RUNNEMEDE REMEMBERED

Growing up in a small town in Southern New Jersey


Monday, September 19, 2011

High school 50th reunion, etc.

I will be posting several articles -- some with pictures -- for the next few days about my 50th high school reunion.

I went to Triton Regional High School in Runnemede, NJ. We were the first class to go all four years at Triton. In fact, the school wasn't even finished when we first started. Some of the hallways were blocked off, but the school opened in September of 1957 anyway.

Yes, I met my husband at Triton, but that's another tale for another day.

Let the journey begin!

Alan and I left on Wednesday, planning to arrive in Mt. Laurel around 2:00 in the afternoon on Thursday. That didn't happen. And prior to our leaving I had told Lorraine, reunion coordinator extrarodinare, (last name omitted on purpose) that I was going to be at the reunion if I had to be wheeled in on a gurney. Well, I did wheel myself in on a scooter for old, mobile-impaired people. I thank the inventor of scooters that come apart and can be put into the trunk of a smallish car.

However -- there's always a however or a but, isn't there? -- on Thursday morning after breakfast Alan collapsed/passed out/ fainted, we don't know, at any rate the poor lady in the hotel breakfast room where we stayed in Somerset PA on Wednesday night, came running out to the lobby where I was sitting in a comfy chair waiting for Alan to finish his breakfast and reading USA today, figuring I could get in a good hour of reading a book I was into. (Phew, long sentence. Ms. Magargee would never approve.) When Lois (the lady in the hotel breakfast room) came running out to the lobby yelling "CALL 911, CALL 911", I knew that Alan was down and out, and I was correct, he was lying on the floor next to our table unconscious. At that point I started laughing and Lois was near tears and I told her about relating to Lorraine that I would come to the reunion even if I had to be rolled in on a gurney and it looked like my husband was going to be the one on the gurney, or I was really going to miss the reunion, and that was NOT going to happen.

Actually, after 12 years of these episodes, I take it in stride and everyone thinks I don't care about Alan, which I really do, but I can't do anything, so I wait until EMTs arrive and then transport him to the hospital and get a doctor's report. In this case, they filled him with fluids, raised his oxygen levels, watched as his blood sugar level went down, and let him go, telling him to be certain to get in touch with his physician as soon as he got home. That appointment had been made several weeks ago, so tomorrow he will be seeing his physician.

Today is Monday, September 19, and this is the first BLOG I have written since before I left for NJ and the reunion. Needless to say, since I got to the reunion, and home again, all is well with Alan.

When we left Somerset, three hours later than I had scheduled for us to leave, after three hours of great driving on the PA Turnpike, I saw a line of red lights ahead after we exited at Valley Forge. We had run head on to a massive traffic jam because of more flooding in NJ and PA, on the Schuylkill Expressway. Four hours to go from Valley Forge exit of the PA turnpike to the Ben Franklin bridge. By the time we checked in I was exhausted and my knees were killing me.

You know what happens in traffic jams you have to switch from gas to brake, gas to brake, gas to brake and that really is not pleasant when you have two bum knees. Funny thing is, I had absolutely NO pain for the three days prior to our departure from Cold Spring, until we were on the Expressway, then I went downhill from there.

So, keep checking FB and I will keep going through the reunion part of our trip, since, after all, I went to school at Triton, which is located in Runnemede, and many of the attendees at the reunion were from Runnemede. So what happened at the reunion is not staying at the hotel where we had all our fun, but will be BLOGged for all the world to view -- as if!

Pictures will be included as soon as I get my battery pack recharged and the pictures downloaded.

ttfn

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