The Great Value That Comes From Attending Reunions

I have been to two reunions this year.  RSL's 50th and my 45th.  What is really great about attending such events, from the perspective of this blog, is that when you do so you become a member of the tribe that is made up of elementary, junior high and high school classmates.  At the event, there is no other classification that matters and everyone there accepts everyone else as an equal.  There is curiousity and respect for what one has done and experienced without judgement.  So, if the conversation veers off into politics, the discussion is conducted with respect for the other person, and assuming both people are in possession of reasonable points of view, there can be a reasonable discussion of the pros/cons of the policy under discussion.  There might even be an agreement on the goal and only a disagreement on how to get there.

Growing up together creates a psychological comradeship that is more important than all other forms of tribe beyond the family.  That is why each of us is a product of two primal social experiences:  family for many basic things and school for socialization during the extended growing up experience.  Each of us had insecurities as teenagers and most of us develop friendships that help us work through those insecurities.  We know when we get to the reunion, each of us had some experience with many of those there that contributed to our adult make up, and we value those people.  Reminiscing and catching up with the tribe balances our personality by letting us know we are valued and do not know everything.

So what did my school system do well?  It is interesting that my take on this was always how many of our graduating class went to competitive schools.  But what came out this past weekend in both conversations and speeches was that we were all taught to be respectful, hard working, members of a team that knew how to get things done.  That universality of education is more important than where one went to school as I learned about the many ways my classmates have contributed to society.  We were not taught to be political animals which is probably why those of us in corporate management hit ceilings below that which our intellect and capacities might have been worthy of.

This is the value of tribes when they are made of people with different points of view.  As David Brooks and others have said again and again, the basis of heightened partisanship is the isolation of people into tribes of similarity with gerrymandering making the winner indifferent to the point of view of those who supported the loser.  We need a nationwide effort to end gerrymandering.