Fall Seven Times, Get up Eight

 Marcus Alden Meredith
September 22, 2025

Reunions (Part 1)

Valley High School, Class of ‘80

So at the end of this week I’m going with one of my good friends to my 45th year high school reunion…. with a very few exceptions, I don’t expect to really recognize any of these people and I’m trying my best to keep my expectations of the whole affair as moderated as possible though in my mind I can’t help but see a bunch of old, fat people, bald and grey (I am bald but obviously not grey) who will talk endlessly about their children and grandchildren…. Oh the onrush of the mind numbingly banal will probably cause my eyes to roll back in my head, cue the 70’s music that I gave up on a LONG time ago…

Now to be fair, this is more of a trepidation than a prognostication or prophesy so I’ll really try to keep an open mind. It’s really that I was never much of a social butterfly like my friend was, he being the artist that everyone was fascinated by and I was just the kid who liked looking through a telescope and getting good grades and never could understand the allure of “Sex, Drugs, and Rock-and-Roll every night at my place!” attitude that was so prevalent in the late 70’s/early 80’s. Again, don’t get me wrong, I love history; my first novel is very steeped in it and I’m still doing research on periods of history for said novel. What I can’t understand is this pull of nostalgia that seems to have so infected my generation. I mean, “Really?!?” people? The cars sucked and guzzled gas like there was a gas station on every corner (which there seemed to be), the music was evolving but not as sophisticated as I like, the politics sucked (well, at least that hasn’t changed), and the clothing and hair styles were dreadful. And to be as upfront as possible, I just never really liked most of the people I went to H.S. with. Call me a killjoy but this honesty needs to be out front or the entire reunion is a social Potemkin village. 

I was always a a forward looking individual. Science fiction like Star Trek and even Star Wars were my thing. And let’s face it, if we only look at the creature comforts of today compared to back then, there is no way in Hell that I would want to live back then again. Even with all the problems we have today involving social media, AI, climate change, etc. we didn’t eat as well as we do now, our cars and other forms of transportation are better, the country is wealthier and I personally am more free that I ever was back then especially in how I am able to express myself and how free I am financially too. 

But my friend doesn’t come to Sacramento very often since his parents moved away from here and he really doesn’t have any connections here but me and a few other friends. As a result, when he does come here, I like to do whatever he wants and since he want this… well, I’ll go too. As a nice aside, my friend and I will meet up with another friend (there were 5 of us who were pretty close in H.S.) will also get together (even though he’s not going t the reunion) and that just doesn’t happen but once in a blue moon. So, whatever the reunion ends up being like I’ll be happy to be with my good friends. So much has happened to us in 45 years. We met in Junior High School and were lucky, I think, to have found each other. But there have been careers, retirements, children, deaths of parents (both mine are gone) and grandparents of course, as well as all the history and social change that comes with almost half century of the passage of time. I started off my post-High School years training to become a scientist/engineer and ended up being a science teacher instead. One of my friends works with developmentally disabled adults and the other retired from being a college professor. NONE of us ever thought that teaching would be something we would all share in common. Children were not in the cards for me, only one of us… well, three of us (I think, there’s some missing data) had children and I am the only one who never got married. My closest of the friends go married just last year… well, that makes me the last man standing and not a title that I was working towards. At the very least, it will be an interesting process to see what the world has done to and for us in 45 years. It is really hard to conceive of who I was back then anymore.

I like to think of this time in my life as my “Third Life.” Here’s how it goes: “First Life” is rather obvious as this is obviously when were born and grown into adults (most of us). We’re growing up, learning, getting some feel for who we want to be and there is a kind of freedom that we’ll lose when we have to go (as Gen Z’ers would say it) “Adulting.” Then we either go to University/College or maybe a trade or trade school, get set in a career and try to find a mate, and the long road of “being a grown-up” lies before us. That is “Second Life” for most of us. Now the road diverges in a yellow wood… for some, the “Second Life” never really ends even if they retire. They spend their days traveling (maybe), playing golf,  being with the kids and grand kids, sitting their enormous fat asses on a couch and there they get planted for life until they finally expire. But some of us are able to get out and discover their “Third Life” filled with freedoms that are even greater than when they were little kids because now we have knowledge and money. And this is where I am now… no longer a teacher, but a writer, utterly able to pick up and go almost anywhere at a whim and explore the world as I see fit. Why would I want to wallow in nostalgia for a time when my life was so much more restricted compared to now when travel and knowledge of the world is quite literally at my finger tips. No, never. So, end of the week I’ll discover if my trepidations were just that or were they more accurately prognostications. Stay tuned… we’ll see… *wink*