Reunions/Yesteryear

Herself speaks.

Beloved Husband and I are in the process of making reservations for his thirty-fifth college reunion. It seems absolutely impossible that so much time has lapsed. Wasn't his graduation just yesterday, or last week, or perhaps just a few years ago? I was there -- it was just a year before my own graduation. 

I am struggling with the whole concept, because... I miss the me of back then.

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I found college to be an isolating experience. I was never sure of the people around me, whether I fit in, whether I truly belonged. I didn't know how to communicate effectively, how to make and keep friends, how to ask for what I would like or what I might need. It was oftentimes quite lonely. Nevertheless, there was also so little obligation: all I needed to do was to study and do well in my classes.  What a breathless freedom from responsibility. I did not fully appreciate it back then. I long for that freedom now. And I long for who I was then, too. 

In days of yore, I could eat what I liked, when I liked; my body cooperated and functioned properly nearly all the time. It was youthful, nubile, helpful. What blissful ignorance, to give my body no thought, except to know that it was generally conventionally acceptable. And as Beloved Husband reminded me last night when we were chatting about college and reunions, apparently attractive -- my junior year, I was voted "person with whom one would want most to spend five minutes in the closet". (That might speak more to the paucity of alluring people in our social group than my particular attractiveness, I feel compelled to say.)  

I was comfortable in my own skin. Happy to be the first on the dance floor, because dancing was always a joy. Pleased to buy Play-Doh to share with my classmates. Delighted to be the Elf at the Christmas party, because what could be better than handing gifts to people? Satisfied just being me, with the only expectations being my own. Delightful. 

And now here we are, these thirty-odd years later. My body is not at all what it used to be. I am middle-aged, invisible, no longer conventionally attractive. I haven't been dancing in ages. I spend my days trying to meet expectations of clients, coworkers, other people. 

I am tired. 

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A few years before college, my family took a vacation to a Club Med. I was about sixteen at the time: old enough to have developed sufficiently to be mistaken for a grown woman, and also old enough to know I did not want a grown woman's attention. The best part of the vacation was blending into the crowd of young woman -- all of us in our bikinis, all of us of uncertain age, all of us enjoying the freedom that came with youth and beauty. It was probably more dangerous than I realized for the young women with so many hungry men prowling about. My aloofness and disinterest in most male attention probably protected me more than I realized. 

I befriended a nice girl with a blue bikini, who was cautiously exploring the men of the resort, while I read my book under a palm tree in my favorite red bikini with the purple stripes. We played the games of catch and volleyball on the beach with the others, tied mauve sarongs around untouched hips, giggled and drank an occasional glass of wine with dinner and blushed when men much too old for us stared a little too long. 

I found the photos recently while looking for some college-era pictures. I've covered my face and the faces of the other young women, because while it has been some forty years or so, we all deserve anonymity even in our innocent youthful exploits. 

I look at those photos, and I wish that I could momentarily slip back into those moments: to be carefree, to have health and youth and a molecule of beauty, to dance and to play, unconcerned for the future. 

It was glorious. 

I no longer have that same health or youth or beauty. Perhaps, though, I can still find a time to dance and to play. Perhaps, even, at the upcoming reunions. We shall see.