Divine Providence

It has taken a few days to digest all of the things that happened when I went spent Friday and part of Saturday of the Memorial Day weekend at the Princeton reunion, and then Saturday night and Sunday morning at my own 25th reunion at Brown University. I predicted sentimentality, and if I had to put a theme song to the part of my own reunion that I attended, it would have to be Green Day's "Good Riddance", even if they do play it at every Bar Mitzvah and on the last day of camp. It truly reminded me that college was "the time of my life."

Probably the highlight of the whole weekend was reuniting with my best friend from Brown on the three and a half hour train ride from Princeton to Providence (reuniting being a euphemism for talking nonstop the entire way, including on the two trains we had to take to get to Amtrak at Penn Station in New York.)

There are some friends who we have not spoken to in five or ten or even twenty years, but it doesn't matter because when we see them again it's as if we've been checking in with them every day since our freshman year in college. We suddenly remember why this person meant so much to us, yet there's a surreal quality to the encounter given that they show up (in some cases) with their 6'2'' teenage son.

My own son (only 5'8", but still) just finished his freshman year at Brown. He came along, allegedly to visit his upper class friends who were graduating, but I think he just wanted to make sure that his mother didn't party like it was 1999. Just in case the reunion committee was serious about recreating an 80s style college "funk night" with the requisite kegs, smell of beer and vomit in the hallway afterwards, I had two glasses of Proseco at the hotel before I left. Luckily we have all grown up to appreciate an open bar (and to be able to pay for it).

Even though I had the usual 'shouting match over the music' five minute conversations with most of the classmates I spoke to, I still managed to have substantive talks with two different college friends, both of whom I never see. That meant a lot to me. Also, Princeton may have the "P-rade" with its loud, outlandish orange and black costumes, but there is nothing like the Brown tradition of marching down college hill with your classmates, and then lining the hill to watch the current class of graduates march. It never fails to give me chills, despite the 85 degree weather.

Walking back up the hill, past the college and on to the main drag of Thayer street, my son said that he would prefer to have just a week off for summer and then come back to school. That, even more than the reunion itself, is how I know just how much time has passed.