One of the weird things about being from Las Vegas (besides, you know, random strangers divulging their wild nights of debauchery, thinking perhaps a native would have similar scruples even though this particular native had never even entered a Vegas club until this weekend, let alone "accidentally" married a cocktail waitress), is how the Strip culture filters into everyday events. While many Homecoming dances involve DANCING, ours included cruising the Strip in limos, Vegas shows, expensive dinners and hotel room parties (good, clean hotel room parties with hot fudge sundaes. Swear it). Teens go to the dance to get a picture and then leave.
So I’m gonna guess mine was one of the few HS reunions located in a former MTV Real World House:

With an after party here:

And not a country club or Elks Lodge in site.

When I first heard about the reunion a couple months back, I was iffy about going. Not because of my HS memories, but because every movie I’d seen about reunions made it seem like a Lame I-gotta-prove-myself Fest.
Think:

But it wasn’t! I mean, there were definitely girls dressed in 2008 versions of these dresses. And they looked dang good in them and I spent a minute or two wishing I’d gone that way (or at least shopped for something new!) until I dropped some fruit from my plate and had to crawl around the Real World floor. Very glad for my trouser jeans then.
And weirder still, people were nice! Like, I had conversations with people who intimidated the heck out of me in HS and now ten years later, it was almost level playing ground. Except for those girls in the hot dresses. No, even them.
Really, I kept waiting for someone to say something like, "Oh, I should have known you’re a mom when I saw your thighs." or "Children’s books. That is so cute!" but nothing. Nada. I’m almost tempted to get on facebook and go trash talk just so I get my money’s worth.
During my flight home, I remembered another reunionesque movie I saw years and years ago on my parent’s ol’ Betamax (Before VHS, which was before DVD’s, which was before DVR)

In case you haven’t seen it, Peggy Sue attends her 25 year HS reunion (wearing her prom/homecoming dress and for some reason that cemented in my mind that you had to wear it and almost didn’t attend solely based on that. Would post a pic if I had one on hand, but trust me on this. Be glad I didn’t)
Anyway, Peggy Sue’s hubby, Nicholas Cage, cheats on her even though she can still wear her prom dress 25 years later and so she gets toasted at the reunion and faints when she’s named reunion queen and…
Boom. Wakes up back in high school with a chance to change her present/future.
Now I might be in the minority here, but I liked HS. It was a fun/crazy/emotional/eye-opening time, and if I’d gone Peggy Sue on the dance floor (passed out and flashbacked ten years. Duh), the only thing I might change is my bangs.

Yeah, no "might" about that.
(I tried to find a bang picture from HS, but all too heinous. Instead, my fake yearbook picture from 1976. Yeah, I wasn’t alive then. Too bad, ‘cuz I rock that hair).
Because I’m glad I was clueless/smart and insecure/self-assured and sarcastic/sweet and popular/dorky. I’m glad I angsted over stupid boys and kissed smart ones and endured ridicule and hung tight to my friends. Besides being great research now,  all those experiences helped shape the Lindsey of 2008. I am who I am partly because of those four years.
The most nerve-wracking moment was walking into the football game for the first time in ten years. There’s that long stretch of sidewalk right before you hit bleacher, and the moment you look up at the crowd and think, please please my friends better be here.
And ten years later, they were.