By Annelise
It was a good day for this writer. I spent time this afternoon talking to a college classmate. I’m the secretary of the class, and write the classnotes in the alumni magazine. I didn’t know this woman when we were in school together, but she welcomed my call.
“What have you been up to since graduation?” I asked.
Timing is everything. On July 9th, she’d received the Knight’s Cross of the Order of Merit – one of the highest honors given to non-citizens by the German government. The award, generally given to diplomats and government officials, was awarded to her for the contribution to international goodwill accomplished by hosting 22 exchange students! Fifteen of the young men had initiated the nomination, given by the president of Germany. (It could only be given to one person, though her husband was equally praised.)
“On our 25th anniversary, my husband and I had a starter house, no children and a dog,” she tells me. “We decided to take in a foreign student.” She taught fourth grade, but neither she nor her husband knew a thing about teenagers. They now have 22 “sons” who have become family.
“Number 15 is coming back this summer to be married to his high-school sweetheart,” she says proudly. “He’s asked me to do a reading. Maybe I’ll wear the Cross,” she laughs.
Based on her “learn as you go” record, my classmate ran for mayor of her town (no previous political experience) after she retired from teaching. Now in her ninth year, she’s a great success. The town of 7500 is thriving, with shops and restaurants, an art gallery – and a movie theater that offers two shows a day for $2.50. Restoration of the town’s historic façade and streetscape is about to begin.
I haven’t always been so enthusiastic about my college or my class. I didn’t attend the reunions for a number of years. I did, however, check out the classnotes when the alumni magazine arrived. I was often annoyed by the lack of substance in the reports. “I’m the president of my trade association.” “I’m enjoying golf and my grandchildren.” “I’m tracing my ancestry.”
What happened to the teachers and social workers and ministers who graduated with me? We were politically motivated by the Civil Rights movement and John F. Kennedy. We were among the first to join the Peace Corps. What are my classmates thinking, I wondered. Where are the stories?
I went to a reunion ten years ago and declared that it was mandatory that the class secretary correspond via e-mail to maximize contact with classmates and expand the subject matter via more personal contact. I got elected. I started calling and interviewing people. I also sent out questions for discussion to people on my growing list of e-mail addresses — questions like: “Is your political affiliation the same or different from your parents? Why?” “What do you make of Gore’s movie, An Inconvenient Truth?” “Do you participate in ‘lifelong learning’?”
What do people who were in the same place as I once was think and do now? Lots, I think as I write the stories.
About Annelise: Annelise is a writer who lives with her husband in a converted downtown Chicago storefront/building that used to be site of a legendary bar in the area. Her daughter, son-in-law, and their children live adjacent in a separate yet connected space.
Annelise says this about writing: I have never had any professional training in writing. My writing career just evolved. After organizing an ethnic cooking school, I wrote articles on the subject. That led to being a magazine food editor. I did a stint in PR, then spent 15 years writing health and nutrition materials for the general public and co-authored three books. Most recently, I have been “writer-in-residence” for a small company that does sensory-based food product development. I write articles, presentations, and promotional materials, plus I run the website. I also participate in what our company calls “innovation sessions,” where we do exactly that — brainstorm, generate ideas, innovate. Using those sessions as a launching point, I create concepts to move the company forward. You might say that I’m more creative now, in this phase of my life, than I’ve ever been before.
First, welcome to red Ravine, Annelise! I’m so excited that you’ve joined our community.
I regularly receive an alumni newsletter, and I have to say, The first thing I read are the alumni updates. And you’re right, they’re usually superficial. But, what do you expect with one or two lines? Devoting more space to the story is important, I think. You get beyond the promotion or the new degree or the new job or the new marriage.
But, what I really want to ask is, What *is* it about those alumni updates? Am I the only one who jumps to them first, or does everyone else do this, too? If not, what does it say about those of us who do? Or this just human nature?
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You are not alone in turning first to the classnotes (for most people, it’s all they read)! I think the reason is that college was for most people a community experience, and they’re interested in the remnants of that experience. When we start to tell the stories in some depth, the community comes to life. My classnotes have now been given a word limit — they were taking up too much space. People from other classes write to say they’re reading our year’s notes. We have become a blog — I am talking to the college webmaster about a blog for our class. HELP! I don’t have time for this! But I must say it’s very exciting. Most fun I’ve had writing in a long time.
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I’m the same way – I read the alumni updates first and am hungry for more. I do get to read what everyone has done with their art though, which is inspiring. But I often wonder what everyone is doing with the rest of their lives. No one seems to want to get too personal. It’s so great that you’ve started to dig in.
I can relate to your piece in that I often wonder what happened to all the activism of my youth. For me, that revolved more around equal rights for women and peace.
I sometimes get the answers by going to see writers like Jean Shinoda Boden and Rianne Eisler. I find it’s similar to what you write – all that activism morphs into a new kind of humanism. It’s grounded more in the way we live and interact with friends, family, humankind, on a day-to-day basis. I guess we change the world, one person at a time. Thanks for writing with us!
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You sound like the perfect person for your job as class secretary. You’ve put some life into the task, and made it interesting and meaningful for you and the person you contact.
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I don’t get my alumni magazine, but my parents do. Three of their daughters went to the same college, so they’ve been on the mailing list for years.
I also look only at the updates, but typically with a skeptical eye. They remind me of the glowing Christmas letters people send out. Listening to everyone’s status as company president or parent of the latest rocket scientist leaves me rolling my eyes. I’m dying for someone to write, “Yeah, just did hard time at Folsom. 15 years of my life gone in a cell. Working graveyard shift stocking shelves. My third wife left me. Broke. Renting an efficiency in the red light district.”
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That gave me a chuckle, Sinclair! Maybe Annelise in her probing will find such a story.
This is kind of morbid, but the other thing I always look at right away on those alumni magazines is obituaries. We’ve talked about that before on red Ravine — I think sharonimo might have gotten us started — but I always go to In Memoriam, and I don’t look for anyone who graduated in a year that would place them at old age, but rather, I study the names from the graduates who would have been there at the same time I was, and I rack my brain to figure out if I knew him or her. I usually don’t, of course.
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ybonesy, Me, too. I check out the obits and always get so sad when I find out people I knew in school died young. I also look for same time graduates. I guess we all do the same things! Somehow, I find that comforting.
I’m with Sinclair – we should know all the grit and grime that’s gone on, too. It makes us all more human.
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[…] Annelise, Everyone Has A Story […]
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[…] Everyone Has A Story by Annelise […]
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I just received an email announcement for my 30-year high school class reunion. My emotions went from excitement to dread to nervousness to complete deer-in-the-headlights.
The organizer of the weekend (July ’09) put together a slideshow, and I feel nothing but tenderness for those sweet kids we were. They’re important to me.
And yet, how do you escape the inevitable standard questions:
Are you married? Do you have kids? What do you do? I’m not fond of the idea of saying to dozens of people the “wrong” answers to those questions. The smart-aleck in me wants to turn the tables: Are you happily married to that lush at the bar? I heard your kids have parole officers; is that true?
How do people manage being real at reunions?
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Funny, I was just at a potluck this afternoon and ran into a guy who I’d known in 6th grade. He reminded me that this is our 30th reunion year (not for 6th grade but for high school).
Personally, being as how I only made it to one reunion (20th), I wouldn’t mind making the 30th. I remember for my 20th, mostly I laughed my head off seeing all these old friends. They had me in stitches. Also, there were some questions about kids, job, etc., but once we got that stuff out of the way it was all about “Remember Tony P and how we used to call him ‘sparrow’—where is he?, is he here?” Also, so much time was spent peering first into a person’s face, then looking at their name tag, which also featured the high school photo, and once it clicked in my head who the person was, all I could do was laugh. Like, wow, I remember YOU! Even if we only had Spanish one year, it was still such a treat to see these people and the flood of memories came back.
I hope someone is working on our 30th because I’d love to go just to get those memories back.
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Sinclair, thanks for reviving this post! What a great memory you have. I’m not much help in the reunion department. I’ve never gone to any of my high school reunions. Mostly because I just haven’t been in close proximity. And the times I’ve been home to visit my family did not coincide with the reunion dates. A few years ago when I was home, I missed a BIG high school reunion, my 35th, by only a few weeks. I was bummed. I think I would have gone.
I anticipate, like ybonesy, that once you get the initial uncomfortableness out of the way, it might be quite fun. When I think about seeing the kids I hung out with back then and all the crazy things we did, it sounds like fun to laugh and connect with them again about the past. I guess there can be some sad things that crop up, too, people who may have lost children or spouses or partners. But overall, though I might be a little nervous at first, I think it would be something to write about to see people who once meant the world to me for those few short years in high school, then once we graduated, I rarely ever saw them again. Isn’t that strange to think about?
My siblings all still live in PA where I went to high school (and where they went to high school), and now many of their kids go to that same high school. Most of the teachers I had have retired. But think about everything those walls have seen! I hope I get to go to the next reunion my class has. I’d at least like to make it to one of them. Sometimes when I’m home, Mom will say, “Hey, I ran into your friend from high school, you know…” Then we’ll try to put together exactly which friend it was. I usually have to remember them by where they lived, where Mom might have dropped me off at their house, or something like that.
Speaking of 6th grade, when I was in Georgia and S.C. over the last few summers, my Mom and Daddy pointed out places where my grade school friends lived and where I had gone to play. They remembered their parents. It was wild. 8)
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