We have to start somewhere and this is it.
I have long wanted to find out what has happened to those I attended school with. I want to see how they’ve fared; are they doing ok; what are they doing with their lives; do they have a family and so on. But why did I want to get back together with folks who, lets face it in some cases, tried to bully me and at the time were downright viscious to others? Well in short my life has moved on and I don’t (nor did I ever) hold a grudge and due to circumstances (an entirely different story) I never got to go to university and ‘bond’ with others – instead I’d already spent the best part of 5 or more years of my life with 50+ boys and 1 girl and no matter what happened then, most of you hold a special place in my mind and heart.
For a long time I lived vicariously through my sister in law (Joanne Thorpe for those of you that don’t know) as she has kept in touch with some of the other girls who started at the Mount in 1979. At least one of those girls has a brother in our year and through these tenuous links I know some of the fate of some of those who chartered the waters that was our O Level year in 1980. Originally I was looking in to trying to get a ‘25 years since our O’s reunion’ off the ground but things in my life back then were far too complicated to allow me to pursue the thought process. Along with the singular lack of response from those I was in contact with at that time, I resigned myself to the fact that it simply wasn’t going to happen.
Then came this year. What is different about this year you may ask? This year my eldest child started the task of trying to pick a university and he and I have been touring the country visiting numerous universities. Along the way he’s helped me reminisce and as a part of that we decided to visit my old alma maters. To enable this I got in touch with Richard Thompson and spent the night at his place. There ensued an attempt by the pair of us to recall all the names of those we spent our final years with – by the end we’d recalled 40 or so names and knew we were short. In the midst of all this (with the 2007 Rugby World Cup as our backdrop) I mentioned that I’d wanted to get a reunion and Richard instantly leapt on the idea.
So, after more discussion here I am.
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