High school reunion organizers are like the IRS. Whether you’ve moved 10 times in 10 minutes or taken up residence in the jungle, eventually they’ll track you down.
So when a red, white and blue postcard arrived in my mailbox 14 addresses, three bad hairstyles and 20 years after graduation day, it felt like a warrant for my arrest. “I knew you guys were a comin’.”

“Our efforts to locate you for your upcoming high school reunion have been delayed and our last mailing was returned by the Postal Service,” the postcard stated. At the bottom, in large red print came this harbinger: “TIME IS OF THE ESSENCE.” It would almost be prophetic if it wasn’t referring to the $93 buffet dinner and cash bar. 

“Do you want to go?” my husband asked.
“I don’t know,” I said. “Probably not.”  Yet one of my favorite movies is “Peggy Sue Got Married,” an ‘80s flick about an unhappy woman who goes to her 25th high school reunion and gets sent back in time for a do-over. If I ever got sent back for a do-over, I’d skip acid-wash jeans, Sun-In, and Milli Vanilli.

My husband had a grand time at his high school reunion several years ago. He grew up in a small town in northwestern Ohio. As an Army brat, I marveled at the conversations he had with his classmates. He not only knew them all, but also their siblings, parents and grandparents. While I couldn’t relate, I appreciated his experience and the very different worlds we came from.

The high school reunion is about as American as the Twinkie and the First Amendment. It’s part of our cultural fabric and a rite of passage. Where military brats fit into this iconic Rah-Rah-Sis-Boom-Bah milestone depends on timing, luck, perspective and personal experience.

“So now the 20-year reunions are here,” said Lisa Yoakum, an Air Force brat friend I’ve known since 8th grade. “Since I went to three high schools, I wonder who is going to remember me. Was I at any school long enough to make a memorable impression on folks?” Lisa made an impression where it counted. She found her love in Iceland.  It’s there she met her husband, Bill, a fellow high school student and Air Force brat.

Unlike Lisa, I attended two high schools. For that, my parents still say I was lucky. Since I wasn’t that crazy about my second high school, it was like being told be glad you only broke your arm, because it could have been your leg, too, kid. I don’t mean to be harsh on my parents. As a military parent myself I realize military parents try to make the best out of tough situations. I’ve also come to realize it’s not so much the number of high schools one attends, but the experiences and friends you meet that can make all the difference. 

My second high school was a large northern Virginia school with more than 2,000 students. I spent a lot of time missing my old friends and school. After graduation, my parents dropped me off at Penn State and two weeks later they moved to their new duty station at Fort Devens, Mass. When kids at college asked where I was from, I wasn’t quite sure of the best answer. I’d never stepped foot in the state of Massachusetts and I no longer had a home in Virginia.  It’s a common dilemma for military brats and can be rather humorous.

Maj. Matt Gill, an Air Force brat and family friend, graduated from Brussels American School in Belgium. After graduation he hightailed it to Mississippi State University. “I graduated on a Friday, was on a plane on Sunday, landed in Mississippi on Monday,” Matt said. “It was crazy. An amazing culture shock.”  His class reunions alternate between East and West coasts.

My Air Force brat friend Christine Lee, a radio morning show co-host with WTIC-FM’s “Craig & Company” in Hartford, Conn., attended three high schools in Germany, Sicily and Spain before heading off to college at the University of Nebraska. I can just picture a Husker asking Christine, who spent her entire youth in European theaters, where she was from. During college breaks she flew back to a new home when her parents PCS’d to Germany.

One recent afternoon, Christine and I spoke about being military brats and our crazy summer together in Germany so many years ago. Our conversation was laced with laughter, but also some sadness. Like me, Christine struggles to find a nostalgic link between herself and her graduating class. I graduated with 535 kids, while Christine graduated with just six. Her base school in Spain closed years ago, but she did hear about a reunion cruise for classes ’62-’89. She isn’t attending and I asked why. “It’s all a blur because we moved so much,” she said.  

On the other end of the spectrum is my Air Force brat friend Carrie Countiss, who adored her two high schools and can’t wait for her upcoming reunion. Her high school experience in Panama was unconventional at best. Prom, the school play and graduation were canceled because of the political upheaval surrounding military dictator Manuel Noriega and the subsequent Panama Invasion in 1989.
“The only plus side, our exams were canceled and we graduated a month early,” Carrie said. “It was an abrupt ending to high school and many of us never got to say a proper good bye to our friends.”
But there were plenty of fun times, and back then I lived vicariously through my best friend’s weekly letters from Panama detailing all the goings-on of her close-knit classmates in paradise. 

“I am so looking forward to my 20th reunion of Balboa High School,” Carrie said. “I can’t wait to see these friends from another land, a place that only we know, as Panama is so different today with no U.S. presence. It was an incredible time and I will treasure it forever. I hope to take my kids and husband to Panama some day just so they can get a feel for what I experienced.”

Joe Condrill specializes in celebrating and reliving brats’ happy days.
Joe’s a military brat who runs OverSeas Brats, www.overseasbrats.com a business that plans brat reunions. Joe, who spent his high schools years in Hawaii, Thailand and Iran, loves reuniting brats. “Few words can explain the emotion involved there,” he said. “Before the days of the Internet, many of these people never thought they would be reconnected.”

Since I didn’t go to close-knit schools like Joe and other overseas brats, I’m celebrating my 20th solo. I’ll open a Bartles & Jaymes wine cooler, dust off my Walkman and pop in some Dead Milkmen, Blondie, and Duran Duran cassette tapes. Milli Vanilli? I’ll leave that in 1989.
 

If you want to connect with other military spouses in your area, please visit Military.com's Spouse Network.