Twenty Years Later

This summer is my twentieth high school reunion.

I know that it is trite, but it seems, both, like that day in May when we were all scattered to the wind was yesterday and that it was lifetimes ago.

BioMom is being a real sport and we are attending the reunion in rural Nebraska where I'm from, so I am busy formulating answers to the usual assorted questionnaire; what did you do the first ten years? the second? plans for the next ten?

At some level, these questions are impossible for anyone to answer. How do you sum up the past twenty years of your life? How do you do this in a way that anyone will give a rat's ass about?

For me, though, this feels particularly challenging. So much so that in past years (the fifth and tenth reunions) I made up--literally invented--entire scripts about my life's experiences.

I find the task difficult not just because of the actual experiences that I have had since high school. For example, I came out post-high school and I am writing with an audience in mind that has, in its majority, not left that rural setting (not that, I'm sure my impending coming out was not expected by all). Not just because I was forced to leave my chosen institution of higher learning at the midpoint of my junior year because I was a lesbian (it was before Clinton and they asked, so I told). Not just because my dad committed suicide a few years after commencement. Not just because my partner and I ordered sperm off of the internet and had some spawn. Not because I am mostly a stay at home mom/dad with a somewhat odd career that includes teaching a couple of days a week and doing research the other days about strange questions that pop into my head.

No. I think its just that weird feeling that my life is some bizarro reverse imprint of a leave-it-to-beaver episode. I've tiptoed around this feeling on this blog now for a few years and I think that my perspective is a bit different than other lesbian parenthood blogs out there. It is not that I feel that what we are, how our family is structured, how it came to be, who are kids are, etc. is wrong or bad somehow. It is just a little, well, different. My mom, had she lived, would have been 87 years old this year. What would she have thought about me being a lesbian having kids via donor insemination? It's not that I care what people think as much as this is sounding. It's just that sometimes I wake up and think to myself, how did this happen? How did all of these people get here? It's just that when you go about explaining the nitty-gritty details well, they sound almost super-natural coming out of my mouth. Furthermore, as I have discussed also on this blog, I have lots of questions about our kids and they questions they will likely have. It all just fascinates me and the answers are not easy or obvious. Even the fact that there are questions at all lends more credence to my bizarro-world impression.

So there you have it.

I'm opening this up to readers. How would you answer those questions? What kind of answers would you like to read of your own high school cohort? My first instinct is to be truthful but humorous and self-depricating. I'll post my answers once they're written. Your comments are welcome and neeeded!