Where Have All My Classmates Gone?

For months now, I've been bombarded with messages from an Internet site telling me that former classmates are just dying to get in touch with me.  And for a low, low price of only $9.99 they will reveal just who it is that wants to contact me.

I almost fell for it before a friend told me she'd fallen for it.  And then she found it extremely difficult to get out from under them and stop them billing her credit card.  Another acquaintance said she'd gotten a computer virus trying to download a message from a classmate.

Smart move not to get tucked up with that lot.

And just why DO I want to get in contact with these old school chums.  The people who looked at me and rolled their eyes.  Yes, I was a geek, who walked around reading and writing Star Trek stories (even though the show had been canceled before I entered high school.  Ha!  Little did they know the franchise would be resurrected and live a long and happy life in syndication and on the big screen.  But I digress).

I had hair down to my backside that I usually wore in braids or a ponytail.  I dressed in sweatshirts, jeans, and baggy wool (Pendleton) shirts (Hey, I was cold!), love beads and sneakers.  I was no fashion plate.  I spent most of my spare time in the library reading biographies.  (They had four of Edgar Allen Poe--is it any surprise I became a mystery author?)

In all these years, I never went to a class reunion.  I never was invited, so I never knew when they were.  So why this burning desire to suddenly get in contact with people who had no time for me back in the day?
I met one of my classmates at a signing just before Christmas. She remembered me.  She bought two of my books.  She was very nice.  I don't suppose we exchanged more than a few sentences in the four years we were at Greece Olympia High School, but it was such a pleasant encounter, I suddenly wondered if more of my classmates had mellowed with age and might be more accepting of the geeky girl.

High school was not a fun time--at least for me.  I'd like to think that we all came away and became better people with happier lives.  It would be nice to know if that were true.

Have you kept up with your high school classmates?