Unpopular Memories

I grew up on the north shore of Long Island (groan) so it shouldn't come as a big surprise that I was not popular in high school. I had friends, just not many. I went to parties, but very rarely. I sometimes ate lunch alone and spent the hour before track practice doing homework in the library rather than heading over to the local drugstore to pick up snacks (or whatever they did over there - I still have no idea).

This all makes me sound very pathetic - but I did have friends. In fact, my best friend was really really popular - although somehow, that didn't really boost my social standing. In the end, I just didn't fit in. I wasn't cool by any stretch of the imagination - I was track runner rather than tennis player; I pulled my brown curly hair into a bun rather than sport a silky, highlighted loose side pony tail; and no matter how hard I tried, I was always one step behind when it came to fashion.

So when I got the Facebook notice that our ten year reunion was around the corner and the former popular queen bees and soccer playing drones were planning a get together I had two immediate reactions:

• Oh. My. God. I have been out of high school for ten year. TEN YEARS! Whoa.


• Should I go? Do I want to see these people? Isn't that what Facebook is for? I already know who is fat/pregnant/married.

Now, I know people change, they grow up, they put aside petty behavior and judgemental looks and catty comments (or at least that's what I've been told). But, when I think about my high school classmates, all I feel is dread. I'm thrown back to a time when I my hair grew out rather than down, my Friday nights were spent watching TGIF and wondering why no boys liked me, and everything I did just wasn't... right.

And then I received another update, with exclamation marks thrown all over the email. The reunion would be held on a booze cruise! Free flowing alcohol! A live DJ playing the songs we grew up with! A slideshow of happy memories projected onto the walls of the boat!

No way. No How. Not going to happen. Out in the middle of the water with these people with no way out? I get (sea)sick just thinking about it. I can imagine ten minutes into it I would be rapidly downing whatever alcohol was available and then possibly (likely) saying things that had long ago been put to rest.

After that went down, I'm pretty confident the night would have ended with me frantically paddling through the Long Island Sound away from my old life and back to my high-school free world.

But, considering the people I grew up with are used to nothing but the best, they would likely have thrown me a Burberry life vest as I drifted back towards dry land.