Don't Look Back

I keep receiving emails and letters from my old University reminding me about a 1990s reunion event which involves a campus tour and culminates in a disco. A thought crossed my mind about going, getting in touch with the one person from Uni that I’m still vaguely in contact with to see if she wants to go along. Of course, she won’t – she has a young daughter now – her days of university discos are long behind her and possibly something she is even in denial about now she’s a mother since hers were wilder than most.

Today’s email mentioned that there was an attendees list online so you could see which of your old friends were going. Curiosity got the better of me and I looked. Of course, there wasn’t a single name of the list I recognised. The sort of people I was friends with at university weren’t really the sort of people to go in for organised alumni events, just as they aren’t the sort of people to be on Friends Reunited, although I do still keep an eye on it to see if anyone interesting will pop up.

I know all this nostalgia isn’t healthy but I would like to know what became of people, how their lives worked out. I did bump into someone I knew from uni at the NFT about 18 months ago, which was a bit of a shock. Someone I had been pretty good friends with for a time and very briefly a little more than friends with. I didn’t recognise him and even when he said his name, it still took me a while to place him. It was actually a bit awkward, I blushed a lot and didn’t really know what to say, then our respective partners came back and we went our separate ways into the cinema.

If that was encounter was anything to go on, a big reunion event probably isn’t for me and no doubt would be full of people boasting about how wonderful their lives/families/careers are.