It took me a while to decide to attend my 30th high school reunion. My class isn’t active in arranging or attending anything. This was an event hosted by the school. I awoke the morning of the cocktail hour, and dressed for work, taking extra time to look into my magnifying mirror to check for blemishes or hairs that needed plucking. I noticed a pain in my ear. A pimple was growing. I’m 48. I’m getting creases in my skin, random hairs on my face, AND pimples? This seems unfair. I accepted it as appropriate, considering I was going back to high school.

I worked a full day and then drove an hour and a half east to my hometown. Traffic was thick, as it usually is in Metro-Detroit around 5:00pm. I prepped in my parents’ guest quarters, donning a shirt from my freshman year field day. Then I drove the ten minutes to my alma mater.

There I reunited with five classmates. It was lovely to see them. Truly. I had heard that one was flying in from Colorado, and that’s what compelled me to finally buy my own ticket. Our fifth and tenth reunions were well attended. Since those reunions, this was triple the attendance! People are busy, reunions aren’t a priority for the class of 1993, I guess.

These five women shared stories and revealed the secrets of legends from our class. We posed for photos with the other reuniting classes and took a tour of our alma mater. A few major changes have been made – obviously technology – and a new gym facility has been built since our departure, allowing the gym-torium of our era to drop a function. The cafeteria is considerably more upscale. The payphone banks are gone. The senior lounge is still a place I would not want to hang out in.

There was a moment, when I stood looking down the pristine and quiet hallway, that I could hear echoes of lockers slamming and classmates talking and laughing. The paint colors might be different, and garbage receptacles have been smartly placed in the corridors, but I was lost in pure nostalgia. The hallway had seemed shorter and more intimidating when I was young. I reflected in quiet gratitude. I now realize that my years at Marian High School helped me to find my voice. The theatrical one, the singing one, and the one that isn’t afraid to ask difficult questions or advocate.

Before the reunion, I grabbed a yearbook and as many photos as I could find from high school. Since our high school years predated digital cameras, I didn’t have that many. Despite feeling the same sparkle of youth within, we were reaching for our reading glasses, or holding the prints in outstretched arms. Laughing about it, only adding depth to the lines creeping onto our faces.

These women (along with others) had gone on a spring break trip together that sounded like a lot of fun and chaos. I had gone with my parents to a sleepy retirement village. Some of these women were athletes. I didn’t even know that sports was a big deal in high school. I sang the national anthem before a few basketball games. Or were they volleyball games? And I think that’s as far as I got.

One attendee told (now funny) stories of her car accidents. I asked if they knew that one of my best friends at a neighboring school was in a horrible wreck and three friends died. They didn’t know. I remember the teenage horror of believing that everyone around knew all of my business. Guess what? They didn’t. In high school, we were all too self absorbed to know about everyone else’s business. I didn’t realize sports, because I came to the gym-torium after sports practices were over for theatre rehearsals.

There was so much for me to process from the evening. Feelings of contentment, gratitude, awe, and respect kept me peppy. I drove to my parents’ listening to Miley Cyrus’ “Used to be Young.” That song perfectly sums up this phase of reconciling youth, as we look toward our fifties.

I updated my dad on the evening before practically skipping to the guest space. I walked into the bathroom to prepare for bed and noticed something catching light on my face, above my lip. I leaned into the mirror and saw a thick white hair stubble that had sprung up sometime during the day. I suppose the sparkle of youth is on the inside only. The surface area of me is a different kind of sparkle.