Reunion Tributes
Blessings
Renewal, reconciliation, spiritually uplifting, revival
These words might indicate that I just returned from a silent retreat at a monastery or from a self-help seminar. Yet, these are the feelings that jump out of my heart when I think of what happened in the past few days at my 25th college reunion at Harvard.
I had no idea that I needed what I encountered while there. There was a sense of joy, engagement, love, interest, openness, awareness and longing to reconnect that I could have only imagined in my best moments.
There was no chest beating, no wishing I had done something else or had ended up with another. Instead it was an encounter with joy, with curiosity, discovery and promise. I savored without ever becoming full. I drank without getting drunk. OK, well maybe I was a little tipsy.
What was perhaps most surprising and most delightful was the way our time together connected me with someone I had long forgotten. No it wasn’t a freshman year roommate or an old girlfriend, but rather myself, who I was, who I used to be.
I felt years of anxiety, disappointment, frustration and uncertainty just peel away while I was with you and have it replaced by a feeling of community that I forgot, a community that I had worked to build and relied on at such an important time in my life. The realization that it was still there, albeit a little grayer and a bit rounded out. It still felt vibrant: relevant and ready to engage. I liked that person I used to be and for the first time in a long time, could feel myself come alive with energy, excitement and creativity. For the first time in a long time I was happy.
There were many wonderful moments: the anticipation as I made the journey to registration in time for dinner, the sighting of my first classmate, fitting together in Sanders Theater on Thursday night, storming Harpoon Brewery after the Pops, and chasing my children and their new friends during field day (and never quite catching them). I will also remember dashing from the entrance of Memorial Church to the steps of Widner Library in hopes to make it into the class picture. Yet, along with the conversations that I had with so many of you, my deepest delight occurred during the memorial service. See, when I discover joy amidst sadness, I know that I am in a special place. At that moment I felt vulnerability and strength collide. I found that place with you and it will remains a source of strength, inspiration and hope. I was totally surprised by what if offered in terms of renewal, reconciliation, and rejoicing. And while there were a lot of things that I loved about our time together (like Harpoon Beer and Al's singing) it was the community of being with you while lighting the candles and ringing the bells that will return the skip in my step and the be a source of comfort in the darkness.
Part of me wants to just throw the kids in the mini van with my big thick red class report in one hand and the other on the wheel and start visiting folks. It would be a noble life’s work. It would be such a joy to continue the conversations we began but more importantly to affirm the friendships that we began, some 29 years ago and some just last weekend.
While I loved seeing my roommates and those on whom I relied while in school, it was seeing faces that I haven’t thought about in years, someone who I sat next to in EC 10 or who I studied with in Hilles Library during reading week that reawakened me. They were people who I didn’t know well but was fond of and friendly with, yet hadn’t thought about for a long, long time. Yet when I saw their faces and often after a several second delay, their names would come to mind, a bright smile would come to my face and I would feel a new sense of joy, love and connection. It happened a hundred times over the course of the reunion, each as fresh as the next. I never tired of it nor did I ever take it for granted.
A funny thing happened this weekend that somehow made it all right for having gone to Harvard. What I mean is that all that stuff about evading the question of “where did you go to college”, went out the widow for a final time. What did it for me wasn’t that somehow we had arrived at the pinnacle of success or that we had raised and outrageous and wonderful sum of money, but that we came together as a community in a way that can only happen when there is engagement, commitment and love. I felt all those things and so the Harvard that I was embarrassed to mention melted away on the banks of the Charles River and was replaced with a junior high school spirit that sings to the friendships and loyalty of our class.
I am not sure when this feeling will go away. Already I find myself getting caught up in the buzz of the day and I feel the pull of gravity beginning to move us apart. But I believe that I have been forever changed by our twenty-fifth, by you. I will commit with all my might, both through physical strength and focused prayer, to maintain and remember and to call upon you, the idea, and the community.
I am grateful to those who worked hard to make this event happen, I appreciate those who sacrificed and contributed in terms of time and money, to just get themselves, and for some, their families together to play, reminisce and create new bonds.
As I was leaving, I noticed that several of my children had tears in their eyes as they said good-by to their new friends whose parents were my old friends. Some of these kids live across town while others across the globe. I don’t know what will happen with those friendships, but I take the greatest delight in knowing that the kids I love and adore somehow got to know something about you whom I love and adore also.
People were nice, welcoming and supportive of my family and me the whole weekend. I hope that you know that I want to be all these things to you and your families for the rest of my journey in life. I, or I should say we, are there for you, just as you showed that you are there for us. I love my class!
Peace,
Wayne Meisel