After a couple of weeks of parenting upon the precarious perch of teen angst, I have been sent the gift of clarity wrapped in the form of a 25th high school reunion invitation.
Attached to the bottom of the mass email was an innocuous document titled "20th Reunion.doc"
I clicked to open 27 pages of volunteered information about people for whom I hadn't given thought in 25 years. Knowing the people now is not nearly important as was my curiousity to view the 'then and now' of a few particular folk. As I read their answers to the survey, I gleaned parts and packaged them together as a reflective exercise of my own teenage years. After much pondering I conclude and admit I learned absolutely nothing in high school. At best, I fumbled through the social crap. And it was all mostly crap. I was an emotional, social and physical retard. My friends bestowed upon me the nickname 'Retardar'--a moniker I wasn't necessarily proud to earn, but at least I kinda sorta had friends. It is amazing I survived those days. All this worry about my own children's future is as silly and as stupid as the age in which they are in. If'n I can survive the teen years, then there is hope for every 'Retardar' out there....
I'd be curious to read what, if anything, you learned in high school....
P.S. I showed this post to both my girls. Eldest was amused by the first set of answers. Typical reaction for her: "Hmmm, I wonder what I'll answer 25 years from now?" Then Youngest stole my yearbook from me and promised to return it after reading every single handwritten entry. Her last words to me tonight were: "May I show my friends your annual? I know they'll think you and your friends were retarded." My reply: "No, just me, I was the original 'Retardar' and don't you forget it. You are the spawn of the Great Retardar. My legacy."
You can read parts of the survey by clicking. There's some fun stuff in there:
Most important things you learned in high school:
*How to drive.
*How not to take myself too seriously!
*You really can write a paper after reading only Cliff Notes.
*Never run out of hairspray.
*The exact amount of alcohol that could be consumed prior to a Friday night football game and still allow the motor skills needed to perform with the marching band at halftime.
*How to piss off teachers and coaches.
*I really didn't learn anything, but it was a lot of fun!
*I never read more than 32 pages of Crime and Punishment and still passed the test.
*It's who you know and how you know them, not what you know that matters.
*To stand up for what you believe in
*That cheaters never win (cuz I got caught cheating in Mr. Potter's 10th grade marketing class receiving a big fat "0"...
*How to speak Latin
*Learned to drive, tailgate to football games and sing the Dr. Pepper song in Latin
*Dance to 'Rock Lobster' and memorize every girl's name in "52 girls"
Most important things you've learned since high school:
*How not to take other people too seriously!
*Haircuts before your high school reunion are like a box of chocolates, you never know what you’ll get.
*An overdraft account is not free money...
*That underneath my underachieving exterior lived a "Type A workaholic personality".
*All the things I should have learned while in high school but was not paying attention in class!
*One's accomplishments and disappointments in high school and college don't mean a whole lot later
*It doesn’t matter how much you know if you know where to find things.
*Personal integrity is one's most valuable asset; wise are they who do not wreck it in youth.
Human nature, unchecked, will wreck integrity and anything else standing in its way.
In the absence of wisdom in #1, or in the case of #2, God is gracious to preserve.
*Life is not predictable, nor should it be.
*My GPA is forgotten and useless. My friends are not.
*That speaking Latin will not help in picking up women.
*Be careful whom you trust in business/employment relationships
*Never buy a house with a pool
*Never engage in a home remodeling project
*The cost of maintaining a boat is proportional to the cube of the horsepower of the engine
Most interesting things you've done since high school:
*Helped "tear down" the Berlin Wall
*Visited a pig farm in Kentucky and saw how pigs are processed and artificially inseminated.
*Met with presidents.
*Flew Cobra helicopters and T-34s (fixed wing) as in instructor in Pensacola.
*I deployed aboard ship twice to the Mediterranean, the last one during Desert Shield/Storm, with a brief stop in Liberia (west coast of Africa).
*Watched ex-wife give birth to 3 beautiful babies a-la-natural. I guess she did get back at me for that.
*Accompanied Nelson Mandela to President Clinton's First Inauguration
*Became involved in humanitarian aid to orphanages in Romania
*Appeared in a photo in the New York Times with Tom Wolfe and Barbara Walters
*Flew on Donald Trump's private helicopter; Visited the Soviet Union in 1984
*Have moved out of Alabama 5 times
*Flew in first row of a 757 the morning of September 11, 2001.
*Picked up a wife on an airplane.
*Rode an ore train through the Sahara Desert.
*Sat in the Space Shuttle Atlantis on Launch Pad A at the Kennedy Space Center
*Have the opportunity to chat with some pretty interesting people - my favorites have been Nelson Mandela (serious, yet humble), James Brown (very 'interesting' conversation), US Rep. Maxine Waters of California & US Rep. John Lewis of Georgia. (gave me great advice re: working on the Hill).
*Featured in several journals and a book relative to my work associated with the tobacco industry lawsuits and investigations.
