Had an action packed 4 days in Arizona for the Prescott High School Class of 1988 20th reunion and visiting friends and family. On Thursday, due to the 3-hour time difference (AZ doesn't follow DST), we left Baltimore at 7:30 a.m. and arrived in Phoenix at 9:30 a.m., so we were up in Prescott (aka Biscuit) by 12:30.
Julia was thrilled to see Angela's son, Paul, who is 5, and off the kids went to play while we visited. Little Will, 2, gamely joined in and is adorable! You should hear him talk. It's "monsoon" season in Arizona, which usually means afternoon rain storms that move in and then out. On this day, however, they stayed and poured down buckets, then even hailed. The temperature dropped to the low 60s and we were suddenly regretting only packing summer clothes! I visited Grandma and Grandpa in the afternoon, then we had a delicious home cooked Mexican dinner. Angela's husband, John, was on his way back from Phoenix and had to turn around and go the long way around through Wickenburg due to an accident. Kim and Stephanie Albritton came by after dinner but unfortunately we couldn't visit long because after being awake since 2:30 a.m Arizona time, we were wrung out.
Friday brought more rain, another unusual occurrence, so we did our swimming inside at the Y instead of at the neighborhood pool. We met Arminta for lunch, then another visit with the grandparents, before getting ready for the first big night out. The opening mixer was scheduled from 6 to 10, and with a babysitter, we got there on the early side. The only people there were lurking outside since no-one wanted to be the first person in. We opted to skip the mediocre quality warm hors d'oeuvres -- for which we were charged the princely sum of $40! -- and instead have dinner at legendary Mexican restaurant El Charro, one of my dad's favorite places.
Fortified with cervezas y margaritas, we headed back to the hotel to find a lot more people there. It was a smaller turnout than the 10th reunion, but that was probably to be expected given the high cost of tickets for the weekend at $95 *per person.* We saw some of the usual suspects who are still in town, either long time or recently returned (Kim, Molly Day, Beth Pearce, Ian Russell); some who traveled in state (Sally Sonczalla, Guy Grover, Mike Miller); and some who traveled from out of state (Shaker Cohlmia, Stacey Humble, Traci Shosted, Kristi McDowell, Stephanie). It was fun catching up and we screamed ourselves hoarse trying to be heard in the noisy room. At last we called it a night, and went home to relieve the babysitter and sit out in the cool evening to talk some more.
On Saturday we slept in a little, then picked up a yummy KFC picnic lunch (must be a theme this month) and headed to the family picnic at Willow Creek Park. The kids were happy to run around and we got a little more time to talk to folks, including some people who didn't have tickets for the dinner, like Sadie Conley and Mike Holevar. Then we headed home for a snooze. Julia and I woke up first, so we headed over to the grandparents while Ken finished sleeping.
It was while we were there that we got the sad news that my uncle John, my dad's brother, had lost his battle with cancer. He had been in declining health in recent weeks and we knew when we left on the trip that his time was short. It's especially sad for my grandparents who have now lost both their children in just 2 years. At that point, we thought if the memorial service was in a few days, we would extend our stay and drive on to California.
We got ready for the evening's final big event and headed back to the same hotel. There we saw some people who hadn't been able to make it up on Friday, like fellow valedictorians Jim Kimmett and Brian McNally. This time there was dinner and a live band whose guitarist, Curt King, was one of the classmates. The band was good, but made it too loud to hear inside the room. We had to either scream or go outside. By midnight we were all reunioned out, and headed for home. Once more we visited outside on the patio as Kenny "Sawbones" Moon introduced John to the delights of the Dropkick Murphys by way of my ipod.
On Sunday, thinking we weren't leaving the next day but instead going to California, we visited my grandparents in the morning, then took the kids to McDonald's and the circus -- Ringling Brothers' smaller, one-ring version was at the arena in Prescott Valley. After we got out, however, I learned from Arminta that the memorial service for Uncle John was now being scheduled for either the next Saturday or the following weekend. Knowing that, we realized we couldn't stay that long and had to leave Monday after all.
Which meant that we should have left to drive down to Phoenix already. We scrambled back to Angela's to pack up and say goodbye, went over to my grandparents to bid them farewell, got gas and dinner and finally departed into a black sky at 7:30. Somehow the rainstorms missed us and we rolled into our hotel at 9:30 that night, in bed by 10.
Flying east meant we spent most of the day traveling and were finally home at 6:30. We easily re-adjusted to Maryland time to fall exhausted into bed. Five days somehow felt like five weeks. I'm still recovering.
Labels: Prescott, reunion
