I have been thinking recently about something that plagues everyone at sometime in their adult lives, reunions.

We all have to deal with them sometime, and the big decision is to go or not to go.

You see, my mother just went to her 30-year, high-school reunion last Saturday, and she was telling me about it.

She and her identical twin sister went and toured their old school and saw how much it had changed. They now offer marine biology as a course at her old high school. What ever happened to home ec?

That night they went to the dance and had a good time seeing how much everyone had changed.

The once blonde cheerleaders had become spongy haired and old-looking and the guys who used to be muscular and tan are now flabby and bald.

My mom and her sister danced the night away to the BeeGees, and even had a beer. (If you knew my mom, you’d understand why it is so unusual.)

She had such a great time that she decided that, compared to all those aging has beens, she and her twin “still have it.”

This made me think about myself getting older and the fact that I have my first five year reunion coming up next year.

What will people look like? Will they all have good jobs and families? Will I be the only one still unmarried and in college?

Hopefully, by my reunion next year I will be a graduate of Iowa State, or at least close to it. Will I actually have a real job yet?

I recently saw an article in my hometown paper about a girl who was in my class in high school who used to be the captain of the cheerleading team. She recently graduated from Iowa State with a degree in chemical engineering and is getting married to her chemical engineer fiance and living in Texas. Does this make anyone else nauseous?

I know the first thing everyone will ask me at my reunion: Are you still going out with Matt? Are you guys married yet? The answer is yes and no. We are still going out after nearly four-and-a-half years, but to me marriage can wait until after college.

My best friend since seventh grade got married last year and just had a son. It is amazing to me that someone with whom I used to play “chubby bunnies” is now a mom. She and I used to entertain ourselves by eating Spaghettios with our hands and catching sneak peeks at Cinemax after dark on Friday nights.

Now that she’s a parent, these are the types of things she will be trying to keep her own son from doing.

I also know that even in the class behind me, people paired up in high school and had families before they even reached age twenty. It leads me to wonder, how the hell do they do it?

I just don’t feel like I could handle that kind of responsibility; for god’s sake, I have a hard enough time keeping my fish alive.

I just keep thinking that if I go to this reunion I’ll have to continually explain to everyone why I have a guy roommate, no marriage or kids, and how I bicycled to the reunion because the fumes in my 1989 Hyundai make me pass out. Granted I would like to see some of the people from my class, but there are always those people you could just do without. In my case it would be that girl who I described above.

So I think the fact that my mom had fun, regardless of how much things have changed, made me realize that if she can get out and shake her groove thang to “Stayin Alive,” I can attempt to put on a happy face and endure the family photos of my peers.

But when the DJ plays one of our old favorites, “Parents Just Don’t Understand” by the Fresh Prince, it will take on a whole new meaning for me and my former classmates.

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Sheila Collins is a senior in journalism and mass communications from Council Bluffs.