Not Hard Enough

I heard about my 20 year high school reunion in the paper. They're having a dinner/dance on a Saturday night in August. I don't plan to go because I will be on our annual college campout with 4 other couples and a bunch of kids. I don't have anything but regrets about high school. I didn't work hard enough academically. I got decent grades but I didn't attempt AP English even though I knew in high school I wanted to be an English teacher. I didn't work hard enough socially. I didn't have a lot of friends and I pretty much only dated one girl. I didn't work hard enough when I was out for the swim team. I improved year-to-year but I never, ever, gave myself the authority to go the next step. I never went more than 100% in practice. I didn't give when I had nothing to give. And, perhaps the one area I regret the most is that I didn't work hard enough to get into my high school's music scene. There was a guitarist and a bassist and a singer who needed me to play drums with them, but I never approached them. The guitarist and bassist eventually went out to form an original band I liked in 1993, but because I had never approached either of them with the idea of jamming or had never approached the school paper about writing for them, people didn't really know I was about music, which has become a lot of what I'm about these days.

So hearing about a high school reunion doesn't really trip my trigger. I'm not harboring animosity towards anyone I went to high school with. It's, well, I have grown since high school. I have, hopefully, matured into the father and husband I was meant to be. I mean, why do I want to go back and see people that still think of me as I was 20 years ago when I am so not that person? It doesn't make sense to me, when I think about it, to go back and surround myself with people - even if it is only for one night - that haven't really made an effort to stay in touch with me. I can count on two fingers - and these two know who they are - the number of friends that I have remained close with over the last 20 years. These two were in my wedding ~15 years ago and I know that I can call them anytime I need them and, hopefully, they know the inverse is true as well. So for the other 440 people in my class... I hope you all have a great time.