A few months ago I posted a blog about the sense of loss I felt being Facebook unfriended out of nowhere by three people I’d known, but hadn’t seen, for many years.
The bottom line of that post was, “No matter how long it’s been, you’re part of my history and my heart still wants to know about your life, even if it’s only through the distance of social media.”
A few days later, my childhood friend Scott reached out to say the post inspired him to connect on an idea he’s had for awhile: an elementary school reunion next time he’s in town.
Keep it casual. Bring a breakfast burrito and a chair to the park and, whoever shows up, we’ll just hang out.
And so yesterday six of us Benchley Pandas made it happen.
I loaded up the chairs, the kiddo and his friend brought their skateboards, we picked up burritos, got clutch parking, and then spent some time reconnecting with a few of my day ones, exchanging hugs and weaving through four hours of delightful conversation.
These are people who know who I am at my core. They knew the me before life really got its hands on me, before I learned how to defend myself, before puberty and armor and facades and excuses and self-doubt, before things were complicated, before failures and humility.
These are people who star in my core memories: sleepovers, recess, talent shows, Girl Scouts….
Mrs. Goldschnider’s 2nd grade production of Alice in Wonderland where Christy was Alice and Andy was the rabbit and I was the rosebud with one line: “I think she’s pretty”…and Amy was the queen flower who got to say, “Quiet, bud.”
Tetherball, kickball, and games of HORSE on the upper field.
Rainy day Heads Up Seven Up and Hangman, trapper keepers and lunch box envy, multiplication quizzes and spelling tests, jog-a-thons, four square, Halloween carnivals, riding bikes during open house.
Singing “Blowin in the Wind” and “Fifty Nifty United States” together in chorus. Every year we’d have a Talent Show where my dad played guitar and I’d sing weird folk songs like “Beans in Your Ears” and “Dead Skunk in the Middle of the Road”. There’s a video out there somewhere….
The girls had legendary birthday parties and sleepovers where moms would order Round Table pizza and we’d watch The Goonies, and play Truth or Dare until it was late enough to sneak out for toilet papering.
Scott was the one who told me about the Challenger Shuttle tragedy during our morning game of Connect Four. And one time he invited me to a Padre game with his grandpa and my mom teased about it being my first “date”.
“Bloody Mary” mirror challenges, Michael Jackson’s Thriller, and Vietnamese pork buns at Sandy’s. Her parents had a Mercedes with a sunroof and a car phone.
Kim’s dad was in the Navy and coached our championship soccer team The Purple Streaks.
Adisa had a kickass Barbie mansion.
Mary and I ate pomegranates and dug trenches to create an outdoor island for misfit Barbies, we’d play costumed make-believe in her gazebo with ukuleles. Her parents were rad hippies and she was the only vegetarian I’d ever met.
Christiane sliced her hand with a scalpel when we were dissecting a sheep eyeball in 6th grade. Her and Angela and Jennifer were also really good dancers. And Tara was a real life ballerina.
I’d ride my bike down the hill to Kelly’s and we’d play Kung Fu on Nintendo and make up “stair dances” to Kylie Minogue.
Chris was really good at soccer. Tony was a really good swimmer. One Josh was really smart and went to the junior high for math class, another Josh was a really good artist and had his bar mitzvah in the Sea World shark encounter, and the other Josh grew up across the street from me and broke his leg when he hit the mailbox riding his big wheel down our hill.
I had a brief crush on this kid Mark until he called me out and said, “I know you like me” when I jumped over a sprinkler before class to impress him…so, then I didn’t like him anymore.
Sometimes I walked home with Sarah after school and we’d hang out at her house…we both had freckles and blonde hair, classmates teased we might be related, but we took it as a compliment, whenever we were together, I remember laughing.
The first time I tried homemade tacos that tasted exactly like Taco Bell was at Lisa’s.
Ian always made fart jokes. Nissa had coke-bottle glasses and was very quiet but whenever she did say something, it was hilarious. Amy’s dad was a doctor and she had a pool. And everyone wanted to be friends with Denise.
And the greatest thing about meeting up with my Day Ones is that all these memories bubbled right up to the surface…these things I’ve buried under the layers of years and experiences I’d stacked on top of them.
And for a few moments yesterday, I got to be a kid again.
In the fourth hour, we were winding down, the kiddo and his friend were on the run from anti-skateboarding security guards and a couple ladies needed a battery jump in the nearby parking lot, so we took it as a sign our time together was up for now.
After we parted ways, I wondered what my classmates might remember about me from those days. And there were little parts of me that quietly hoped my day ones only remember the good times and have forgotten a few of my minor humiliations and mistakes from our wonder years, moments I’d certainly like to forget. Sometimes I know I was loud and obnoxious, sometimes I did silly things to get attention.
But I’m sure we all have those regrets in some way, and maybe mine only seem big because they were embarrassing and happened to me. Perhaps enough time passes where our memories focus more on the feeling of a person rather than a specific moment.
I remembered how I felt being around them as a kid, I got to tap into Little Jaime sharing space with them again yesterday.
And that was really beautiful, to be transported back in time with Little Scott and Kim and Christiane and Angela and Sarah…all of us now fully-functioning, successful humans who have lived the bulk of our lives traveling different paths, and yet we all instantly found ourselves and each other again, back at day one, over burritos in the park.
10/10 would recommend.
We plan to do it again real soon…hoping next time more day ones will join us in the beautiful experience of time travel.
