The Divergent Path

I didn't go to my 10 year high-school reunion because frankly, I didn't like high-school very much and the people I actually liked, I still talk to.

Facebook has removed the need to re-connect at high-school reunions. There is something lost by not drinking face to face, trying to one-up each other in the life awards at a real reunion, but I think I'm OK with it. I've always said, have a couple great friends instead of a ton of OK friends.

There are a few outlying people that don't post to Facebook too often that I want to know what they are up to.

My best friend from high-school reached out to me a few days ago. I hadn't really heard from him in a good 7 years when in college he told me he knocked up a girl and might have to drop out of school.

When I say I haven't "really" heard from him, it means I haven't had a meaningful conversation with him in years. Maybe about every 2-3 years, he sort of checks in and finds out where I'm living and what I'm doing.

He was cleaning out boxes in his basement and found a concert stub for a metal show we went to in high-school and reached out to me asking if I remember it.

I think the real reason is my Facebook picture is me as a kid and he thought maybe I had a child. I get the sense that he lost a lot of friends having a kid so early and was hoping to rekindle ours. As soon as I told him it was me, his answers got much shorter.

There are times where I'm jealous of the attention and camaraderie I see among parents my age. This is especially true at family functions where my brothers and I are the only ones that don't have kids or houses in the burbs.

The other cousins form circles where they discuss trips to Florida or the most recent soccer tournament. The announcement of a new pregnancy brings high-fives and hugs.

The kicker is, I love kids. I'm great with them. I just don't know if Sal and I will ever have one of our own. Anytime we've seriously discussed it, we think adoption is the most likely option for us. And even that, not until we're in our mid-30's. We both always felt like we wouldn't have one of our own, but our parental calling would be more of one for a child in need.

As morbid as it is, we both separately had this deep feeling that something terrible would happen someone we knew and we would take their kids and raise them instead of letting them go to child services.