Text 8774, 69 rader
Skriven 2008-06-12 14:32:00 av MICHAEL LOO (1:123/140)
Ärende: reunion 2 448
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I slept through Commencement. Actually, I had breakfast
with the class (decent pancakes, decent bacon, crappy OJ)
and then went back to sleep. Who cares about pomp and
circumstance and lots of speeches exhorting the new grads
to either change the world or make bundles to tithe to
the mother ship. Did show up at the Faculty Club for lunch,
as it was paid for anyway. Which was an actually quite good
Cobb salad, thankfully with the blue cheese in a neat pile
off in the corner. Just like United Airlines, only a hair
better. The cheap wine flowed free.

Joined a rather ragtag academic procession to the afternoon
exercise, which truth be told I would have missed too but
for the main speaker, J. K. Rowling (pronounced rolling).

Notes about the endowment. It stands at some 60 gigadollars.
with the gift of the 25th reunion class a record 162 meg. I
think at our 25th we'd set a record of 4 or 40 meg, I don't
remember which. President Faust gave a rousing defense of
the sanctity of the fund and described eloquently how it
serves society in so many ways. Not sure I believed her, but
it sounded good.

Our distinguished guest gave a speech of a completely other
sort. She started by describing her trepidation, making a
strength out of weakness, and how she'd lost a stone or two
in very short order because of anticipatory stage fright.
How to cope? By unfocusing her eyes and imagining that she
was addressing "the world's largest Gryffindor reunion."
She went on to describe the educational value of failure -
she had tasted failure of various kinds before her notable
success this millennium and waxed upon not only the
intrinsic learning experience but also the value of friends,
friends, and friends. And segued into a moving appeal on
behalf of social action, taking her own experiences with
Amnesty International as an inspiration. A worthwhile talk
and, I think, better crafted than the books that gave her
unparalleled fame and fortune.

Straggled on even less academically to the class lobster
bake, which had the usual things: chowder, lobster, mussels
and clams steamed together, corn on the cob, steamed onions
and potatoes, accompanied by a Sicilian white of unknown
identity that despite having a resemblance to Sauvignon
Blanc was generally unobjectionable.

For some reason, people are daunted by lobster bodies,
which if you work at them yield a fair amount of good
eatin'. So I ended up with four extras. Was working on these
methodically when last call for the evening event came.

Night at the Movies - two films, one sociological
documentary and one interpretive, about our class and our
time. The first was a string of interviews that featured
mostly people I knew and liked in school; the other was a
collage of commercial films of our day along with clips of
us. I didn't notice it, but apparently there was some
footage of me in the second movie. I found out because a
few classmates said, hey, did you see yourself in the film,
to which I answered first huh? and then yeah, it didn't
register but someone told me. The director I think took it
amiss when I told him that I hadn't noticed. (Paul Petschek)

More booze at the same place. I lasted longer this time,
almost until last call.

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