Way back when this whole process started, I'd promised to update this space with news of my Ryerson graduating class's 25th anniversary reunion. Well, the day has come and gone, and as with most things blog, I've been delinquent, o my brothers and sisters.
That said, we had a great time.
A high school friend told me recently that the older he gets, the more value he puts on relationships from his past. I get this, and my reunion has cemented the point. People with whom you share history bring depth and dimension to your life in a way that newer friends - however important a force they may be in your world - never can. My Ryerson classmates and I lived, laughed, cried and worked together for two years, day in and day out. Those connections were largely broken over the years, with certain exceptions, but now at least some of them have been restored.
In fact, one classmate who was unable to attend - she's now with a major newspaper and was assigned to cover the royal wedding the same weekend - described our group as the core of her life. I was wowed by this statement. I never thought it that way. But I believe she's right.
The evening began on a somewhat hesitant note. One friend and I arrived early, since I had made the reservation and felt obligated to ensure its success. We discovered that the restaurant had put us at two separate tables, divided by a staircase. I had expressed our need to be seated together, given the nature of the event, and been assured that we could be accommodated. This didn't feel very accommodating to me at all.
After half an hour of intense negotiation, the manager agreed to move us to a different area of the restaurant. We were still at two tables (our group was about 17 or 18 people total), but at least they were within hailing distance of each other. Plus we had the space pretty much to ourselves, other than the servers, which gave it a certain intimacy.
The food was good, if unmemorable. But we weren't there to eat. We were there to drink in each others' life experience over the ensuing quarter century. And the evening flew by at light speed.
Three and a half hours after it began, dinner ended. We'd agreed in advance to repair to a nearby bar, the same one we'd frequented as students. In fact, my selection of a dinner location was based largely on that premise. As we were leaving the restaurant, two servers literally chased us out into the street and accused me of not having paid my bill. I should have been moritified - they were completely mistaken - but in the glow of the moment, I simply said, you've got it wrong. And then we moved on.
The following morning the server who had looked after my table got my mobile number from her manager and called me to apologize for what had happened. And then a few days later, I got another call from a different manager who wanted to know what he could do to make things right. I said the apology was more than sufficient, and made particular note of the server whose apology had preceded his.
I won't be going back to that restaurant any time soon. But it doesn't matter.
Even the reunion itself wasn't about going back. It was about catching up. Tony Soprano once said, "Remember when is the lowest form of conversation." And interestingly, we spent precious little time reliving what was past. We were much more interested - or at least I was - in finding out who people had become, where they'd gone in their lives, their successes and missteps, their families, all of it.
We were - and some of us still are - journalists. So we all know how to tell stories, how to impart information in a wry, pithy way that gets to the heart quickly. And we know how to ask questions to draw out other people's stories.
Some people had families; others didn't. Quite a few had ended up, as I have, in public service. Interestingly, of those in government, a few had ended up on political staff, albeit not permanently - hardly a surprise.
There was some discussion of those not present. Of a class of 30 people, it's a little shocking that we've only lost one person to illness or disease over the years. Others were either not as easy to find, or else didn't wish to be included. Either way, their absence was felt. 
There was a flurry of activity in the few days after the event, as people posted pictures, swapped messages and made plans for future get-togethers. Maybe these events will happen; maybe they won't. I will do my part to ensure they do, as will others, I have no doubt.
I'm just grateful to have had this experience.
