Grown up?
by Jon Worley

June has arrived, and with it my annual haircut. See, I get the ends trimmed just before attending a wedding of a friend. Since 1994, there have been one or two of these each year. Another is coming up in a couple weeks, so my split ends went under the blade.

As if to offer further proof of impending doom, my ten-year high school reunion is in August. I've been getting these little updates, detailing how the committee has been unable to locate 300 of the 400 members of the Class of 1987. Kinda amazing really, when you consider that only about 100 of us went to college at all, and probably only about 40 of us finished a degree of any sort. Most Clovis (N.M.) High grads stick around for the long haul. I thought about suggesting that the organizers learn how to use a phone book, but I wasn't feeling that mean at the time.

Obviously, my mood has shifted.

My wife Barbara has been campaigning for skipping the affair. She visited Clovis twice, and both times barely escaped with her sanity. It is very possible that she completely reappraised my mental toughness after these visits. She did five days in Clovis; I did five years.

Salvation in this matter came for Barbara when her parents decided that the only time they could visit us was the same time as the reunion. Barbara then tried to convince me that I needed to have someone with me, to keep me from slashing my wrists after the event. And since she couldn't go, I shouldn't go. I passed on the melodramatics and sent my money off today.

The questions on the form are telling. Did you marry your high school sweetheart? Are you still married? How many kids do you have? Any schooling since CHS? How many AA steps have you completed?

The form also asked what I have to show for myself, ten years out of high school. I remember a discussion with our class president just before we graduated. Many wanted a five-year reunion, but she was against it, saying "We'll just have gotten out of college. What would we have done by then?" Of course, she was speaking to the small number of us who were even contemplating college.

I have a journalism degree from the University of Missouri. That means something to a few people. But not to any of my classmates. I worked in the Kansas City office of the Clinton campaign in 1992. That means even less. As for my stints as curling correspondent in Michigan, appraiser of obscure music or barely-competent columnist, well, I don't think many would even understand.

Folks in Clovis expected me to do things. Big things. This whole "non-career track" concept that I fleshed out in school and have striven to live since then will sound like a big cop-out. Or, at the very least, an excuse to "be lazy". The fact that thousands of people around the world read my musical musings every week doesn't count as "something big". My failed attempt to start an internet radio station last year certainly is a black mark on my "permanent record". I probably won't bring that one up at all.

The thing is, ten years out of high school, the idea is that you're supposed to have accomplished something. Hell, I've lived a more interesting life than all but maybe one or two of my classmates. That counts as far as I'm concerned. And that's why I'm going back. I want to know exactly what these people consider to be "the good life". What makes them the way they are. Why they are radically different than me. Why I still can't say, write or think "Clovis" without a chill going down my spine.

So it will be a weekend of confronting demons. I'll tell a few stories, like the time I jammed an advance tape of "Pump" with King's X back in 1989. I think that one would make sense. But I have no children, no job with Microsoft, so big shiny car or any of the other things seemingly expected of me back in 1987.

Maybe Barbara's right. Maybe I really shouldn't go. But I think it is best to face fear, to face uncertainty, to figure out just why I can't put my years in Clovis behind me. I'm not a hit man going back to look for my dream girl, but I am curious just what the hell happened to some of the folks I knew. And if they're not there, I'll grab a couple beers, request "Setting Sun" from the DJ, give an example of exactly why I never fit in and then drive the four hours back to my brothers' house in the big Q.

I'm not sure if I'll be giving my hair another trim before I wander west. It doesn't seem necessary.

The 1987 CHS reunion is the first weekend in August. Jon Worley plans to attend, but he won't be participating in the golf tournament. That would simply be too weird.

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