This year my high school class held the 30th reunion of the day we were all foisted upon an unsuspecting world. Although I graduated with them, I did not attend the reunion, therefore, I did not celebrate thirty years of not being a kid any more.

I don't know about you, but I don't consider that fact to be a particular cause for celebration, since, in short, it means you are now old enough to have been out of high school for 30 years. It is hard to argue that you are still young when you can say that about yourself, since it requires you to be closer to 50 than not, and let's face it, even for a Baby Boomer, 50 is still middle aged.

Although, I must point out, one of the arrows thrown at both Barack Obama and Sarah Palin is that they are too young and inexperienced to be in the White House. Since I'm about their age, it's nice to know I'm still too young to do something. Although I'm going to be completely honest here, given the wide range of criticisms available for me to lob at both sides of the aisle, too young to do the job is pretty far down my list. But, as usual, I digress.

The Boomers are going kicking and screaming into senior status, and although I am not exactly your traditional Boomer, in fact I rather pointedly do not identify with them on most things, I agree that I am much too young to be middle aged. I cannot quite fathom how it has happened, or where the years went. Was I asleep? Did I miss some years in there? Sleeping Beauty I am not, and in fact, it seems the years went by without my really noticing. [My children would point out that I miss noticing a whole lot more than that, but it's my blog, so I will just ignore their chatter and continue.]

My oldest baby is now 23 years old, yet another way of being reminded, constantly, that you are no longer a youth yourself. Of course, he was born 30 and acts about 55 now, so if you average it out, I'm actually younger than he is. Oh wait. That's his dad's math, and I don't want anything to do with that. I guess I'll have to be older than him after all, then. So never mind.

More alarming is that my youngest baby is now 16 going on 27, and I am a virtual antique by her standards. I am afraid not even my nearest and dearest would make the claim that I am in the groove of today's youth oriented culture, although I do try to be current, whenever possible.

Heck, I even have a facebook page. I have eight friends now. Virtually all of them either my children or their friends, and all of whom obviously have taken pity on my pathetic lack of online people power. Which just goes to show you how nice my children and their friends are.

I am sort of fascinated by the concept of class reunions, although I have yet to attend one. I am sure it says more about my lack of star status in high school than anything else, but I can't really see why people who barely acknowledged my existence in high school would find it interesting to spend time with me now. If you didn't like me at 17, I'm fairly sure you wouldn't think much of the 48 year old model, either. I am both very much the same, and very different, all at the same time.

The intervening years, when I am forced to think about them, are an interesting road in review. The path has been pretty uneven, I'd have to say, because I appear to be one of those people to whom things just happen for random and unfortunate reasons. I am the one for whom the [para]phrase [my mother reads this blog, so I will amend to preserve her sensibilities,] "Stuff Happens," was coined. However, I must add that I have been informed, mostly by people for whom life has been one long joy ride, that it has not been my luck that has been at fault, it is my attitude.

Interesting perspective. So apparently if I am just receptive and upbeat enough, if I run around radiating positive attitude, I will have no more odd happenings in my life? I'm all over it, home free.

I am willing to accept my dad's premature demise as a fluke. I mean, seriously, he was only 50, two years older than I am myself at this very moment. It can happen, but it's not likely, so why it happened to him is beyond me. He was a jogger and fitness nut before it was The Latest Fad, even before Jane Fonda made 60 look like the new 40, except for the leathery skin from the overtanning and the ropey veins that make her look, well, 60. So I'll take that one as a fluke. Upbeat attitude at the ready. Check.

Colon explosion at 40? Well, that's more than a fluke, but still, could have happened to anyone, right? I will spare you the details, but after 12 days of dealing with me, the nurses were begging me to check out. Take that however you want to. I don't think they cared any more, just so long as I wasn't their problem.

That was a pretty fascinating adventure, all in all. I remember going through the ultrasound prior to the surgery, when they all still thought it was my appendix. There is an ultrasound-ologist with whom I have a bone to pick over it all, by the way. He kept insisting that I was feeling less pain, despite the free fluids clearly floating around my insides, because my appendix had obviously burst, thereby reducing the pressure, or whatever his theory was.

I'm not clear how a burst appendix would be an improvement, but I definitely wasn't feeling better. Mostly I was just resigned to my fate at that point, and I said so. He continued to tell me that my attitude was the problem, that I was just not accepting that I was feeling better. I do recall allowing that while he may be the expert, I was, in fact, the person in pain, but my opinions cut no ice with him. I wonder if he was ever advised that it wasn't my appendix that had burst? He was lucky, though, because I was on the very verge of getting testy with him, and then I can be a terror. But happily for all, I remained in positive mode. [Please note my coy refusal to mention what I was positive about. I am a model of self-restraint today, it seems.] Check.

I can understand how getting divorced was my own fault, of course. If you choose unwisely in the first place, you are unlikely to have a happily ever after. So I certainly accept the responsibility on that one. Smile is intact. Or is it in tact? Either way,check, check.

Starting my own business 25 seconds before the recession went into gear was just bad planning, I guess. Who knew? Certainly not me. But obviously, I should have foreseen that recession would happen the moment I declared myself a business owner.

Absolutely no one who knows me was surprised to learn that there was a recession on, since my very livelihood depended on lots of disposable income and poorly thought out credit decisions by people with no time and too much money. I would feel bad about it, but I'm too busy feeling guilty about having brought down the entire world economic system by having been so foolish as to start my own business.

And those college degrees you worked so hard for? Well, trust me on this, colleges grant, and colleges ungrant, and you may not have a clue why, but they will not have any sympathy at all when it happens. It is possible to write a thesis and defend it all to no avail. A small piece of advice to those seeking higher education. Make sure your degree actually gets recorded. Because if you go back 20 years later, you will find your committee dead or forgetful, and the current management totally unsympathetic to your cause.

And don't even get me started on the IRS. No, seriously. You don't want to get me started on the IRS. Someday I will tell you the tale, but not today. You will think it's funny, because it is, if it didn't happen to you. But if it did, it's not funny at all. Seriously.

I could keep going, but you get the drift. I keep a smile on my face, a song in my heart, and a laugh on my lips [and yours, whenever possible,] to the best of my ability, but Stuff Still Happens.

So if I were to attend my class reunion, what would I talk about? What do I have in common now with people with whom I had nothing in common even when we lived in the same small town and attended the same small school with the same 85 other people in our grade from K-12?

I attended an event some years ago with a few people that graduated from high school with me, some of whom I hadn't seen since that long ago day. They were older, but somehow, still very much the same. It was fascinating, sociologically speaking. In many ways, I felt like I had sat down at a table in my high school cafeteria again, and warped back in time 20 years. It was eerie, how little things had changed.

Through that experience, I realized that my varied life experiences, while mostly challenging, have made me a much different person. I have been forced out of my comfort zone over and over again, and in so doing, I have stretched and pulled and shrunk into a whole new shape [and size. Although I fear that might just be old age, since I've recently shrunk half an inch, according to the records at my doctor's office. I would try to make the joke that they had been doctored, but she probably wouldn't think that was funny. And since she is obviously the best doctor in the universe, I can't really afford to tick her off.]

While still an introvert, I prefer IM to phone calls and e-mail to meetings, I can also stand up in front of someone and talk about the things I know with confidence that I will do a good job.

Maybe I will attend my 50th reunion. We can all have lunch and pretend we remember each other from way back when. Maybe then, I will be able to rewrite history - I will be the popular one, while they can be the ones who brought a book to read during the basketball games while waiting to play in the pep band. Although, on second thought, these days, that probably makes one elite instead of a geek.

I guess my history is mine, and for better or worse, or poorer [forget richer, I'd settle for solvent these days,] I'll just hang on to it. I seem to have gotten lost on the way to the pot of gold at the end of that rainbow, though. So if you find me wandering in the woods, please set me back on the path and point me in the right direction.