Grassy hill

drabble of personal thoughts based on highschool

It was a day like any other. The grass was green, the sky blue and everyone seemed to have either a smile on their face or an iced late' in hand. these days I had missed the most. knowing that nothing has changed since those fateful summers so many years ago. 

A couple walking off to talk alone. Or the few who mannaged to sneek into the woods to talk about the rest of the gathering now sitting on one of the grassy nowls. An endless snickering circle of teenagers thinking they know the world inside and out.  I wouldn't have traded anything for those whispers and snide comments. The memories that had originally made those summer days worth going to.  Now just wallpaper in my head,  littered with frames of faces and names; places and experiences. Nostalgia racked my brain from left to right. How I wish sometimes that i could be that kid again; experience that rush of excitement from hearing a new rumor about someone I had thought i'd known.  Or flutter of the heart when my crush looked at me from upon that grassy hill. 

But here I sit, gazing upon a time that has long since passed me by. And now started anew for those fortunate few. those few who think they know the world inside and out. those few who think they know eachother better than they know themselves. those few who i had once called my friends.  

All these things passed in my mind until my name was spoken over the mic to give the welcoming speech to the class of 2011, and thats when everything went silent, including my head. I walked forward onto the stage and into the spotlight, looking at all the familiar faces infront of me. I cleared my throat and looked down. 

"I could start listing my experience off just fine since we have all seen eachother if you really wanted me to. However instead i'll talk about not what i've experienced as an individual but instead what you may have experienced with me. 

The first night where a curfew didn't matter because you were finally old enough to 'decide for yourself'. However, probably ended up spending your now extended time at the local dennys...because thats the only place open that late that you could all legally hang out at that wasn't someones house for once or a closed park. 

Or maybe that day when your world was expanded from your small community to the big city because you finally got the keys to the family car and the courage to drive on the freeway. 

How about that day when the sky was littered with square hats and strings? cheering because you had made it...or crying because one of your friends didn't. 

Everything couldn't have been any better right? but wait...life isn't like that. you can't just skip from one happy memory to the next. In all reality, between these few short shared experience we had forgotten to mention the friends who never did make it. Those who lives were taken just too early, even for gods sake. 

We remember them fondly as people we shared smiles and laughter with. Someone who we might have even shared a first kiss with at that spin the bottle game. Bitter sweet memories that let us taste the salt of the ocean every night we are left alone. Every reunion when we can see just how few of us are left.  But here we are welcoming the new faces of loved ones, children, and friends here besides us tonight, while keeping those we cherished close to our hearts. So here is a toast to keeping the present moving forward and making history every day together as the class of 2011."

And even then, when we all share a toast to those who never made it, you can see the two walking off to the other side of the room, the few who left for the punch table snickering. and the now one who is losing site of that grassy hill that one summer day so long ago.