The good thing about lines drawn in the sand is that one good gust can come along and blow it to smithereens (wherever smithereens may be). This weekend, I found the same to be true with the boundaries that divide some people.
Grab a mug of tea and I’ll tell you the story…
Once upon a time, in a land called High School (you can find it on a magical map entitled Anywhere, USA) invisible moats were dug around various members of the kingdom. In the fields you could see the athletes (or the “Jocks”, as they were known) standing tall and proud, knowing none could reach them — except the “Soshes” (as my generation called them), cheerleaders and a chosen few deemed cool or hot (depending on the decade and the vernacular) who could come and go across an unseen bridge into their realm.
In another corner, flags festooned the arena where the Theatre & Music Geeks roamed. While some of these jesters were occasionally requested onto the grounds of other high school groups, they were usually quickly carted back to their own domain (some of us via locker or trashcan) to await future summons. Many others would wait until their hair reached Rapunzelian lengths, yet the invitations never arrived.
Ghostly brainiacs wandered the many halls of high school, too… the Mathletes, Audio-Video guys and others carrying high GPA shields and armor. Their chains of sadness rarely rattle nor their woeful moans ever heard, but pain was evident on their faces as they walked the halls, never bothering to approach the various fiefdoms around the campus.
Tales have been told of other inhabitants of the kingdom who had no moats or guards to protect them. They wandered in a nameless no-man’s land, with no affiliation or banner to identify their loyalties, because they had none.
High school, for many, was a wicked and thorny briar patch where years were spent planning elaborate escapes and vows were made never to return.
It’s too bad, really. Truth is, sometimes a story needs to be revisited in order to gain new perspective or for hidden plotlines to be revealed. Just like the movie “Sixth Sense”, if you miss the final minutes… you’ve missed the most crucial elements of the thing.
This past weekend, I attended a Mini-Multi-Year Reunion for my high school and it turned out to be an unexpected evening of gems and treasures. While high school wasn’t necessarily a fairy tale place to be – spending the evening with its fellow inhabitants, all these years later, was an opportunity to hear richly detailed and colorful stories of how the spell of time has changed everything: lives, minds, hearts and souls.
As another attendee was heard to say, “I love this getting older thing. We’re all even now. There are no lines between us anymore.”
Except for the ones I see on our faces, so true. So true.