Class Reunion

Here I am 10 years after graduating from High School. I can't believe it has been that long.

My class reunion was this weekend, and I was definitely looking forward to it. I never really kept in contact with my classmates, so I was looking forward to this new opportunity to do better this time around. I was excited to show everyone how different I am and how much of a better person I am (or at least that's how I feel). I truly think I have really grown a lot as a person. I am happy with who I have become.

I know that in High School I was just like every other teenager: feeling pretty awkward most of the time and just wanting so badly for others to accept me for who I was. I find that not much has changed in that area. I'm just 10 years older, and still feeling the strong need for people to accept and like me. I have always been that way. What can I say, I'm a people pleaser. I will be that way until the day I die.

I never had that one true best friend in High School. Yeah, I had friends, but not that one true friend that would be there for me no matter what. That is still something I long for even today. In school I would find myself wandering from one group of friends to another depending on who I felt most comfortable with from one day to another. I think that is why I still don't have that one true friend. It does make me sad to see all my other classmates still hanging out with each other, and here I am still trying to find who I feel the most comfortable around.

I went to the first event last night not knowing what to expect. I arrived to find many familiar faces of people whom I was surprised to remember their names. What surprised me more was that there were many who remembered me. I just thought I was just "some girl" in the midst of our nearly 400-student class. There were a lot of people who I expected to see there, but many who I had hoped to see were not there. Many of the people who I hung out with were not there, and again I found myself wandering around and making small talk to people I knew, but we never hung out in school. I felt just as socially awkward as I did in school. It's funny how I think I have changed in 10 years only to find that I am just the same.

It didn't surprise me to find that the people who were freakishly attractive are still the same, but the only thing different is that they have found an equally attractive spouse with amazingly beautiful children. The token screw-ups are still just as much of screw-ups and already drunk within an hour of the reunion starting. There are the same cliques, and the same group of people who still won't talk to you even after 10 years.

I was encouraged, though by many people who were genuinely interested in finding out what I had been up to and what is going on in my life. That was nice to find. I was also surprised to find those who never took the time to talk to me before, were eager to talk to me. It's funny how things have changed...and how they haven't.

It was good to see some familiar faces, but I left still feeling just as empty and friendless as before. I still hope to find that true friend someday.