I planned to attend my 20-year high school reunion, but mostly, I ended up just going to the meet and greet, which was the night before. I paid and everything for the reunion, but I had my son Saturday night, so that pretty much trumps everything.

My best friend came by and picked me up, and off we went. Back before I moved back to Cleveland—almost six months ago–he was pumping up the reunion—“y’gotta go, dawg!”—but it wasn’t that interesting to me. There was no one in particular I wanted to see. But the more I thought of it as fodder for writing, then the more sense it made to go. Like I said, I ended up not going to the reunion itself, but the meet and greet was probably as good as it was going to get.

So we get to this pizza place—Pizzazz—head down to the basement, and the motherfucker’s packed to the gills. Which means, there are about 50 people here. What struck me immediately is that, after 20 years, the room still self-segregated itself, cafeteria-stylee: white alums were at the bar, while black folk had pretty much taken over the back. This was the first sign that skipping the reunion itself was a good move. I had to make my way through the white folks to get to the black folks, and while some remembered me, most did not. Granted, I didn’t have one of those nametags, and I am about 120% larger than I was in high-school. But I’m still me. Most of the white folks didn’t even acknowledge me. Even a girl I dated briefly—white girl—was at a loss. Our love affair, obviously, was not the World Series of Love. This experience, a troubling stumble down memory lane. I was invisible in high school, I thought. And I am invisible today.

I made it back to where a lot of the S-Town-types were holding court, and was disappointed that a lot of these cats were still the same. They are exactly as I left them. I guess you are whoever you are going to be by high school, and a lot of the cats who were assholes in ’88 where just assholier in ’08. Among the men, I probably looked the most drastically different. In high school, I was 110 lbs, mostly muscle and hair. This morning I tipped the scale at 226, more or less muscle and hair. And gut. There were a few extremes, and I was probably one. But mostly everyone looked the same. The women who attended were either dramatically thinner or about the same, which just some of that MILFy seasoning (e.g. wider hips). Most of the girls either looked real bad (read FAT), real good, or about the same. And that’s how they treated me too, even after all this time. Real bad, real good, or about the same. So nothing has changed much in 20 years.

There was a lot of drinking and laughing, and it was weird to be in a room where a good portion of these people had intimate history together. Weird, because some of those folks were trying to get reacquainted, on the low, and they often had husbands and wives in tow. And, just like I did in high school, I had fun watching that drama play out. There were a ton of under-class party-crashers, and that was cool. Also, there were a few mean-mugs from cats, cats who haven’t done much with their lives but work shit-hole jobs, showing up like the Time Haters to try and throw salt on whatever you are up to. I even had this dude try to re-start a fight we started back in 1989. I was floored, like, I would have beat your ass at a buck ten, but at two and quarter, you may not survive it. I just laughed it off, because he was trying to get his thing off. He wanted to feel as if he belonged here. Like he’d done something. He needed that cafeteria dynamic. I gave him his moment. I’m magnanimous that way.

I had fun, but by and large, I was an outsider in high school, and I was an outsider 20 years later. I didn’t feel any more invested in Shaker Heights’ myth of integration. And I know it’s a myth because, even after 20 years, these folks didn’t feel any more comfortable comingling with black people. At the reunion, I’m told people sat Shaker Cafeteria –style: white s on one side, blacks on the other. And it took some real doing to get the white people to cross that line. These are all middle-aged people from one of America’s first models of integration and diversity. Obviously, the social engineering didn’t take. If you are going to your next high school reunion, I have some helpful advice for you–more like, some simple math.

jimi izrael’s High School Reunion Math

1. As a rule, any sentence that starts with “remember the time you…” = a scenario you don’t want to remember.

2. Felony record= not as sexy as it used to be in 11^th grade.

3. When people remark on how big you’ve gotten, they rarely mean that in a good way.

4. If you need to remind someone that the two of you dated…. Don’t.

5. Chams De Baron shirt or Chic jeans = “I work at Family Dollar and still live at home.”

6. Being confused with someone else you went to school with = net loss.

7. Stuck up, popular girl who would give you no play + 20 years + 180lbs= Karma.

8. Calculating the chances you’ll get laid at your high school reunion: Popularity in high school divided by years away from multiplied by fame and/or relative success and the price of drinks and time of night, squared.

9. Bald > Receding hairline. This applies to women too.

10. Recalculating your sexy: whatever your sexy was in high school minus a GED +your undergrad degree+ your grad degree minus 25 for every pound you’ve gained and strand of hair you’ve lost, divided by the price of drinks, squared.

All that said, I took pictures, and I ganked some from others.

You may recognize Ed from “The Inside Man.” He was the father.

October 1st, 2008 | Uncategorized

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