of which she had not seen since graduation. I so enjoyed watching, hearing a few stories, and just generally observing a part of my wife that I never knew as she laughed and remembered events and people that she had all but forgotten on her own, but came back to life with reminders from her classmates. 

A friend of hers sent her a note the next day: They come, they go; they seldom know how they changed you.

So true; it was a great night.