Derek: yes. we are poor examples of boating safety. kids, don’t try this at home. and yes, our dog’s wearing the life jacket. it’s because while she’s a good swimmer, she’s neurotic enough to leap into the water to worryingly chase after us if we’re swimming, and the handle on the back makes it easier to lift her out of the water if we’re far from shore.

I found that my 10th high school reunion (in 1996) was okay, but not especially fascinating because nearly all the guys — I went to St. George’s, an all-boys private school in Vancouver — were still basically the same, and only a little further along in their lives. Many were either still in university or early in the job market. Some, like me, were married but nearly all, also like me then, had no kids yet.

The 20th reunion a couple of years ago was a different matter. People had found careers and had children, and it was finally possible to see each other as grownups. Yeah, some of my fellow graduates were still annoying in the same ways that they had been back in 1986, but I also saw that a lot of us had grown into ourselves, becoming real people instead of the older teenagers we were at our 10th reunion.

What I did notice at the 20th event, part of which was held at the school, is how isolated and inward-looking it is (and was) as an institution. While it certainly has outreach programs and encourages students to travel and be charitable and so on, it has all the perils of an elite education noted in a recent issue of The American Scholar (an elite magazine? fer shure!).

Some of my co-graduates absorbed the sense of entitlement and arrogance and still exude it. Some (myself included, I hope) rejected or never embraced it and became, I think, better people. Maybe it’s an opposite problem to what you saw at your reunion, Jen: boys who were expected to become doctors and lawyers and movers and shakers who did just that, whether they really wanted to or not.

I do recommend going to a later reunion — 20th or 25th or beyond — because these days people often don’t really get their lives going until our thirties.

My next step is trying to work on a general reference system that I like (I know DA recommends just plain file folders with a labeller, but I am a hanging file aficionado, and I also like things in sheet protectors in a binder).

In my collecting stage at the office I went through a whole notepad of Directis stationery - that’s 50 pages - just trying to empty my head. And I don’t even have any projects really right now. That’s pretty daunting. I’m kind of scared to move into “processing”.

Also, I’m trying to use remember the milk mobile, but I often scribble stuff down on napkins or scraps of paper while I’m out and dump them in my inbox when I return. (I have asked more people to borrow a pen now than I can count).

Happy Belated Birthday!

and i see sasha invited a friend too?