10 Year High School Reunion

So, yesterday was my 10 year high school reunion. 10 YEARS. How crazy is that?

I mean, high school does seem like it was a long time ago... but even so, that blows my mind.

We met up at Palmer Park. If you know the park, it was easy to find the pavilion. I didn't know the park. I came from the wrong entrance and drove around for about 10 minutes before I finally found the right place. And even then, Hayley and I almost drove past it, because the pavilion was decorated for a little kid's Batman themed birthday. I could see a group of kids gathered around a Batman pinata, and there was a bouncy house set up next to it and everything. So we thought that couldn't possibly be our reunion--but I parked and hiked over to check things out, to at least find out the name of the pavilion in the hopes that I could figure out where we really needed to be.

And I found a couple people from Rampart Class of '06 hanging out there. They politely let the birthday party kids know that we'd reserved the pavilion--we didn't rush them out, because we didn't want to ruin the party. So with all that, it took about an hour for things to kick off. It was an awkward hour, with the birthday party, and with only a few people from our class standing around and waiting for more people to show up. A couple more trickled in, but... it was a very small affair, haha.

It got better once we ate lunch together. We all fit around one picnic table and talked and caught up. Some of us didn't even know each other in high school. :) But the ones that I did know... I don't know, there's just something special about hanging out with someone who knew you as a child/teen. Even if they didn't know me well back then, they still know things about me that no one else will ever know. There's a special connection there that you just can't fabricate with anyone else.

It came up what advice we would give our 18 year old selves if we could go back in time. I was surprised to realize... I don't have any regrets from the last 10 years. Sure, I made some mistakes in that time, but I learned lessons from those mistakes that made the experience worthwhile. Life didn't turn out as I hoped or planned in many ways, but it never does for anyone. That wasn't my fault. All things considered... life has turned out pretty well. I may not be a wife and mother like I wanted, but it turns out being a successful career woman isn't so bad either. :) I've had opportunities I wouldn't have had as a married mother, and I think it's okay to embrace that and be grateful for them. That's something I've struggled with sometimes... If I'd sought out those opportunities rather than marriage/motherhood, that would be one thing. But that's not what happened... those opportunities are what has happened in my life while I've been waiting. It's okay to be happy about them--actually, I probably should be happy about them.