Sometimes a madeleine is just a cake...
So, I decided to go to the graduate reunion for [swathe of some 15 or so yearsworth of graduands] at my [place of obtaining first degree].
It wasn't painful, but it wasn't anything else much either. For one thing, there were only a handful of other people who'd actually been the same year as I was, none of them people I'd known at all well - although at that time [institution] was a fairly small university, it was still the case that unless individuals were in one's hall, doing the same courses, or people that you came across in the course of pursuing other activities, there were lots of faces you might vaguely recognise but didn't really know or that you'd had one class with but never developed any kind of relationship. On the upside, none of my particular betes-noirs were there.
The campus - well, there have been lots of changes, yet there are still substantial portions that look pretty much the same providing you don't look around and about too much.
I realise that I don't have much nostalgia for my undergraduate years: at the dinner last night one of the people at my table asked had I been happy then, and really, I wasn't particularly. There were good things and good times, but there was also a lot of depression, insomnia, stress, and trying to figure out human relationships. I don't feel the kind of passionate loyalty to my alma mater that the Deputy Vice Chancellor was endeavouring to invoke in after-dinner speech. How do I know I might not have been happier/done better academically/anything elsewhere?
I left this morning earlier than I'd originally intended: there didn't seem anything worth hanging around for.