Twenty years have come and gone since Matt graduated high school in California at Twenty Nine Palms High. Without being too pushy I encouraged him to attend (I knew I'd get a trip out of it myself). We left in the wee hours of Friday October 8th to head to Cali. We arrived without incident and were able to eat pizza with Grandma and Grandpa for dinner (more of our visits with them in another post) before Matt and I decided to go to the Homecoming game. He played football for TPHS back in the day but I couldn't talk him into wearing his football jersy. Ya can't really blame him. There was one fella from his class at the game that had a letterman jacket on with all sorts of medals pinned to it. He didn't seem right in the head though. We had put in a long day traveling and we were pooped but in the end he enjoyed seeing some pals.
This is John Lore. He was a Senior class officer that helped organize the weekend. Matt wasn't particularly close with him in HS but with a graduating class of around 150 he knew who everyone was. Jon asked where we lived and then noting Matt's BYU shirt asked the inevitable, "Are you LDS?" He hadn't known that Matt was a member in HS and that he even went to early morning seminary. John was interested in this because he joinded the church five years ago. He then asked what we are never asked, "Are you sealed?" It's like he's just found out this cool thing that he never knew about before. We told him we were sealed in the Salt Lake Temple back in 1994. He grinned big, "I'm sealed too!" He lives in AZ and he and his wife were sealed in the Mesa Temple. Real nice guy. But when we left Matt said, "He's the
last person I would have thought would ever join the church."
We bailed on bowling afterwards though because we were beat.
The next day was the picnic in the park for families. Matt and I had paid for us to attend the reunion but the invitation to the park read, "Kids eat free." They didn't know what they were getting themselves into when we arrived with our six in tow (plus Grandma and Grandpa [though they brought their own subs.]) Yes we had the most children by a long shot. We were also one of the few who were on our first marriage and married for so long.
This is Jeff Mayers who was the class president.
The black and white photo of Matt second from the top is with this same girl, Brenda. She's now got a whole list of accolades and is very politcal. No man, no kids. Just her hat to look after should it blow away in the wind. She almost choked on her wine that evening, "You have six kids?"
Dinner that evening was at the fanciest place in the small desert town the
Twenty Nine Palms Inn.
We dined with Debbie Walters and hubby Mike. She was the other girl member of the church in HS. Matt said it was hard to follow the council to date members only because she was pregnant! Matt commented about the Inn, "I don't think I've been here before." Debbie had, "My first marriage was here." She was a fun dinner guest. Debbie wasn't judging nobody.
Catching up with pal Summer. I almost put Summer Wheatly, but that's from Napoleon.
Matt was also a track star in HS. He ran with a good buddy Ronzelle. I was so glad to be able to meet he and his wife since they live back east (Marlene I think it was). They have been married for as long as us, which was a treat to hear. She was so sweet and fun to talk to. When we gave them hugs goodbye that night Ronzelle said, "If we are ever in Utah we'll look you up," I asked, "Are you ever in Utah?" "Nope!"
As the shot glasses for $2 a pop were being passed around after dinner I said, "How 'bout cuttin into that buttercream!" That's my guilty pleasure.
We boogied a little but mostly wanted to visit. The music got so loud that John motioned for us to join he and his wife Naomi outside. I haven't even downloaded the pictures from my camera because as soon as we got home there were new friend requests on FB and all the photos at the click of a button. I still love technology...
