Welcome
Ode Class of ‘59
By
Leon Webber
Remember when we were last all gathered in rented caps and gowns?
We left the good life in the fast lane and return now to the good life in the slow lane….
where Yearbook meets Facebook.
We have seized this opportunity to rekindle the ashes of our youth…
when we were classmates, teammates, scholars, friends….
We return to forgotten stories, secret stories, untold stories, revised stories and outright lies!
There are those classmates who stayed and kept the hometown candle burning.
We thank them for their neighborhood watch.
And there are those of us who left the scene,
ran to big city streets, country roads, wilderness valleys, or foreign soils,
We’ve returned to each other to create another class moment to remember.
Oh my dear classmates,
I barely knew myself back then while I was practicing for manhood, family, career … life.
And now I am too olde for new friends to become olde friends.
The man/woman we are today returns to meet the boy/girl we left behind. ( T S Eliot)
This reunion is an opportunity to experience “regression in service of the ego”.
Back then we journeyed daily from home to school
Some homes were loving…some not
Some generous to our minds and spirits..some not
Some homes safe..some not
Some healthy..some not
We survived and we blossomed!
DHS was our boot camp for adulthood, career and family.
An ode to our youthful days filled with energy and innocence
When testosterone flirted with estrogen
which flirted with testosterone flirting with testosterone
flirting with estrogen flirting with estrogen…
When the softness of female bodies brushed ever so gently
against our hypervigilant virile bodies
An ode to Old Spice breast gazers
To bobby socks and butt gawkers and crotch peekers
To cashmere sweaters on supple, firm breasts
To a time when some boys went from snapping bras to unsnapping bras
An ode to bathing suits lying on the shores
To strapless taffetta dresses
To every 15 seconds when were were told we would think about ‘it’
And some of us did …. every 15 seconds
I am grateful to the girls who were willing
to try to touch their elbows behind their backs
To the feel of cashmere over soft skin and firm breasts
To dancing too close for teacher’s comfort…
and how we enjoyed the annoyance…
To the feel of soft youthful skin..
hard muscles and fresh lingering kisses
To homerooms and libraries
To our academically gifted and disciplined classmates
in the arts and sciences
To our athletically gifted and disciplined classmates
To loving and good friends
To the W’s in our class….
especially when I was fortunately sandwiched
between Carol Weisberg and Bryna Webber!
To books and learning
To our fertile minds, bodies and spirits
To special teachers who knew our names
and watered the seeds of our future
To doing homework..not doing homework
To skipping class…not skipping class
To those of us who fled to bed with Playboy!
To pajama parties and back seats of cars
To frustrated parents and proud parents
To parents not at home
To empty cottages
To dancing and touching and sweating
To music, ideas, laughter, fears and tears
Ode to the hypnotic trance of our generation
To the parochial potions
mixed and administered by family, teachers, clergy and our neighborhood communities
To parents, guardians, teachers, mentors, rabbis, priests, ministers, friends
who challenged and prodded our minds, bodies and spirits without breaking us.
To dreams that came or passed us by
To dreams still held
To wrinkled skin, hearing aides, knee replacements,
bulging waistlines, memory lapses, tummy tucks, gray hair, no hair,
To illness, and suffering and losses
To DHS Class of 1959
Our training ground
For love and loving relationships
For friends and friendship
For contribution and service
For work and play
For compassionate living
For kindness and generosity
We gather again in the Autumn of our lives
We’ve loved, we’ve laughed, we’ve mourned
Ode to more loving, more laughter
And to acceptance that we will all experience more losses..that we too will pass….
Our 50th will be scrapbooked in the storage bin of forgetful minds
We meet as a whole again…. DHS Class of 1959
We are the purple and white
We left singing of loyalty, nobility, righteousness,
Pride, conquering, might and honor
And we rushed into a world crying for
Justice
Equality
Peace
Compassion
We did the best we could.
There is still more for us to do.
This moment we stop…for a moment…
And breathe together..
Moment to moment
Breathing in and out in gratitude
Mindful this too will pass.
Of books and education
Of breasts and recreation.
I still read books!
DHS Class of 1959
Peace and Blessings
Thanks for visiting
LTW © 2009
8/7/09
photo by Leon Webber © 2009
