Reunions

Tonight I am getting together with a group of women with whom I graduated high school in 1976. I went to Girls’ Latin School, then located in Codman Square in Dorchester, Massachusetts. I started in 7^th grade, getting on a bus in Cleary Square in Hyde Park, then transferring at Forest Hills Station in Jamaica Plain to another bus that took me to the decaying yellow hulk that was GLS. I was 12.

For six years I went to classes with mostly the same girls, those whose names began with the letters A through C. Brolin-Brooks-Butler, I think Branagan may have been in front of me. We started as one, survived the death of a classmate in 7^th grade as one, and made it to graduation pretty much as one. We were a very tightly knit group. I never realized how close until our 30-ish-th reunion, when I spent time with Fs and Gs, and some Ms. I heard stories about girls in other classes that really shocked me, and made me realize how drama-free our class was; how, even though there were some sub-groups, there were no cliques.

This is our third or fourth gathering after our 25^th reunion, which occurred immediately after September 11, 2001, and reconnected so many of us from the entire alphabet of the class of ’76. I am so grateful for the new friends I have made. But I want to say a special thank you to my 6A1 to 1A1 classmates, those 20-or so women who set the bar pretty high for what friendship should look like. For being wicked smart and damn proud of it. For being funny and kind and accepting and supportive before you even knew that was what you were doing.

There are some of us who are tragically gone far too soon (we miss you, Carrie), and some who live too far away to join us (Joanie and Dianne, you are with us in spirit), and some of us who have never resurfaced, despite the efforts of reunion organizers (I’m looking at you, Joanne). Even though I know I won’t see many of you tonight, I will be thinking of you. Fondly. And looking forward to our 40^th reunion in a few years.