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Ever since late last December, an ex-classmate has been doing her damnedest to call attention to our… correction… THEIR… 50th class reunion; has been overburdening my landline’s aged answering machine; of late, has also been farming out this onerous (odious) task to a confederate, who is now snailing me similarly themed, junk mail appeals. All to NO avail. So, why my disinterest?
Stated diplomatically… not everyone has fuzzy fond memories of their K thru 12 experience.
Stated exhaustively… from 4th thru 8th grade, inclusive, that bygone student body’s bully faction had rendered my life utterly miserable; my avoidance of their verbal abuse and physical assaults depending upon how well I could “sell”, to my folks, my allergy related raspy voice, runny stuffed up nose, sneezing and asthmatic wheezing as an affliction of a more serious nature; my ability to parlay such cold / flu / pneumonia like symptoms into the perfect excuse to cut classes.
And, typically, my Academy Award worthy performance art would prevail; provided my folks didn’t whip out a thermometer.
Had both of them not been college degreed educators; fully capable of home schooling me (dad’s disciplines the Sciences and Math; mom’s expertise English, Lit and History), I could’ve easily wound up falling behind, flunking (perhaps even dropping) out.
Eventually and inevitably… my father had eye-witnessed, from afar, these bullies physically attacking his son; resulting in his outrage fueled letter; next-day delived, by me, to my school’s secretary.
However, rather than the principal extending me a helping hand, he publicly humiliated me. While angrily wagging his finger in my face, he vociferously accused me of being a liar; the venue for his fury fueled tirade being my school’s lunchroom; eye-witnessed by multiple hundreds of my stunned into a dead silence classmates; among them, the very bastards who were bullying me.
Returning to the here and now… that these people would even try to reconnect, I view akin to a testimonial; either to their forgetfulness or, far worse yet, a further demonstration of their thoughtlessness.
Let’s keep this all real… I’ve never attended any of our… correction… THEIR earlier reunions. Even chance encounters (grocery store, auto service waiting room and at my former workplaces) have been limited; our (lack of) quality time, grand total, amounting to approximately fifty minutes, tops. That’s 50 minutes out of the past 50 years; which begs the key “Q”…
Having not missed me for a freakin’ half century, why start now?
Beyond that… quite telltale is how, prior to past reunions, the organizers’ missives have included entreaties for locating hard to track down classmates; that roster, invariably, naming the very people I’d want to reconnect with. Hey, if they’re not gonna show up, why the hell would I?
Truth be told… there is one former classmate, in particular, who I really do miss; would love to see once more. Alas… long sigh… that’d be impossible. I’ll relate more about her once…
“We Meet Again” (Part 2) merges with the www within the next seven days…
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Stay Publicly / Properly Masked!
Stay Safe at Home!
Stay Healthy!
-30-
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CommonSenseTom 