1984

Well, this has been a most interesting month. During the entire month, hardly a whisper was heard from any member of the class of 1984. I received few letters, got even fewer phone calls, and was hard pressed to run into one of you on the street. Well, I don't know who you take me for. I may be slow, but I catch on eventually. Especially when I torture one of you to find out the truth.

That's right, the cat is out of the bag. AH you folks thought you could keep a secret from me, but you can't. I found out your secret, and now the entire world is gonna know. But let me start at the beginning.

It all started when I stopped in Hanover during a recent foray through New England. As I strolled past the Hanover Inn, I spotted a familiar face across the street. I couldn't quite place the name, but this didn't stop me from running over to say hello. Well, his disguise was good but not good enough. Shaving his beard and quitting his job to go to Wharton Business School was not enough to prevent me from recognizing John Harris.

"John," I said to him, "how is it that no one from the class has contacted me in the last month? What has happened to you guys?"

Well, John wasn't talking, so I had to resort to harsher measures. Mentioning that I could associate his name with a few felonies in an upcoming issue was all that it took to break him. He told me the story of how you guys tried to "ditch" me. That's right, just like when we were little kids. Without warning, we would all run away from one person, leaving him abandoned. The entire class of 1984 was involved in a gigantic game of "Tag," and I was "it."

A few stragglers tried to cancel news that they had sent me, hoping to cover their tracks and conceal their whereabouts. Andrew Ryan postponed his nuptials just so I wouldn't be able to use the announcement of his marriage in a column. Little did he realize that I have now used it twice, and will probably continue to use it for the next year or so.

Kathy Zug moved from Dartmouth Med to Brown Med, in hopes of eluding me. When I walked over to see if I knew anyone at the D S, Gillian Fletcher tried to convince me that the entire game of Tag was a figment of my imagination.

"Not so!" I protested. "If you people aren't trying to ditch me, how come my season football tickets have me sitting in the guest stands? How come Bob Lucic, a powerful paralegal in New York, doesn't write me to ask for advice?"

It all began to come together. The pattern was clear. While I had thought that you people were off trying to launch successful careers, you actually were trying to hide from me. For example, you wonder what ever happened to Carin Reynolds, right? Well, she married JoeHolland and changed her name to CarinHolland. While some may claim love to be the cause of this, I can see right through it. Carin thought that a new name would successfully "ditch" me. Well, kiddo, it didn't work. And that goes for the rest of you who plan on marrying just to ditch me. It won't work.

Keith Dickey travels to terrorist-strewn Greece, under the pretense of doing "research" toward his Ph.D. in the classics. I know better. Keith figured that a few fanatics with bombs would halt my quest. Wrong.

I meet Craig Sukin in a restaurant. Trapped, Craig begins to lie wildly. Craig claims to be in town "helping a friend look for an apartment before he returns to medical school in a few weeks." He then runs out of the restaurant, leaving me with the bill.

The list goes on and on. People run to the ends of the earth to avoid me. AnnArmbrecht goes to teach in a refugee camp somewhere in Asia, while Ted Dardani goes to Houston or something just to stay out of my way.

Well, I've got news for you. It won't work. Where ever you people go in your quest to ditch me, I'll find you. I may have to spend the rest of my life traveling to remote corners of the earth, braving the trials of fire and water, but I'll get to you. Impossible, you say? Maybe so, but consider this one fact. You're reading this column, so I found you. And you all know what that means: you're "it!"

1 Cindy Court Melville, NY 11747