I spent the weekend at my college reunion, 34 years after I graduated. I didn’t think I needed to go to another reunion, I’ve been to two already, but I was swayed by the promise of a bed in an Air BnB with friends and the looming specter of mortality. “Next time this happens we’ll be in our 60s,” said Zoe, who drove. “We have to go.”
Oberlin, being a small school, organizes reunions by “cluster,” so for some alumni it was their 35-year reunion, and for others the 36th. But such picayune distinctions are anathema to the whole vibe of the reunion experience. Because you guys, it was so much fun. There was a hot tub. There was cheap beer. There were epic, wide-ranging conversations with the smartest people who you knew when they, like you, were dumb young people, oblivious to their potential. There was dancing. The experience of reconnecting with your 20-something self in the safe embrace of several hundred others all doing the same thing, without shame or fear, is, I now firmly believe, something everyone should do as often as possible, whether in the reunion context or in some less structured fashion— especially as the possibilities of your youth become ever more remote. The 2008/2009/2010 reunion was happening at the same time, and they seemed to be having fun, but we were the ones going wild on the dance floor with ecstatic urgency, our quality 80s moves fueled, I suspect, by the sharpening awareness that nothing lasts forever.
It was a weekend out of time, one sorely needed by everyone I encountered. But while we were time traveling, of course, Israel bombed Beirut and Helene tore through the Southeast. Snapping back to reality this week, I struggle to keep up. To sit with the enormity of the world’s pain, whether in the Middle East or the Blue Ridge Mountains.
Weeks like this holler at me to not spin out, to stay in my lane, so that’s what I’m doing here. I’m currently on a train to Springfield, Illinois, to attend a conference for work, and not really in a space to generate much of substance anyway. But here are links to a few recent pieces that spoke to me from the parallel lanes of cancer, movement, and writing:
October is “Breast Cancer Awareness Month” and this blistering essay by Kaya Oakes, a writer I wasn’t familiar with but whose “subscribe” button I smashed, cuts to the quick of what “survivorship” really means. Hint: it’s bullshit.
My writing group partner Cameron is grappling with the extraordinary challenge of being diagnosed with a third diagnosis of breast cancer, in a highly aggressive form, while pregnant with her second child. This achingly lovely piece is a manifesto for the right to beauty.
Millicent isn’t writing about cancer, but she is writing about movement here — and grief, as twinned with joy. Her point about how the longing to get ones body “back” springs from our own desire to go back to an unattainable place in time seems aptly placed given my weekend activities.
I didn’t know Julie Novak but I’ve come across several tributes to her on social media since she passed away last month. This one, by Jacinta Bunnell, grabbed me by the throat: a glorious tribute to someone who seems the most awesome friend, and a moving model for how to write about unthinkable loss.
And then this, from the great Phil Christman. A must-read for any writer.
Last, from Keia Mastrianni, who writes the excellent newsletter Pleasant Living, here is a list of grassroots organizations doing Helene relief. If I learned anything from the bit of reporting I did in Puerto Rico post-Maria, it’s that in the aftermath of disaster, the community saves itself. FEMA might show up later, maybe, but it’s the locals with chainsaws who clear the roads. The best way to help from afar is to send them money.
Given how much I hate academia, is it weird that I feel strangely emotional about our Oberlin connection? Like overlapping lineages/writerly ancestry. I adore my students--all issues with the institution aside--and I think I'll share with them that my editor really enjoyed their 34th Obie reunion. :)
Thank you for including me with such great writers. I also gotta say, a fall reunion sounds a little better than commencement, like really being there instead of at this moment when the town and the college is untenable.