Salamander
Fire Walking

The five year reunion of my class from veterinary school was a bit of a bust. The way the reunions work for my school is that they hold an "Alumni Day" once a year on campus when any graduate can attend. During that alumni day, graduates celebrating their -5th or -10th anniversary a specially noted. The biggie, this year, was the fiftieth reunion of the class of '53. There were perhaps a dozen in attendence, from all over the country. I found it interesting that there were no women at all in that class, but then things didn't really start to change until around the sixties for that. Dr. Twenty Cats and I were the only representatives who showed up during the morning activities. When the time came for the picnic lunch, we went and gave it a shot, but no other classmates showed up. We were both disappointed, and decided to kill some time window shopping in the exlusive little town nearby. We walked for hours, and I was absolutely exhausted by afternoon's end. We then went to a nearby museum, where the dinner for Alumni Day was being held. Neither Dr. Twenty Cats nor I expected to see any of our classmate by this point; the dinner had been a little pricey, and most of our classmates were still paying off school loans.

We were surprised and please then to discover that three others from our class had signed up for the dinner. They sat us all at the same table, and we had a grand time together. Seating was according to year graduated, with those who had been graduated the longest sitting closest to the buffet table. We were the babies of the group, and had to wait forever to get our dinner. We made cracks about how our reputation had preceded us. It was some of our absent classmates who, unfortunately, managed to get our school permanently kicked out of another local museum after they got out of hand during a dinner dance being hosted there. We might have laughed a little louder than the other tables, but we did manage to keep the high spirits under control this time.

I got back to the apartment late last night, tired from all the activity I'd put in during the day plus the late hour. I know The Socialist is upset with things; he's called this a "ruined weekend" on several occasions now. Even though I'll be out on disability after Monday (Tuesday at the latest), he feels that he never got to see me this weekend. I'd hoped he'd be more independent that that, doing things he couldn't ordinarily do with me hanging around and just generally enjoying being on his own briefly, but it seems not to have worked that way. Perhaps I can find some way to make it up to him next weekend. Pity it's Memorial Day weekend; that will make it more difficult to actually go away for a brief trip anywhere.

It is weird to think tomorrow will be my last day of work for a while. It scares me a little bit. I hope to hell I know what I'm doing.