65.0°,
A Few Clouds From Bayonne, N.J., cruising down memory lane
There are two ways to write this story: glass half full, glass half empty. I believe I’ll take a sip from each in describing the recent reunion cruise of Lawrence High School’s class of 1964.
Well, not the entire class of 600-something, just 13 of us who have stayed tight enough through the years to travel together once in a while. Some of us went to Number Three School in Cedarhurst, some to Number One School in Lawrence. Neither school still stands, nor do most of the landmarks of our youth.
For this trip, we came from New York, Florida, Louisiana and Pluto (I’m not telling who’s who). In past years we’ve traveled to Club Med, but this time we decided to take a cruise from New Jersey to Nova Scotia, one week on the high seas with an intimate group of some 2,000 other passengers.
Collectively, we have survived polio, meningitis, leukemia, heart valve replacement, cardiac bypass surgery, brain tumors, spinal surgery, defibrillators, diseased gall bladders, skull fractures, heart attacks, adrenal tumors, hip replacement, breast cancer, diabetes, ongoing bouts of depression and a garden variety of neuroses. I’m not sure if this is the half full or half empty part.
Some of us had ADD before there was even a name for it! As if we need proof of life’s random acts of unkindness, my very own husband accounts for seven of the above afflictions. He and I both graduated from Lawrence in ’64 — the only “pure” couple.
I’m guessing that for our age, we’re a reasonably healthy group, yet the morning ritual of pill-taking usually extends until just before lunch. The amount and variety of medications make you wonder how many of us would be breathing, no less walking, if not for modern meds. One observation: We’re pretty much the way we were in high school, only more so. Personality tics apparently do not fade with time.
Of the 13, five married into the group, and they are remarkably good sports. It can’t be that much fun to sit around listening to homeroom hi jinx stories from 63-year-olds.
