A love letter to the HHS class of 2002

Maybe we weren't all friends, maybe some of us hardly new each other, but looking back I feel nothing but love and gratitude for the HHS class of 2002.

Just so this doesn't look like it came out of no where, I should mention that my 10 year HS reunion was last weekend and while I couldn't make it (something about living 3000 miles away... LOL) it made me stop and think about a lot of things.

The first and for whatever reason most important thing is in 2002, right before HS graduation I will always remember telling my family's neighbor how excited I was to go to college and how excited I was that my friends and I were all sort of staying nearish by so we could visit and get together, and how I was going to email and keep in touch with my friends who weren't staying so close by and all those cliche things someone says at the end of something.  But I remember most, is her very distinctly telling me I wouldn't keep in touch with my high school friends, we wouldn't see each other, even though we said we would, because that's just how the world works, you grow up you move on and keeping in touch isn't as easy it sounds.  I was floored by this bit of news, but decided to not let it bother (clearly it bothered me enough that 10 years later I'm telling you fine folk about it).


I don't think of the people I keep in touch with as my "high school friends" I think of these people as my "whole life friends"  because many of these people I have known almost my whole life, or at least the parts of my life that really mattered the most. These are the people I went to elementary school with, middle school with, high school with and a few I even went to college with.  And I'd like to thank(in chronological order) AIM, live journal, free after 9 cell phone minutes, free long distance on your cell phone, free mobile to mobile calling, unlimited text messaging, facebook, unlimited everything cell phone plans, getting a paycheck so we could afford to travel to each other, and skype for making sure that I can in fact keep touch..

And like I said maybe I'm not exactly BFF's with most of my graduating class, but it amuses me to no end that every now and then I'll get a comment or a wall post from someone in my graduating class just checking in or saying hi.  In fact I'd like to think because of the huge amount of communication technology we now have at our literal fingertips I have become better friends with certain people from HS.

I like how get really really happy when I  see a text message or a facebook post, or a phone call (I'm still bad at answering the phone I know!) from a friend who knows my whole life story and in spite of (or maybe because of!) it still wants to be my friend.  I love how the best part of saying goodbye to these people is the chance to say hello again, and how happy and excited we all  get counting down the days till we can see each other again.

Because there is nothing in the world like the balm to the soul that is being surrounded by old friends, nothing in the world like knowing no matter what these people will love you for who you were, are and becoming, nothing in the world like hugging someone you've missed for a long time!


So, I guess in away my neighbor was right, I didn't keep in touch with my HS friends.

 I just kept in touch with my friends that I love now just like I did when I had that conversation.




I said this was a love letter to my graduating class, so here's to you class of 2002...(some of these apply to everyone, some apply to small groups, some apply only to certain specific people)


The people who apparently love chicken patties so much that our class president ran on a platform promising them everyday.

The people who were in the classroom with, or down the hall from on 9/11.

The people who know "it's up to you in 2002!"

The people who were told by advisors or teachers, or even parents or other students that they couldn't do something, and then did it anyway... (especially those at the bottom of the alphabet LOL)

The people who heard Eve 6's "Here's to the Night" the summer before senior year and took all the words to heart.

The people who used all 4 years of HS as their very first "Metamorphosis"

(and to the people who were fortunate enough (or maybe unfortunate enough) to hear my very impassioned speech on Kafka's "The Metamorphosis" that Gregor Sampson was not in fact actually turned into a bug... I stand by this)

The people who didn't have an iPod in HS, because iPods weren't a thing until right before we graduated.

To the people who have the yearbook signed by 2002's best Dressed Mindy Fhoweveryouspellit with note to save it because someday she was gonna be famous!

To the people who were fortunate enough to meet the cast of Hedda Gabler in NY, because our awesome teacher happened to know one of the actors (and thus remember the line "Hi my name is (name) Mr. Hynes is my teacher...") 

The people who still get choked up when they hear "With One Look" or "On the Waterfront" The people who still cringe a little when they even hear the words "Russian Christmas Music" or "hoods" and still smile when they hear the opening chords to "SCHERHAZADE"... the people who know that sometimes getting demoted is the best thing in the world.


The people who can finish the speech "you're gonna get your butts kicked, you're gonna your asses handed to you..."

To the few people who still my Gimpy...

The people who have a hard time turning off "Oh Holy Night" when it appears on your playlist and it's not Christmas time... for that matter who have it on their playlist at all times.

The people who don't think it's strange when you find yourself humming and maybe still singing a long to Carmina Burana.

The people who swing around lamposts and ask "what'cha knowing?" , the people whose hands still burst into jazz hands at the words "bop... bop bop"

The people who "studied" for the AP history exam by going to Taco Bell and then had to break into a friends house because she locked herself out.

The people who created and participated in the first ever Youth Bureau Lockin

The people who remember the time The Ghost of Christmas Past was a "little late"

The people who understand the phrase "watcher man in all that tweed..." and "star wars puem puem" and understand that strawberry is the opposite of banana (or stake for that matter)

The people who understand what "not in my car!" "you save my ass, I'll save yours" "partners in crime" mean

The people who were rivals in HS who are now people you can't imagine your life without (you totally know who you are!)


The people who went to "college to get more knowledge" and participated in senior walk around the block with balloons day, who were destined to become the "best and the brightest"... who went to college when the economy was still booming and graduated just in time for it start to fall apart...the people who survived in and maybe even thrived in the worst recession our generation has seen... the people who haven't give up yet.

The people who are fortunate enough to remember that we were a class of people that didn't have a clique problem, a class of people where the football players and cheerleaders were also in the school plays or the band, the 'smart kids' were also jocks, the quiet kids also burst into song, the class who managed to work together to get shit done and get shit done right!


Again, I look back on my time at HHS with love and gratitude, not only to my class, but to our teachers, and our parents.  It was quite a ride, but the last 10 years have been an even crazier one, and while I enjoyed my time at HHS, let's be real, I wouldn't do high school again.

Putting myself out there and admitting (again) I don't take enough advantage of the fact...

...that I live in Los Angles.  A coworker said something like that to me the other day.  He said he and his wife "dont' take enough advantage of Los Angeles"  it got me thinking, that I too don't take enough advantage of Los Angeles, and in retrospect wasn't that part of what starting this blog was all about?

So here I sit 6 months and 1 day in to my second move to Los Angeles (and my third move cross country)  and I spent the last 2 hours outside enjoying the most perfect day of weather ever.  A perfect Sunny 75 degrees with not a cloud in the sky.  And most days are like this in Los Angeles, and most days like this I spend either at work or watching TV on my couch.  It's sad really, but I think part of it is because when you have 290 plus days of sunshine a year, what makes one of them any more special than any other?  Probably nothing, but then again, you never know where they day will take you if you don't get off the couch a little more. So I spent the morning dog sitting my good friends dog and drinking my coffee on the patio.  I spent sometime sitting by the pool at my apartment with a good book and a cold (non alcoholic) beverage, and I took advantage of yet another perfect day of weather.

It was a week ago my TV finally arrived from the East Coast, I had gotten such a good deal on when I bought it that I knew selling it was never going to help me get another TV so I let it sit at my old upstairs neighbors house in CT while I tried to figure out the best way to get it here.  If I had known it would have been as cheap and easy as it was, I'd like to think I would have done it a long time ago.  I wouldn't have, but I'd like to think that I would have.  It always just seemed like so much effort to ship...

It wasn't until this morning while I was making the bed at my friends house where I stayed to dog sit for the last few days I realized what it was about the last 6 months and 1 day in LA that made me a little gun shy, maybe a little more reserved than I had hoped the move back to LA would make me...

...The fear that this was all just temporary. The fear that maybe if I got to attached, I'd have to leave again and I'd be heartbroken over it once again.

Since I'm being so open at the moment, and since this whole blog is about putting myself out there, I'm going to be honest... I feel like I knew 30 days (30 days... 1 month!) in to my move to CT, that I wanted that to be temporary. I knew 6 months and 1 day in that it was going to be temporary and that Los Angeles really was where I wanted to call home. I feel like I got up everyday knowing that it was temporary and thus didn't feel the need to experience anything that was going on around me.  Which I know is kind of a counter intuitive way of looking at the situation, because normally if things are temporary you should WANT to experience all you can because you might not be there later.  But in my case it was because it just didn't matter and it was all going to go away and I could get back to what I had been referring to for sometime as "my real life" , so why bother putting down roots, roots would mean a tree would grow and form branches and grow leaves, and other tree metaphors...and I didn't want to be a tree in CT.  I spent a lot of time sad, alone and maybe even a little depressed, I was afraid if I let myself enjoy it, I'd never leave, I'd get complacent and I'd become a tree.

I once again naively thought that moving back to LA would be a cure all for all those things I mentioned above.  Newsflash... it wasn't, but it wasn't until just now I think I realized why.  I was afraid I couldn't become a tree here, and here is where I want to become a tree (or a cookie!).

I can experience things and fall back in love with Los Angeles (hell maybe even fall in love with someone, because for the first time ever I think I really want too, and I feel like I really can... but that's a different post) because here is where I want to be a tree!  I want to take advantage of the fact that I live here, I want to experience all those things I didn't or couldn't experience in CT and I want to be here now... and probably (possibly) always. I want to make being here worth being here, worth putting down my roots, and becoming a tree!

I need to snap out of it, I need to realize that I can't experience the world from my couch, which I admit I have gotten quite used to doing.  I need to do things even if they take what I would consider "too much effort" because as it turns out those are things that are worth doing (case in point this week I drove to Hollywood and I sat in line for three hours to make sure my friends and I could get tickets to a screening of Jurassic Park in cemetery and then waited another 2 hours before the movie started and while that sounds insane and like a lot of effort... I had really excellent evening!!) I need to realize that I'll still be able to do my job even if I'm a little more tired because the night before I went to a concert, or out with friends or whatever.  (this doesn't mean I'm going to go crazy before those 5am mornings) I need to embrace the insanity of it all and just be here now... because forever or not, there is no point in living in LA if I'm just going to sit on my couch.