"Class Reunion"

I have a weird relationship with school. I was good at it, but didn’t enjoy it. Especially high school. I’ve often wished that I’d left high school a year early and gone straight to New York or London. As it was, I did the normal school thing just like everybody else, graduated along with everybody else, and went to college like everybody else. Northwestern University in Evanston, Illinois. I was a trombone performance major. It started out okay, and initially I did very well. Halfway through my freshman year, though, I decided it was not for me.

I made it through that first year, and then transferred to Berklee College of Music in Boston. I didn’t get along with Berklee any better than I’d gotten along with Northwestern, but my life in Boston suddenly took on a whole new glow. I felt like Plato’s caveman seeing light for the first time. I found myself immersed in a whole new world of music, east coast energy, gay culture, and art. I joined a band. I experimented. My creativity flowered and flowed. High school in Des Moines seemed a million years and a billion miles away. “Class Reunion” was the final song on a school-themed cassette I wrote and recorded in December 1985.

Class Reunion

© Brian Hutzell 1985

I went back to high school

Two years after my commencement

Just for a visit.

Everything had changed.

I didn't recognize anyone.

Even the rooms had moved.

I was so confused.

I went back to high school

Five years after my commencement.

Everything was just as I'd left it

Five years ago.

All of my friends were there,

Unchanged by the years.

They asked me where I'd gone.

They said, "You've missed so much."

"Everything has changed."

But I knew they were lying.

I could see very well that I was the only one affected by time.

When I left,

I swore I'd never go back again.