The Cold Dead Grip of the Past Grabs Your Vorlon

[ErGingerbreadMandude]

Hey,if it has a hole....

[vorlon13]

I interact at 12 Steppers with women. Some of their issues with men I find familiar and informative. And family issues are family issues regardless of who they happen too.

Encountering a rich and popular high school girl 40 years later at a subsistence job at wallyWorld was quite a jolt. A substantial percentage of people I have encountered from high school on have met with a bad end. I'm not equating running a cash register at WalWart with dying of HIV, but I had/have considerable expectations for most everyone I met when I was young and they presented as bright and full of promise.

Perhaps my time at the defense contractor has skewed my perception of expectations? I'll admit considerable exasperation with all the bright successful people I worked with at the same time my peer group was being decimated; had I considered what had become of her (I hadn't) I would have assumed she married her BF or another equivalent guy and as promising or better and enjoyed a life as a grown up commensurate with her privileged upbringing. That she didn't was really an unexpected unpleasant surprise.

Another surprise, perhaps, is I haven't encountered her at 12 Steppers. I guess I'd be looking for something familiar to explain her reality, and that would be it.

I've had a couple of days, and still haven't googled her boyfriend. I'm surprising me . . .

[Pyrrho]

I interact at 12 Steppers with women.  Some of their issues with men I find familiar and informative.  And family issues are family issues regardless of who they happen too.

Encountering a rich and popular high school girl 40 years later at a subsistence job at wallyWorld was quite a jolt.  A substantial percentage of people I have encountered from high school on have met with a bad end.  I'm not equating running a cash register at WalWart with dying of HIV, but I had/have considerable expectations for most everyone I met when I was young and they presented as bright and full of promise.

Perhaps my time at the defense contractor has skewed my perception of expectations?  I'll admit considerable exasperation with all the bright successful people I worked with at the same time my peer group was being decimated; had I considered what had become of her (I hadn't) I would have assumed she married her BF or another equivalent guy and  as promising or better and enjoyed a life as a grown up commensurate with her privileged upbringing.  That she didn't was really an unexpected unpleasant surprise.

Another surprise, perhaps, is I haven't encountered her at 12 Steppers.  I guess I'd be looking for something familiar to explain her reality, and that would be it.

I've had a couple of days, and still haven't googled her boyfriend.  I'm surprising me . . .

People who start out seemingly a bit ahead in life do not always end up there.  Part of this is a matter of perspective, where one imagines that the "rich" people at one's school are actually rich.  Typically, the differences in wealth at a particular school are relatively minor compared with differences in society as a whole.

And frankly, I would rather die of HIV than be someone running a cash register at Walmart.  Seriously.  Fucking kill me now rather than be someone who runs a cash register at Walmart as an adult (as opposed to a kid just starting out).  [For those who feel differently:  Fine, you feel differently.  But I feel as I do, not as you do.]