Sunday, September 30, 2012

Jim’s 45th Alamosa High School Reunion

Much of this blog post is for the benefit of present and former residents of Alamosa who know some of those photographed.  For our other blog readers, patience!

September 28-29th we celebrated Jim’s 45th high school reunion. Yes, we drove there in Jim’s pride and joy, the ‘64 El Camino.

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The weekend started off Friday with a tour of

CIMG0877Ortega Middle School, which was Jim’s high school back in the day….in fact, Class of 1967 was only the second class to graduate from that building.

The building custodians were waiting for us and were so good to open up rooms for these old students to check out.  Interestingly enough, many of the men wanted to go into the principal’s office------since they spent so much time in there when students, they said.

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There was a surprise waiting in the Nell Roger’s Library (she was a friend and a wonderful, fun-loving lady).

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Inside was the class’s history teacher, Leonard King, and Betty Stevens, school counselor, both of them looking great after 45 years!

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There was much laughter walking the halls and passing classrooms with comments like, “remember when we ________ in the chemistry lab that day?” and “damn, I hated being in that classroom”!

A lot of the folks in attendance must have been in a lot of the plays, choir and band, because the band room and auditorium were very popular places to visit. Hey, Beth (our daughter), remember all the hours you spent in this room blowing your sax.

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Another place everyone wanted to see  was the gym…..and was the moose head still up on the wall???  Oh, yes, it still was…top right side of the wall. (AHS is known as the Mean Moose in sports.)
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After the tour we all gathered at Ramada’s Inn of the Rio Grande out east of town for a little socializing.

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Saturday evening we went back to Inn of the Rio Grande for a banquet.  We were so happy they kept things simple without a lot of programmed events, a simple greeting, reading of departed classmates, acknowledging veterans in the class and a fun trivia game.  Bill Clark won for coming the farthest – Maryland; four couples married classmates and which of them got married first; and Jim and I won for having the most great-grandchildren…..we have a great-granddaughter and another one on the way. 

There were little placards on all the tables with names of their teachers and others with names of hangouts and stores in town, many of which no longer exist, like A & H Bootery, Small Fry’s, Goal Post, Nine Nine and Ace Inn. Lots of memories spoken.

There was a very nice buffet dinner and lots of time to visit and get reacquainted.  Later on they had a DJ playing music from the 60s with a few people dancing to the likes of “Unchained Melody”, “Sherry” and “Louie Louie”.

I only knew three or four people, there but I enjoyed myself, laughing at the retelling of the antics of these mischievous 63 year olds LOL!!!  For a few hours everyone was 18 years old again and seeing all their friends through 18 year old eyes.  It was very wonderful.

Everyone is looking forward to the 50th reunion, God willing.

Remember, you are loved.
Read the story behind the saying HERE

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