Thanks for the insight. You mentioned alot of people I remember well. I wish I could have been there.Caroline--- On Fri 10/29, tschibasch < tschibasch_at_yahoo.com > wrote:From: tschibasch [mailto: tschibasch_at_yahoo.com]To: OliveStarlightOrchestra_at_yahoogroups.comDate: Sat, 30 Oct 2004 00:59:12 -0000Subject: [OliveStarlightOrchestra] About the 25th Anniversary Samohi ReunionTo whom it may concern: Here is a description of the 25th anniversarySamohi reunion. If you are not particularly interested, please skip!###The reunion was held at the FantaSea Yacht Club in Marina Del Rey onSaturday, October 16th, 2004. It started at 6:30PM and ended aroundmidnight. A buffet dinner was served at 8:00PM.The event was hosted by "Elegant Reunions". They were charging $90online and $100 at the door. To my knowledge, I was the only person ofour extended group of friends ("Olives") who was attending.I arrived promptly at 6:30, and it was already dark and sprinklingrain. After giving my car to the valet, I went inside and stood inline. Just like the last reunion, there were people behind tableschecking our names. After finding mine, they gave me a very unstickyrectangular nametag to put on my jacket. Besides your name, the tagincluded your 1979 yearbook photo, which for me was blank since I leftin 1978. There was a second line after registration, now for photos.These were going to be put on CDROM. Brad Wheeler and Jeff Condon, thefirst two folks I recognized were at the back of the line, and Ijoined them. Photos were $20/$30, depending on what kind of framingyou wanted. None of us were thrilled at having to pay out any moremoney; a lot of folks opted for the "no frame / no pay" option.I enjoyed speaking with Brad and Jeff. Brad is an architect, and livedfor a while in Italy and New York. And Jeff is an attorney whose kidshave gone to Franklin Elementary School. Brad, Jeff, and I had a goodlaugh waiting in line for the photos. They very much seem like peoplethat I would like to stay in touch with, more often than just at highschool reunions!After the photos were taken, I started to mill about. There were sofew familiar faces! And yes, this was a repeat of the last reunion Iattended in 1999. I would see someone who was basicallyunrecognizable, and then look at the nametag. Again, I would not knowthis person. The old graduating photo stuck on their jacket didn'thelp either. Who was this person?? I would see them doing the same tome: studying my face, looking at my name, frowning... A fear startedto come across me - - was I maybe at the wrong reunion? Well no, sinceBrad and Jeff were here! I was at the right place...I then came up to Laura Karst and her husband. She asked me how manypeople I was recognizing, and she was relieved when I told her it wasso few! She was with Ann Van Winkle and Kathleen Keane. At last I wasamong people that I knew, though not terribly well. They still live inthe area. Kathleen told me she went into law enforcement. We alltalked for several minutes, and I turned out to be a valuable memoryresource. They remembered a few teachers and bullies from Samo andLincoln. Who was the short bully? Fred Redman, as it turned out. Andwho was that other troublemaker who got expelled? David Boring was theanswer. I was able to recall names for them as long as they asked theright questions. Overall, my trusty memory for names and dates came inpretty handy during the course of the evening. One of the women saidthat she had heard of Fred Redman moving to Oklahoma. Nobody had aclue where David Boring ended up, but the suspicion is not good, basedon information we had. Jon Arenberg was the chief organizer of this event, just like for the1999 event. He was the next person I bumped into. Over the evening, heseemed to spend a lot of time with Annette Herbst. Maybe she had beeninvolved in coordinating the event with him? It was nice to speak tothem both. Jon asked me if I had any news on Greg Turk, since he hadbeen looking for him some time back. I updated him on Greg'swhereabouts. Jon is still an engineer, involved in research. Annetteno
w is in LA, but had lived in Colorado for a few years. She workswith children.I then met Douglas Gunson. He is now a lawyer living in NorthCarolina, and has 7 (!) kids. The oldest is 21 and wants to go toUCLA. It was nice to speak with him. I never knew him too well back inschool. In fact, the only class I had with him was Art in 8th grade. Next came Jane Grafton and husband. She did not remember me very well.I don't hold that against her, since we only had one class together,in the 10th grade. Remember Mathematics with Harry Pappas? Jane hadlived in England for a few years in the 1980s, but now lives back herein Venice. While were talking, Cheryl Pollock came over. She was inanother class with me in 10th grade. Neither of them remembered beingin these classes, or names of other people at that time. I was able tocome up with a couple other names. This did not help them any...Anyway, Cheryl is still living locally, involved in computer graphics,and is unmarried.I next saw Mark Swartz, who looked the same as at the last reunion.Talk about dressing down! He looked like he had come over to paint theplace, all in work clothes. While I studied him, he cheerfully pointedout that maybe I had overdressed for this event. I think he did have apoint, since not every guy there was wearing a suit and tie! Mark nowlives in Mar Vista, happy with his bachelor lifestyle.Then I saw Shauna Lockett. I had a super-8 film class with her inLincoln. Her recall of this was extremely good. She recalled that sheliked Mr. Wexler, the teacher. We both remembered other characters inthat class. Shauna now lives in Montana, where she manages a dentalclinic.Then a strange thing happened when I bumped into a certain Mike Smith.Friendly fellow. We did not know each other. Mike told me he tookLatin at Samohi... There was just one Latin instructor, a brilliantlinguist by the name of Michael Quinette, and I assumed only oneclass. How many people study Latin?? I suggested some names of peoplewho were in the same Latin class, such as Robert Baker, CarolineSauls, Robert Tarquin, Lisa Greenwood, and of course Karen Elizabeth"Bisbee" Jerome Shepherd Goldfarb! Mike did not remember any of them.I now suspect there were two Latin classes at Samohi. Or maybe MikeSmith never took Latin. Or maybe he never existed at all!?! The mindwonders if maybe HE was at the wrong reunion... Well, whether Miketook Latin or not, he told me that he became a plumber. Latin is notneeded for that.I went outside to get some fresh air. The rain had temporarilystopped, and the night air was fresh. I was joined by a bunch offriendly smokers. Craig Allen was one of them. He works now inentertainment, and often visits Las Vegas. I do not know exactly whathe does. Then I spoke with Richard Cardenas at length. A very niceguy, and definitely someone I never knew in high school. He told methat he had been involved in track/long distance running, and at 17years of age, he was hit by a car! He was in a coma for a week, andafter that, the doctors told him it was unlikely that he would walkagain. He managed to beat those dismal odds. Right after high school,he got married and moved to Houston, Texas. He bought a house and hadthree children. Richard went into the printing business, since heenjoyed the shop class with Mr. Little at Lincoln so much. He is nowon marriage #2, and his oldest son (20) is married with kids of hisown. Anyway, Richard still lives in Houston, caring for his ailingmother. He was not going to attend the reunion, and then at the lastminute got in his car and drove directly to LA.Richard Cardenas asked me if I remembered Nick Trifunovich. Yes, Irecalled a few classes with the guy at Lincoln – he was tall, skinny,with blond curly hair. He was a prankster! Apparently, in 1984 Nickwent to the hospital for some exploratory surgery on his stomach. Theyput him under and he never woke up again. How awful.I went back in and milled around some more. It was now as full as itwas going to be. There were all told about 200 people, maybe less. Itwas noisy and cheerful, and people were sitting at
tables enjoyingdinner. I again looked around, and I don't think that I missed anyone.Some other people that I noticed and barely remember: MandyKamibayashi, Chris Kolodziejski, Frank Lempert, Glenn Sato. A womannamed Bonnie Kanner was overdressed, if I might say. Maybe too earlyfor Halloween, if you get the drift.Everybody was really nice, I must say. And they looked good – happyand healthy. As I made the rounds, I usually managed to strike aconversation as long as there was some other student or teacher thatwe both mutually remembered. Even in cases where nothing was found,there was still interesting information about someone's current job,or where they are living. I was doing fine and enjoying meeting people...Well, almost.I then met Alison Raeder. The poor thing seemed a little off... Afterthe perfunctory "hello" and "how are you", she asked if I was married.She was genuinely sad to hear I was still single, and hoped I wouldget married soon. She said she would pray for me... She then told methat since the previous reunion, she had at last found her soul mate.She now summoned her husband, Dave over to meet me. After a warmhandshake, it was his turn to ask if I were married! No, I responded,I guess you might say that I am "married" to my work. And much happierabout that now, by the way, compared to 1999! Dave explained that hewas from the Samohi graduating class of 1975. He was unkempt and alsoa little off. He was also very big and loud! He looked exactly like acharacter you might meet at a Star Trek convention. (Not that I wouldknow about such things.) Dave now launched into his obvious favoritetopic: comic books. Alison fell quiet, looking on adoringly as Daveexplained that he is an expert on "comic book technologies"; hematches weapons used by comic book characters with the correct genre.He cited an example in Batman, where the Joker used a laser gun thatcould not possibly have been invented yet. He told me that he writesangry letters to publishers to protest such inaccuracies. He was veryknowledgeable about this subject, and would not stop talking about it,in fact. At a convenient pause I managed to excuse myself. I later sawDave talking to Mark Swartz, giving him the same treatment.The dinner was superb, I must say. Very enjoyable.After dinner, more milling about, drinking good coffee. No new faces.However, I heard the following names of people who were reportedlydoing okay but who did not attend the reunion: David Early, TomErspalmer, John Vidor, Jason Hoffs, David Kearney, Sandra Loh, DamonMoore, Ted Lee, Dave Newdorf, John Nolind, Brian Yori, RalphSlaughter, John Drexel. I have no other information about them. Also,Michael Perlmutter did not attend.Many people commented on the low turnout of this reunion. It wassuggested that the really big ones are 10-year, 20-year, and 30-year;the 25-year is generally low. Really? I would not have expected that...Anyway, that's all, folks!
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Received on 2004-10-31 21:27:39