Looking Back

Boy, it's been a loooonnnggg Day!

I wouldn't be posting this now but I had to cease and desist working on the photo poster board for my class reunion because I need more glue. I've been working since about 10 p.m. tonight on clipping, sizing up, pasting photos of my classmates and just emptied the third -and last - glue stick I had in the house. So today -when Mandy gets home from work, I'm going to have to have her pick up more glue sticks for me and hopefully, I'll be able to get the rest of the photos glued onto the poster board tomorrow afternoon and will have that project all done, neatly tucked away.

I was going to start with our graduation photos -placing them in a circle and working out from the center of the poster board but decided instead, to start with the oldest photos I had -one is a baby picture of one of the guys from our class and the other is one of my cousin and me taken when we were about 2-3 years old and put them in the center and then worked my way out from there, trying to do it in a "sort of" age type layout. So if someone starts at the center and works their way towards the top, bottom, sides, etc., it will be an age progression - if you use your imagination. I'm worried I will run out of space now too but we shall see how that pans out - gonna take a lot of "nips and tucks" on the photos I have left to paste on there, that's for sure!

The pictures I have left to work with are all ones of people from my class taken after graduation. A few wedding pictures, some that are just kind of "general" and photos I have acquired of a goodly number of classmates with their children and grandchildren. If need be, I may have to run to Walmart and find another poster board - but won't need a great big one like the one I've been working on tonight.

As I worked my way out from the center, using pics of various classmates from first grade up through our senior year, I then took the pictures that were our yearbook photos and by snipping them a bit, I was able to "ring" around the early childhood photos with our graduation photos and as it turned out, it was a perfect fit! Talk about a lucky streak I had going there, huh?

After that, I pasted up photos of our class reunions - group photos from three reunions and snap shots of various classmates and the two last reunions.

Earlier this week, I posted a group photo of our class taken at our 25th reunion and seeing as I am sooo alert ya know, I didn't realize until today that that particular photo has a date over the top of it saying it was our 1982 Reunion -which would have been our 20th reunion. However, I know for a fact that picture was taken at our 25th reunion which was held in 1987 so I must have put the date label on it at sometime or other and scanned it in incorrectly then. Sometimes, I am just sooo danged bright you know! Brother! How the heck could I have done something that freaking stupid anyway? Well, for me, it was probably pretty doggone easy!

Just for the heck of it though, here's some more photos from the assortment I have gathered up, starting off with the one that is the REAL one of our group from out 20th reunion - back in 1982.
That year - as shown above - I think we had our best turnout - if I counted correctly, there were 28 classmates who showed up for it. This one was held down at the Quehanna Motor Inn, just outside of Karthaus, and for entertainment, we had a "one-man band." Yep, one man who played several instruments - some of them if I remember correctly he played simultaneously! He was quite a "one-man show"!

Here's a picture now taken at our 30th Reunion. This was the first "picnic" reunion we had which was hosted by our classmate, Joe, at his house - out in an area near here that is very rural, I don't think there are any true villages in that township, but somewhere over the years, the area was given the name of "Pinchatooley." I have no clue whatsoever as to the origin of that name but most everyone around here just refers to it usually as "Pinchy."
At that reunion, shown above, we had 22 classmates present -which now seems to be about the norm for our group. This year, according to my neighbor, friend, our class president (Kate), we have 21 who are going to attend. There were 61 of us in our class when we graduated and our class was one of the largest to graduate back for that era. I don't remember - and I don't have anything around anymore either that gives the count of how many students there were in our class when we started out high school years -but it seems to me there were somewhere around 80 of us our Freshman year.

Since we graduated, we have lost six classmates - five of the boys and one girl who graduated with me are dead. The last of our class who passed away was Jim Wasseen and he died three weeks after our 40th reunion of cancer. I think the youngest member of our class to die was Lynn Gruendler, who took his own life on January 13th of 1976, which would have made him 32 years old at the time. That was a terrible time as two days before Lynn shot himself, my neighbor's son, Bobby, had also taken his own life too. Bobby was only 28 years old. I'd grown up with Bobby, my Mom had taken care of him and his mother when he was born (born at home back in those days you know and my Mom was a registered nurse), so he was like a little brother to me. Six years later, my cousin David also took his own life. Having seen the devastation the actions taken by these three young men on their families, the state of shock the entire community here was in when Bobby and Lynn BOTH did that, words simply do not describe the feelings that existed then - and still do -over those losses. And, I remember those events like it was just yesterday that it happened - suicide leaves such a void that is so much harder to accept the loss, even after these many years.

One of my classmates who brought some photos down to loan me for this poster board commented to me when she was here that this may very possibly be our last class reunion. I would hope it isn't the "end of the road" in that respect but I know Kate - our Class President - didn't want the responsibility this year of planning this event and I'm fairly certain she is going to request if we want a reunion for our 50th year, that someone else take over and do the work. It is a tremendous amount of work involved in a function like this, for openers. I know how much work goes into trying to plan our family reunion every year - which reminds me, I need to start working on the newsletter I send out to all family members to remind them of that event coming up here the last weekend in July.

The family who used to live in the house next door to me - the Little family - had their family reunion this past Sunday. It's such a contrast to see how many attend that function - they use the Cooper Grove paviilion - which is often rented for wedding receptions and such and probably holds at least 200-300 people in the dining room. The Little family though is anything but Little - there were 13 children for openers and I think there are 66 or 68 grandchildren (I've lost track now). And great-grandchildren - now great-great-grandchildren too -and they pretty well fill that building when they get together! One of the grandchildren is Charmaine of Jim and Charmaine's Restaurant here and I had to laugh at Charmaine's Mom - Helen Ann - who Mandy and I saw Wednesday afternoon up at the restaurant as she was talking to me about their family reunion and remarked about how many kids there were there this year - "All over the place" according to her! And I can easily believe that!

My own family reunion at the end of July, although there were 13 children in my grandfather's family and 40 grandchildren - I'm of the "great-grandchildren generation there - but we wil lbe lucky I suppose if we pull in 25 cousins to attend our reunion. When I was growing up and my grandparents, several of his siblings too, were still living, we usually drew 60-70 people back then for our reunion. But back then, most of those in the Eld family side of my tree tended to live in Pennsylvania, New York or Maryland - pretty much within a 3-4 hour drive to get back here. Today, the family is scattered all over the place - from one cousin in Hawaii, a few in California and Texas, Florida, Indiana, Michigan, Tennessee, Vermont, South Carolina and Georgia and only a few of us in Pennsylvania and as close by as New York or Maryland! How times do change things that you grew up! And, to my way of thinking, seeing my family reunion dwindle down to those low numbers brings about the fear that soon it may disband for lack of attendance and interest. I just hate the thought of my grandchildren NOT being able to grow up and know who their relatives are regardless of how distant the relationship might be today.

And now - before I fall asleep typing or worse, get off on a really sentimental tangent and keep writing - I'm going to post my normal "Bushism" for the day and go to bed!

Thursday - May 31, 2007
"And if you're interested in the quality of education and you're paying attention to what you hear at Laclede, why don't you volunteer? Why don't you mentor a child how to read?" - Pierre Laclede Elementary School; St. Louis, Missouri; January 5, 2004.

PLEASE, Say It Isn't So!????

Yesterday was a really crazy, very mixed up, get very little accomplished day for me.

For openers, I'm struggling with filling out forms to get an organization affiliated with our church to, hopefully, back us with extra funds for the Cure Autism Now Organization's walk/race fund raiser here in State College next Saturday. I've e-mailed I think every friend and relative, even casual acquaintance I can think of whose address is somehow magically listed in my e-mail address book. My kids- each one has been trying to "talk up" the walk, donations, etc., for our team. We're not doing poorly with it but because this event really means so much to me, because the cause hits home directly with my little princess, Miss Maya, I want it to be that our team has a good showing.

Now, I know we can't begin to compete against the fraternity and sorority teams that are involved in this event, but still I think we can do well but can also always do better. And, every little bit we gather up helps is my belief here.

I know we are very fortunate with Miss Maya as she is picking up so much, just amazes us some days to see how far she has come. Then, out of the blue, things turn on a dime with her and she will suddenly go into an absolute meltdown that may last a matter of mere minutes or in some instances, may go on and on and ON till you want, as daughter Mandy says, that advertisement of years back to be available right now for you - "Calgon, take me away!" It is at times extremely frustrating to try to cope with some of her actions, moods, you name it.

But I still wouldn't trade her for the world! And I'm sure anyone reading this -whether you have an autistic child, or one who is facing a life-threatening illness, or so, so many other challenges life often bestows on the littlest ones that seems so unfair to them, to parents/grandparents, family, friends alike at times, you know what I mean there, don't you now?

But that is just one item on my "challenging" list yesterday.

The other just so happens to be my 45th high school class reunion - coming up now shortly on June 2nd. I know, I've mentioned this before but yesterday, something came up that really threw me for a big loop.

I'm not the one planning this event - my friend, neighbor, former classmate, former class president too she was, is in charge of that. I'm just here to help here once in a blue moon with piddling little things - like trying to see if I can locate maybe a long-lost classmate, or communicate with some class members I keep in contact with fairly regularly who live far, far away from here. And this year, I'm supposed to be coming up with some little bit of entertainment, of sorts. No, I'm not a stand-up comic - far from it! But, I'm just trying to figure out some little thing we can do that will serve to entertain the troops and keep us still wanting to come back together in, hopefully, another five years.

So yesterday, I got an e-mail from Kate - the coordinator of this event. In it, she told me which classmates had responded that they will definitely BE THERE and right now, it appears we have 16 classmates coming and 8 are bringing a guest. That's good - gives us a total head count now of 24 and possibly 25 if Nancy, out in Colorado comes home and convinces her husband to come with her, it will then give us the 25 needed for our reservation so we won't have to pay extra for a room fee. Yippy!

Then I read further in Kate's note as to a couple kids who responded that they WON'T be coming this year and that is something that is always disappointing to see who can't come.

But this year, one name stood out as someone not planning to attend and when I read that name, I said out loud, talking to the computer screen of course, OH NO, This can't be! This is a real BUMMER! Please, say it isn't so!!! Joe's gotta come cause it just won't be right within our class reunion world without him there!

Shortly after reading Kate's note, I was composing a response to her when my daughter (the birthday girl) called and I told her this piece of news. To my surprise, really, she said "OH my Mom, that's terrible! He has to go or you'll have no fun at all without him there!" Wow, even my kid knows him, and knows how much I enjoy being around both him and his wife. I almost always sit at the same table with him and two other guys from our class and their spouses. Not that I don't associate with the rest of my classmates but those three guys, their wives - well, I just am totally at ease around them.

My daughter told me then too "Mom, you have to call him. If you call and talk to him, I betcha you can talk him into coming after all. You know, you HAVE to do that!" And I thought and thought about that idea and finally decided ok, I'd take a chance and do just that.

I made the call -his wife answered. We exchanged opening pleasantries, not having talked to the other for quite a long time although they only live maybe 5 miles or so from my home.

I asked her if it was true that he wasn't going to attend - that they weren't coming and she said yes, he had decided he wasn't going to go.

Now, I have my own theory as to why Joe had made this decision. You see for our 30th and 35th reunions, he had graciously invited our class to their home - a beautiful area out in the country here, not anything grand, pretentious, just a pretty home, fixed up very nicely, with lots and lots of open space around, plenty of room to park, and also, to party!

A businessman in the community, Joe had also opened up our reunion to invite kids from classes three years above our and three years below ours plus he had included kids who had attended with us but for one reason or another, hadn't finished school with us. His theory - and I happen to concur with him on this - they were all still our "classmates." Then too, he invited the people who worked for him in his construction company, and from the bar he owned at that time too. Keep in mind, many of his employees had attended school with us too, so it wasn't that they were unknown entities exactly. All this made for a bigger event than we would have had if we only invited those who actually graduated and their spouse or guest. Because of the way he did this, he was also of course, able to use it as a tax write-off too but the base cost to his classmates was minimal compared to what others were shelling out to go to their particular class reunions at the time. He also had a DJ present, several kegs of beer and an open bar too - no "cash and carry" stuff with the drinks - it all came with the price of our acceptance to attend - $10 a head! His wife's niece and a friend had begun a catering venture at the time and they catered these reunions - one being an ox roast, the other a pig roast - and the food was excellent! No complaints at all from the peanut gallery on that.

For my part, I loved it too because it was casual - meaning I didn't have to go on a search and destroy mission for some special dressy outfit that I would only ever wear most likely that one time and which, because I have expanded more than my mind over the years since graduation, regardless of what dress style I found, it would still make me look and feel like was was an over-stuffed sausage! Now, jeans, or even slightly dressier slacks and a loose top -hey, I figured it would hide a few of the multitude of caloric sins I had obviously committed over those years between high school and the reunions.

Well, at our 35th reunion, some of the girls were kind of grumping that they would prefer our next reunion to be one held at some nice, relatively upscale restaurant - a place where they could visit, be wined and dine, then even dance to a band of some type too. Some were even kind of quietly growling too about there being so many people at these gatherings who weren't even part of "OUR CLASS!" Well, that part didn't bother me in the least cause I looked at it as a chance to see lots of other kids I wouldn't have a chance to see and talk to any other way. Actually, I loved that aspect of those reunions too!

But anyway, a vote was taken and the ones in favor of a change of place, of participants, etc., won out.

Now I'm not saying I know my old classmate Joe like a book or anything like that but I KNEW how much he had put his heart and soul into these two events and how much he wanted to provide the best time possible for his classmates -along with yes, a lot of other friends too. And hearing him speak up there about changing the place, etc., I could see by the look on his face the disappointment there that he was actually struggling very hard to hide. But I knew then and have seen it in his eyes when we've talked on occasion since then, the hurt, that he felt he'd been slapped in the face for all his hard work, his efforts, his caring for his class. But he's also one very macho individual so if you were to talk to him about this, he would respond in his gruffest voice and try to put on the mask that heck, this didn't bother him at all. And, especially those who maybe only saw him once every fifth year at our reunions, they would believe he meant that too.

Talking with his wife, she pretty much verified my thoughts were on target there. And, because of things that happened at our last reunion, it solidified his feelings into not wanting to be a part of this scene.

Now, his wife is going to talk to him, tell him I called and that I want him to return my call. If/when he does that, I plan to open with the fact even my daughter knows that it's JOE who really makes our reunions flow, come together. As soon as you hear him laugh - and he does like a good laugh and a long one - and his laugh booms and echos and makes you want to laugh too whether you know what he's found humorous or not - it's the contagion there that he brings. It relaxes everyone around him to see him flash that big smile, that laugh then gives you a nice comfortable feeling that somehow, all is in its place and right within this little corner of the world for that short period of time.

So, that's where I am now - waiting, hoping he will return my call. Hoping I can tell him what my daughter said, how I feel about him not being there and if I have to, yes I will probably beg him too!

Please Joe - Say it isn't so! Come on Buddy, you've got to go! You HAVE to be there! He's a big, big part of the cement that keeps us glued tightly together and wanting to return to see others from our class. To feel his big strong hand clasped on your shoulder and saying "HEY! How're you doing?" And know, that he really does care about everyone who shows up for these things.

Now, say a few extra prayers that somehow I can cajole him into changing his mind about this whole process. If need be, I'll try to call in some reserves too who might be able to talk to him and get him to change his mind too.

Wish us all luck there, please now, will ya?

Come on Joe - You've GOTTA GO!