Tales from a Ten Year Reunion

If you have been reading this blog, you would be aware that I spend an unhealthy chunk of my life fretting about the comparative failings of my life, as compared to, say, someone with the word ‘regional’ in their job title.  My thoughts are divided in relatively even quantities between; dreaming up characters and plots for my writing; berating myself incessantly that I’ve elected to spend my life dreaming up characters and plots for my writing.  Hence it was with great fear and trepidation that I scrolled through the Facebook invite to my ten year high school reunion.  Ex-classmates.  With careers.  Careers that pay in currency other than Facebook likes.  No matter, I said to myself with sudden and intense glee, I would lie.  Lie my little fucking ass off.  I wouldn’t even tell a far fetched lie.  It would entirely plausible.  I would simply add, like, 10 extra published books to me portfolio.

I sailed through several days placated by the by the brilliance of my ruse, until of course it hit me that I write a blog.  A blog which serves as a soapbox from which to spew my life’s failings onto the internet.  FUCK!  I screamed loudly into my cereal.  Because I had already decided what to wear and was kind of looking forward to it and now I would have to face the taunting mass of alumni sans vocational alibi.  I WOULD JUST HAVE TO BE MY SOMETIMES SHIT SELF!

I had a panic attack in the taxi.  Not a full blown I-think-I’m-dying attack but enough to fuck up my breathing so I was audibly sucking air in and out, in and out.  The taxi driver asked me if I was ok.  I ignored him and continued to plan my entrance.  If I could just get to Helinka, I could hide behind her and only pop out intermittently to speak to people I wasn’t intimidated by.  No!  I thought suddenly as the taxi pulled up to the pub.  That is a really fucking dumb and fundamentally flawed idea!  And with that I was there, walking in, with no career and no plan. 

Since I was late I had no choice but to stumble right into the action.  This is what I thought, in a twisted muddle, as I wormed my way through the crowd feigning an irrational fascination with the floor:  Everyone looks exactly the same!  Do I look exactly the same?  Probably not!  I’m probably the only one who doesn’t look exactly the same!  Oh shit there’s the popular girls.  Katie you idiot you’re 28 years old they are not the fucking ‘popular girls’ anymore!  Still think I’ll avoid them for a while.  I spotted Helinka and was inserted by default into a conversation with Dave, an ex-drama enthusiast who had been known for his eccentricities and sometimes bullish nature.  ‘I’ve read your blog!’  He boomed.  I winced.  ‘It’s really good!  It’s great that you’re so honest!’ 

Not for one second had it occurred to me that my pathological penchant for over-sharing might count as a plus.  I peered up at Dave, confused.

‘I especially like the one where you have an enormous anxiety attack and end up crying into the floor!’ 

A wave of vomit threatened to make itself present and I swallowed, hard.  I had been half hoping the more embarrassing details of my blog might have escaped my peers’ attention.  But as Dave began chatting animatedly about his love of craft beer, another feeling began to materialise.  Relief.  If everyone was savvy to my lunacy, there really wasn’t any point putting on airs.  I had been relieved of the burden of trying to seem accomplished!  So, having been spared the colossal task of bullshitting everyone, I excused myself, went to the bar, and began drinking wine with gay abandon.                    

As it turned out, I had once again managed to make a colossal drama out of the sparsest of materials.  No one gave a fuck that I was just a writer.  No one accused me of being a deadbeat.  And as I caught up with friends of yesteryear, I honestly felt a bit stupid for having believed people would have been invested enough in my life to care.

 

There were a couple of hours of polite chit chat, and early leavers could have been fooled into thinking we had all grown up.  But come 11 o Clock, we had fallen under some sort of high school spell, and regressed back to teenage-party-mode.  One ex classmate who I was yet to talk to pulled me suddenly and violently in for a hug.  That’s nice, I thought, until I realized he was simply using me as a means of remaining upright.  ‘How are you?’  I said into his hair.  He looked up at me and tried to speak, but instead just spat a bit and smiled wide.

I talked to all the ex popular girls, two of them were married which somehow rendered them not scary anymore, and they listened politely as I explained in great detail the feeding habits of my pigs.  

       

In true teenage party style we ended up back at Terry’s house.  I somehow forgot my plans to make a dignified early exit, and instead sought out my old crush, as I had every time I’d seen him since high school, and spent a lengthy amount of time lamenting to him the difficulties of having been so in love with him.  I would be embarrassed by this memory but I’ve done it that many times I’ve become kind of desensitized.  He listened politely for a while before going to the ‘toilet’ and never returning.

My last memory of the evening is of waking up on the couch in a puddle of my own drool whilst singing the lyrics to ‘We Can’t Stop’ by Miley Cyrus.  I had obviously passed out and, to the delight of the other stragglers surrounding me, been miraculously roused by the pop anthem.  ‘Do you like that song?’  Taunted one.  And, considering I’d been literally singing it in my sleep, I had to admit that yes, I did.  But it didn’t matter.  Any hope of appearing cool had long since been squandered.