Wallflower

Last night was the first of the weekend's festivities for Dave's high school reunion.  We met up at a restaurant/bar for cocktails and appetizers.  I am not the most outgoing person in new situations but I'm not exactly a wallflower either.  I like to think of myself a good looking, interesting woman with pretty decent conversational skills.  Being the spouse meant nobody cared about all that, they just wanted to reminisce. 

I stayed for an hour or so before I finally realized that Dave would be just as well off with a cardboard cut out of me that he could say "This is my wife, Mona." and the cardboard me would stand still and smile and look lovely.  The real me tried to make conversation.

"So, where do you live now?"

"Kansas.  Hey Dave, remember that time we drove to Oklahoma and got drunk and picked up girls?"

I stand there smiling for a few minutes while Dave and Bob try to pull out the dusty memories of junior year of high school and reinvent them as more exciting times.  Dave tries to include me in the conversation.

"Bob loved classic cars.  Mona has a Mustang and also loves classic cars."

 Bob takes a swig of his drink and glances quickly over at me, his eyes only grazing mine before focusing back on his third whiskey.  I nod enthusiastically.

"I love classic cars!  What kind did you have?"

"I had a bunch.  Dave, remember when Pete and you and I got drunk and drove to Montana and picked up girls?"

 Twenty minutes later and I have finished my glass of wine and am standing staring off into space.  Despite Dave's best efforts to include me, it's clear that the only trip anyone wants to make is down Memory Lane.  It's also clear that they don't want to TELL the stories to me, they want to check their facts with Dave and see if he agrees that high school was the best time of his life.  When Dave doesn't jump right in, they turn to someone else who's had more drinks and is ready to go there.

I left and went back to the hotel room, where I had a lovely time watching movies and eating cookies.  Today is the picnic (in fact, we should be there right now but Dave is sleeping off the remnants of last night's Memory Fest which included trying to drink like you were 20 again).  Dave has said the picnic will likely be less about the past and more about the present.  It should be interesting.

I should say that these are not bad people or rude people, they are people at a reunion.  This is why I tend to avoid reunions.  I don't want to discuss what we did in high school or how drunk we got and do you remember this or that?   I want to know who we are now and what we have learned. This may have something to do with my crappy memory.  I don't remember much about high school.  I don't remember people that I have dated, which sometimes hurts their feelings.  I don't remember what we looked like, I don't remember the time we went downtown and bought beer and you threw up on that guy.  I have my own collection of memories for sure, but they may not include the guy from 8th grade that I made out with once on New Years (I think his name was Boris but I could be wrong....if Boris is out there and reading this, I'm sorry that we made out and then I pretended not to know you.  I was an asshole.)  I like that life moves forward isntead of backward and I'm not getting younger, I'm getting older.  I think I'd rather go to a Senior Center and talk to the ladies about life moving forward and about learning new things at 75 years of age.  That's where my life is going, not back to high school.

I am looking forward to getting to know some of the people that were important in Dave's life back when he was rocking the 'fro.  This is where I wish I had a picture of Dave circa 8th grade year.  I will work on that.  In the meantime, I'm off to barbecue and make some new friends.