good times never expire

The most expected and dreaded part of a high school reunion, by tradition, has to be addressed–the awards for who "traveled the farthest," has the "most children," is the "most" or "least changed"...you know the list. After hearing horror stories of reunion-going classmates being re-traumatized in front of their eternal peers, and how awkward the moment of judgement can be, we carefully considered how to approach this part of the evening when planning our 20th year get-together.

For us, the solution was a presentation of a series of beautiful gift certificates to our favorite high school haunts. The joke was that all of the featured places have closed since our glory days. So, the premise of the presentation was something like, "How embarrassing. We had some great prizes to award tonight, but just realized that all of these certificates expired in 1988! But just so you know what you could have won for having the Most Tattoos, you would have received..." It kept that part of the evening nostalgic and light-hearted, without forcing people in or out of the spotlight. I think it worked well. There were passes to Xenon dance club, and gift certificates to places like Snelgrove's ice cream parlor, Castleton's department store, Granite Furniture in Sugarhouse, the food court at Crossroads Plaza, and Bill and Nada's Cafe.

When the event was over, one classmate asked if she could take home the gift certificate to the 7-Eleven on 21st and 21st. She said that whenever she drives by that location with her kids in the car and points out that building as being her favorite high school hang out, her kids reply, "Mom, you are so lame. You hung out at the dry cleaners?"

Life moves on, but good times never expire.