Hey! This post is not as thoughtful as Jon's recent post...still thinking of comments for it as it did promote great reflection.
So, I got a mailing recently asking if I would participate in reunion planning for Calvin....which got me thinking, I haven't been to a reunion, haven't been inclined to go, and don't see the point as they currently are scheduled at an odd time...In fact, each year the mailings seem to inspire cynical comments about awkwardly sitting at an Improv session.
so, I'm wondering. Have any of you attended a Calvin reunion? If so, why? How was it?
Would any of you consider attending a Calvin reunion? Why? What would draw you in?
The only "reunion" I've ever attended was with many of the friends who read/write for this blog. They have been wonderful times of good conversation and reconnection in various locations. The focus was on maintaining friendship across the miles.
I most recently attended the alumni reunion at my grad school...which was great because it included a continuing ed component focused on my profession, as well as offered some great opportunities to network and reconnect with professors and classmates. Again, all in my professional circle, with an immediate "application" if you will.
This may be a bit snarky, but Calvin alumni reunions seem to have less than interesting topics, time to reconnect with classmates, but not necessarily faculty, and are great for boomers and beyond but lack a connection to our generation X/Y/Millenials. In addition to possibly missing our generation, I think the concept of a reunion as functioning as a time/place to regenerate giving to Calvin could also use some re-thinking.
Thoughts?
5 comments:
I just got an invitation for my 10 year high school reunion. We are getting old, my friends. The 10 year H.S. reunion is the one you're supposed to go to right? I'll probably go. Maybe I'll rent a Cadillac like the chubby guy in those enterprise commercials. What are the big college reunions?
I'd be up for a 10 year Calvin reunion, but I probably don't want to go to one every 5 years. It also would depend on who is going. If everyone was going to be there it would be a blast, but if it's just people that I barely remember, I'd rather stay home.
I probably wont be going back to the Calvin reunion. Mostly because it is out of my way. Right now I only have so much vacation time and It is being spent else where. Like John I would be most interested in seeing old friends. One thing that it is kind of fun is seeing people you probably would never see again otherwise. Granted the conversations are shallow maybe awkward, but I am always a little amused when I go home and see someone at a bar I thought I would never see again and we shoot the shit for a while and that is that. But I think mostly I would feel awkward at a college reunion. I am not as outgoing as I once was. One thing that strikes me as I thought about my comments and your post is there is almost a consumerism ingrained in our thinking. We are almost always interested in what we get out of things, is it worth the cost. I consider "spending" my vacation days. Your alumni reunion was preferable because you got something out of it. A friend of mine and a friend of yours was once talking about this guy she liked talking about what qualities it was she liked and she pointed out how it felt so consumeristic. That stuck with me and I am reminded of it now. Some day I will have to dovetail a calvin reunion with a trip to my parents, we will have to coordinate or trips.
great points. Micah, thanks for pointing out my consumerist language and views.
Limited vacation time and other external factors tend to commodify how we "spend" our time. I think it's more than what I can get out of it...it's also a question of utilizing resources well...both of time to devote to planning and attending an event when there are other relationships to tend to, and of resources...does it make sense to take precious vacation time away from family/friends to attend an event that doesn't nurture those relationship?
suz, after i posted that i read it back. i didnt mean it the way it came out. its not like i was calling you out. about the consumerism language. it was just something i was thinking about. your response was more cultivating/growing/farming language its an interesting subtext. your points make a lot of sense, in fact i have a hard time seeing myself going to one of those. Its funny though how sometimes we are blessed in the oddest ways. i dont know how pertinent this is but my senior year of calvin i was at a gas station and some one had written on the wall "heaven is a new pair of glasses". It got me thinking about how the kingdom of God, Heaven on earth, is sort of like that. a new way of seeing things. how all things bear a resemblance of their created grace and will one day be redeemed in full. it is a new perspective a new pair of glasses. i didnt expect some graffiti to change my life, but its something that has stuck with me. Not that I think we should go and do things in search of little nuggets or the diamond in the ruff, but its surprising where life's little gems are. (whats with all the mining metaphors) Just a thinking. Sometimes I use these blogs/comments to ramble, sorry.
Don't be sorry for that. That was inspiring. I love little things like that. That's really what keeps me going, and keeps me from drowning in suburbia, consumerism, etc. It's easy to get caught in that one way of thinking, and I'll take anything that gives me a "new pair of glasses".
Post a Comment