Oddly sad.
My grade school is having their 30th year reunion this weekend. It coincides with the schools 150th year celebrations. I may just go to the open house to see the school but I was never much for socializing so I'll hope to avoid people I used to know.
What is freaky is that I open the paper today and what do I see but a picture of my grade seven class! There was even an article talking about my graduating class and this is where it gets creepy.
I was not a social kid... no real to difference now really. ;) I generally only had one close friend at a time. My school day BFsF (only so not) were... one from grades 1-5, then I switched to a new girl in grades 6-9, then one for 10 then a new one for the remaining years. I just discovered, through the article, that my first BFF died in 2002. Now we had nothing to do with each other for 20 odd years but wow, no words.
.
'78 students reflect on their bond as elementary school turns 150
Apr 22, 2008 04:30 AM
Catherine Dunphy
Feature Writer
School ties don't always bind, particularly not the elementary ones.
Tell that to the class of '78 from Our Lady of Perpetual Help, a compact red brick jewel nestled in a corner of Moore Park that will celebrate its 150th anniversary on the weekend.
Its roughly 35 members have spread around the world, to London, New York, Texas, even Afghanistan. One member, Joanne Kelly, has become a Paralympic basketball gold medallist. Another is well-known Toronto photography gallery owner Stephen Bulger.
"They were the most remarkable group," says Irene Echevierria, who taught them Grade 1 and Grade 6 and who now lives in Florida. "Very bright, just so bright. They stayed forever in my mind."
The class is reconvening this week at Bulger's gallery on Queen St. W. to mark the passage of 30 years.
Most of the former classmates will be there. The notable omission will be Kira, the quiet girl with the pale complexion and lovely hair. She committed suicide.
There are always casualties on the road to reunions.
Our Lady of Perpetual Help was originally built at 1414 Yonge St., next to the cemetery. Amateur historian Henry Miller, a parent of four children who attend or attended the school, pinpoints April 28, 1858, as the date St. Charles School, as it was called, was opened.
It moved to its present site on Garfield Ave. in 1923. Margaret Atwood immortalized it under an assumed name in Cat's Eye, the novel about the backbiting world of prepubescent girls. It also figures predominantly in Hugh Hood's novel, The Swing in the Garden.
It's always been a top academic school. Today, it's at full capacity with 301 students, having turned away 70 last fall. "Other schools focus on anti-violence programs," says principal Anthony Tacoma. "We have a manners program."
In Bulger's time, they learned how to properly address grown-ups (and to slip facial tissues in their sleeves) from Mrs. Ryan, the kindergarten teacher. Emily Hencz, 42, a member of the reunion planning committee, learned how to enunciate clearly from the ruler-wielding grammarian Brother Xavier. And they memorized poetry.
"I can still recite `In Flanders Fields' with all the commas," says Margaret Codrington, 43.
Codrington and Hencz are chatting with Bulger at his gallery on a Saturday afternoon. Bulger, 44, is hosting their class reunion here Friday night. He hosted the first one, in 1988, in his parents' backyard. They had been in their early 20s, poised to take on the world, aware enough to wrap the reunion of their Grade 8 class in heavy irony. Still, all but six showed up.
"It was like we hadn't missed a step," said Bulger. "Like being at our one-year reunion."
Except for Kira.
If they remembered her at all, it was because she and her best (and only) friend, Julie, liked the Bay City Rollers when no one else in the class did and saw Star Wars together perhaps hundreds of times.
They were amazed by the grown-up, divorced Kira. While they'd been at university, she'd moved to an eastern European country, perhaps Romania, and married.
Bulger was tending bar as he figured out what he wanted to do with his life and here was a classmate with three kids and a past.
"She was a stronger personality - more of a presence," Hencz recalls.
The group headed in different directions over the next decade and a half. Then Codrington saw Kira's death notice in a newspaper in 2002. Displayed at the visitation were wedding photos, Kira's certificate from a college course in administration, mementoes from her Métis heritage - "I was surprised about that," Codrington recalls - but no photos from her time at Our Lady of Perpetual Help.
Kira's husband told Codrington about finding Kira dead in their bed. Shocked and saddened, Codrington emailed the class of '78.
"It felt like our lives had turned all of a sudden," Bulger says. "I remember thinking 'Oh my God. Now we are dying.' "
He organized an impromptu potluck in the apartment where he and his wife were living over his first gallery.
"You turn to those you know to reconnect," he says. About 20 came, bearing old photos, memories and, for the first time, regrets.
They toasted Kira and talked long into the night. In their mid-30s they were building their lives as she ended hers.
"Kira's death really brought us together. We grew up at that point," recalls Hencz. "... Our get-togethers had always been light and fun and horsing around. We became a more mature group discovering the ties that really did bind us."
Those ties were formed at Our Lady of Perpetual Help. This week, the long road from there will also lead back.
Best memories of our childhood friendship.
Digging clay out of the stream bed and making pots and dishes, that of course fell apart.
Whipped cream in a can.
Skipping church.
Learning to ride a bike.
Artichokes.
That stupid rabbit.
Her parents were the coolest I knew. They smoked dope...I was easily impressed back then.
Happy hunting grounds Kira.
What is freaky is that I open the paper today and what do I see but a picture of my grade seven class! There was even an article talking about my graduating class and this is where it gets creepy.
I was not a social kid... no real to difference now really. ;) I generally only had one close friend at a time. My school day BFsF (only so not) were... one from grades 1-5, then I switched to a new girl in grades 6-9, then one for 10 then a new one for the remaining years. I just discovered, through the article, that my first BFF died in 2002. Now we had nothing to do with each other for 20 odd years but wow, no words.
.
'78 students reflect on their bond as elementary school turns 150
Apr 22, 2008 04:30 AM
Catherine Dunphy
Feature Writer
School ties don't always bind, particularly not the elementary ones.
Tell that to the class of '78 from Our Lady of Perpetual Help, a compact red brick jewel nestled in a corner of Moore Park that will celebrate its 150th anniversary on the weekend.
Its roughly 35 members have spread around the world, to London, New York, Texas, even Afghanistan. One member, Joanne Kelly, has become a Paralympic basketball gold medallist. Another is well-known Toronto photography gallery owner Stephen Bulger.
"They were the most remarkable group," says Irene Echevierria, who taught them Grade 1 and Grade 6 and who now lives in Florida. "Very bright, just so bright. They stayed forever in my mind."
The class is reconvening this week at Bulger's gallery on Queen St. W. to mark the passage of 30 years.
Most of the former classmates will be there. The notable omission will be Kira, the quiet girl with the pale complexion and lovely hair. She committed suicide.
There are always casualties on the road to reunions.
Our Lady of Perpetual Help was originally built at 1414 Yonge St., next to the cemetery. Amateur historian Henry Miller, a parent of four children who attend or attended the school, pinpoints April 28, 1858, as the date St. Charles School, as it was called, was opened.
It moved to its present site on Garfield Ave. in 1923. Margaret Atwood immortalized it under an assumed name in Cat's Eye, the novel about the backbiting world of prepubescent girls. It also figures predominantly in Hugh Hood's novel, The Swing in the Garden.
It's always been a top academic school. Today, it's at full capacity with 301 students, having turned away 70 last fall. "Other schools focus on anti-violence programs," says principal Anthony Tacoma. "We have a manners program."
In Bulger's time, they learned how to properly address grown-ups (and to slip facial tissues in their sleeves) from Mrs. Ryan, the kindergarten teacher. Emily Hencz, 42, a member of the reunion planning committee, learned how to enunciate clearly from the ruler-wielding grammarian Brother Xavier. And they memorized poetry.
"I can still recite `In Flanders Fields' with all the commas," says Margaret Codrington, 43.
Codrington and Hencz are chatting with Bulger at his gallery on a Saturday afternoon. Bulger, 44, is hosting their class reunion here Friday night. He hosted the first one, in 1988, in his parents' backyard. They had been in their early 20s, poised to take on the world, aware enough to wrap the reunion of their Grade 8 class in heavy irony. Still, all but six showed up.
"It was like we hadn't missed a step," said Bulger. "Like being at our one-year reunion."
Except for Kira.
If they remembered her at all, it was because she and her best (and only) friend, Julie, liked the Bay City Rollers when no one else in the class did and saw Star Wars together perhaps hundreds of times.
They were amazed by the grown-up, divorced Kira. While they'd been at university, she'd moved to an eastern European country, perhaps Romania, and married.
Bulger was tending bar as he figured out what he wanted to do with his life and here was a classmate with three kids and a past.
"She was a stronger personality - more of a presence," Hencz recalls.
The group headed in different directions over the next decade and a half. Then Codrington saw Kira's death notice in a newspaper in 2002. Displayed at the visitation were wedding photos, Kira's certificate from a college course in administration, mementoes from her Métis heritage - "I was surprised about that," Codrington recalls - but no photos from her time at Our Lady of Perpetual Help.
Kira's husband told Codrington about finding Kira dead in their bed. Shocked and saddened, Codrington emailed the class of '78.
"It felt like our lives had turned all of a sudden," Bulger says. "I remember thinking 'Oh my God. Now we are dying.' "
He organized an impromptu potluck in the apartment where he and his wife were living over his first gallery.
"You turn to those you know to reconnect," he says. About 20 came, bearing old photos, memories and, for the first time, regrets.
They toasted Kira and talked long into the night. In their mid-30s they were building their lives as she ended hers.
"Kira's death really brought us together. We grew up at that point," recalls Hencz. "... Our get-togethers had always been light and fun and horsing around. We became a more mature group discovering the ties that really did bind us."
Those ties were formed at Our Lady of Perpetual Help. This week, the long road from there will also lead back.
Best memories of our childhood friendship.
Digging clay out of the stream bed and making pots and dishes, that of course fell apart.
Whipped cream in a can.
Skipping church.
Learning to ride a bike.
Artichokes.
That stupid rabbit.
Her parents were the coolest I knew. They smoked dope...I was easily impressed back then.
Happy hunting grounds Kira.