Alumni Dinner Address 2017

ALUMNI ADDRESS

July, 2017

What a pleasure it is to see so many old friends together in one place. My graduating class is celebrating its 50^th anniversary this year.

1967, The Summer of Love (sing: if you’re going to San Fran…)

Did anyone here get to San Francisco in 1967? I didn’t get there for almost another 20 years.

In the spring of 1987, I was offered a job I really wanted in San Francisco. I remember telling my future boss I appreciated the offer so much, and I wanted to say yes, but there was one stipulation, and it wasn’t negotiable: I said, I have plans to go home for a week in July, and I have to go.

She asked me where “home” was, and I said, oh, it’s a small town in upstate NY. She said she was from a small town, too. Ames, Iowa. That wasn’t what I meant by small. Well, I got the job, with my plans intact. One day I was at lunch with a bunch of coworkers when someone asked me why I was taking a week off in July, and where I was going.

When I told them I was going to my 20^th high school class reunion, they all stared at me.         “Why on Earth would you do that?” one of them said. Another said,

         “I don’t know anybody I went to high school with. There were 700 in my class.”

          Another said, “You couldn’t pay me to go to one of those.”

They were still staring at me.

So here’s what I said: “There were 40 kids in my graduating class. Aside from my family, these are the people I’ve known the longest in my life. I entered kindergarten with many of them, and we were together for 13 years. Others joined our class from time to time, making it richer. A few left us over the years, and I still miss them.”

Ordinary as that sounds in this room today, to my friends in San Francisco, it was stunning. I think they pictured a one-room schoolhouse, a teacher in a long skirt with a bun on her head, whacking reluctant readers with a ruler. Since they were still staring, I went on to tell them

•     I really did grow up in a house with a picket fence, that

•     the angel who drove my school bus was named Bing Howe and

•     how my best friend, Linda Kennell, and I went to the “basement” and washed our mouths out with soap after Mrs. McCaffery threatened someone with that punishment for saying a bad word. Linda and I thought soap was kind of nice, and couldn’t possibly taste that bad, so we had to try it. (Oh boy, it was bad!)

I told them about marching in the band behind the horses in the Memorial Day parade.

About learning Latin declensions from a teacher who looked exactly like a figure on a Roman coin.

And about being a teacher’s kid. It wasn’t all peaches and cream.

But it was special. I was reminded, by the reaction of those co-workers, how special it was, growing up in Arkport, with all of you.

So…1967. Well, our class tumbled out into a world that was changing so fast, I don’t know about you, but I felt like I was on thin ice until I was about 40. After Arkport, I lived in the North Country, in Baltimore, in Manhattan, Rochester, Oakland and San Francisco, until, at about age 50, I ended up back here. With Dick Muse!! AND THEY TELL YOU YOU CAN’T GO BACK! I even live, once again, in the house with the picket fence.

Here’s the thing. For us, it’s different. If you grew up in Arkport, you can go back! I’ll bet the house you grew up in is still right where you left it. Our teachers are gone now, but Arkport Central School is pretty much as we left it.

•     I walked the halls once a few years ago and actually heard cheerleaders chanting a cheer that I wrote when I was in 7^th grade!

•     Debbie Dungan won a contest to name The Ark-Reporter, and I think it’s still called that!

•     A few years ago, they were refurbishing the front office at the school, and on opening up a wall, they uncovered a set of old, wooden mailboxes with the names still on, listen to this: Kennell, Lander, Fidler, Chubon, Huff, Crowell, Yates, Kelly, Dungan, Flanders ... Marcus.

We can go back, and we did come back today, because a place like Arkport holds onto its history, and its history is in this room. It holds onto us. We hold onto it. We know where we came from, so we know who we are.

Thank you.