20 years ...

No, not years of marriage, that's a few years away and our anniversary is another post, but this is about 20 years since Steve graduated from high school.  He graduated from Payson High School in 1991.  They got about 130 total people at the reunion, about 75 classmates.  Steve was the VP of the Sr Class so he and a few others "got" to be in charge.  They did a great job organizing it. 

As always, he was at home behind the mic as the emcee for the night.  The night went really well, badges with their old pics on it (to be worn "proud"), an hour of visiting, dinner, a video of some old pics, a game of "whose hat is that?" (pics from Sr. yearbook with faces fuzzed out), sharing answers from an online survey they took and a class photo.  ... It was a good night.   

I put this pic in because you can see the badges that we made ... ok, so my assistant and I made them.  I was quite proud of how good they looked.  Being able to do little projects like this makes me realize how legit my biz is and how good of a job we can do.  :) 

I spent the night at the sign-in table and then behind my camera.  It was fun to watch people from afar.  I saw some people who came in shy and unsure (and based on their high school picture), ones that I guessed weren't really popular or a part of the crowd in high school but they talked to everyone, they laughed and joked and enjoyed themselves.  Who you WERE really didn't seem to matter and that was Steve's goal.  He wanted to let people know that they had all moved in.  They had 4 classmates who have passed on and when Steve pointed out the memorial table and talked about how it reminds us all that life is short and we've all lived life, it was good to see everyone nod their heads and agree.  He talked about the fact that we've all "grown up", gotten older, seen trials of jobs, finances, families ...

For almost everyone there, the facade that they created for themselves back in high school was gone.  It was refreshing and made me look forward to my reunion.  And it made me think about the people I've gotten to "know" on Facebook ... people who I associated with at some point in my "childhood" and who I now know as adults and totally different people than I saw them as when we were kids.  I hope life has torn down the exterior walls that I created as a kid to hide myself and protect myself from others ... and become a different kind person... a person who isn't pretending to be someone, a person who sees past labels and titles, a person who doesn't judge others on appearances and who can accept that sometimes life is tough and we all just cope and do our best.  And I hope that my reunion can go as well (if we even have one).