Maria Otero The reunion was an absolutely highlight, peak experience for me. I always knew that all of you, inspite of the age difference, in some way, had become my very dear friends and over the years I lamented having lost touch with all of you. You have no idea how many times I thought about you, sometimes even about each of you when I looked at these photographs, and wondered who you had become, where you were, if you remembered as I did. This reunion was so affirming of relationships, and of the bonds with others that sustain us and keep us laughing. Adam, I can't thank you enough - this was very special for me. And to learn, 40 years later, that some of you had a crush on me...what a sweet thought! The Washington Post article got it. A hug to each, and let's stay in touch. -- Maria Kai Hagen I'd been greatly looking forward to the reunion from the first moment I got wind of it, and was not disappointed at all (well ...except for the fact that there was just not enough time -- time to speak with everyone, to play some games, etc.). I'm grateful to Adam for thinking of this and making it real. Macomb was more than just a playground for us, as various people pointed out before and during the weekend. It's been interesting to try and describe how and why that was so to current friends with whom I've chatted about it, before and since. Certainly, though, it was special for each of us in different ways, for different reasons, and for different parts of our lives and periods of time. Some of you know more than a little about my situation growing up. Some a bit. And some hardly at all. But suffice it to say that, in addition to all the other things - a place to make and be with friends, a place to play, and so on - it was, for me, a genuine refuge.How fortunate to have a refuge that was so much more. In the delightful hub-bub of seeing and chatting with old friends, and reminiscing about this specific event and that particular activity and those individual people, there were a few moments where a flood of more general and broader memories and feelings washed over me. They were good memories and feelings. -- Kai Marian Moore Like all who have chimed in, I find that Saturday's events reverberate through my days. As Kai said, for each of us, the day was meaningful in different ways and for different reasons. During my adolescence, there was a series of events that pulled the rug out from under me; what with moving after 8th grade in 1970, my mother's car accident, a happy return to Washington and then my mother's cancer and death -- leaving DC completely in 1974. What keeps going through my mind since Saturday is how reassuring I found the experience of seeing all of you. How welcoming and loving all of you were. How my own sense of the specialness of those days was reaffirmed in that magical span of hours -- that time out of time. And that somehow, in all of you, the stability and happiness of those days still exists ... and within me, too. When I returned to Minneapolis, where I have found a similar small-town-within-bigger-city in which to raise my kids, I had a deepened appreciation of what is here, with echoes of all of you in the clumps of kids I passed as I drove home from the airport. I also find that I have piles of unanswered questions -- ones that I didn't have time to ask each of you and maybe over time I will get to. In the meantime, know that I think of you and feel gratitude for all of your presence, and most especially for Adam and his vision and faith and hard work in making this happen. Love, -- Marian aka Babby :-) |
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Reunion Reflections |