Anniversaries important to me (in no particular order):
These are the anniversaries important to me (in no particular order).
June 4 – the day I graduated from high school. While I don’t have any idea of the date of my college or law school graduations, I celebrate the anniversary of my high school graduation every year. **
My entire graduating class of 24 students
April 9 – the occupation of University Hall my freshman year of college.
Picture from Harvard Crimson
January 1 – my wedding anniversary with husband #2, which nobody remembers but us.
Cutting the cake on our dining room table
May 13 – the day, many years earlier, that future husband #2 decided to leave another situation and move in with me.
My house in Davis where he moved in
June 18 – my parents’ wedding anniversary, which still reminds me of them. Also Paul McCartney’s birthday.
50th anniversary
RetroFlash
** When we moved into our current house in 1992, and were selecting a phone number, one of the ones we were offered had the last four digits 6468.
I snapped it up since it represented my graduation date, June 4, 1968. We still have that number, and can never give up our landline for that reason.
(Shutkin Rule: footnotes are not included in RetroFlash word counts)
(Suzy’s corollary: neither are captions for pictures)
Suzy
Memorable anniversaries, all, Suzy. Love your high school graduation class photo with you all in formal attire (those long white gloves!). I also like Shutkin’s rule. I’ll have to remember that one, as I have a RetroFlash in mind in the future. And I particularly enjoyed so many photos. I guess I enjoy those visual cues. These were wonderful.
First, thanks so much for validating the Shutkin Rule. I was a bit nervous about invoking it until now. And I’m equally delighted to learn of Suzy’s Corollary. I had wanted to invoke it myself, but was worried that it might be considered a RetroFlash bridge too far. Thank you for the liberating clarification.
And, as to your story itself, it is a great RetroFlash. I love the idea that, as the prompt encouraged, you noted anniversaries of notable events other than just weddings. And what a terrific, eclectic collection of events! In particular, your telephone number story is absolutely adorable. I like my cell number because I can always draw upon the Wall Street crash of 1929 to recall its last four digits, but your phone number connection is much more felicitous.
I love the way you did this, Suzy. You selected several meaningful calendar dates and squeezed it all into a RetroFlash. Now that I know the Shutkin rules, I may try a RetroFlash again soon. Your photos were great and thanks for including Paul’s birthday!
What a wonderful, varied collection of recollections, Suzy! It’s so precious to have pics from so many chapters in your life. I wonder what crusty old John Harvard woulda said, if only he could have turned his head!
Great collection of anniversaries, Suzy, and very creative way of presenting them. Love the phone number connection. I have a good land line number, but my cell phone number is terrible.
Wonderful Suzy! Whatever silly thing works is what we do!
My birthday is Feb 19 so often at 2:19 in the afternoon my husband texts me “219”. Then I have to try to remember to text him at 4:22 (yep, his is April 22!)
I am impressed that you remember all those dates, but each one clearly had an impact. Especially happy to see the University Hall one–I could have told you the season and year, but not the date! You did a great job locating all those pictures too.
You might be the only person I know who celebrates their high school graduation every year, Suzy! Do you use the day to stay in touch with any other members of your class?
I always enjoy tweaking a RetroFlash to make it 100 words…turning two words into a contraction, or vice versa, adding or deleting a word here and there. Shutkin’s rule and your corollary are part and parcel, and of course the title doesn’t count although it can sometimes be integral to the story.
There were several years after we all got connected by email, when I wrote to everyone in the class on June 4th. And when we were planning our 50th reunion, which was to be a multi-day affair, I insisted on having it include June 4th, which was probably a mistake – I think we would have gotten more people at a different time. But I just love that date. To read about my amazing graduation, see my story “Up, Up and Away.”
All of the dates and memories lost to time make me wish I had been a diarist all my life. Rarely I will find something I wrote long ago and it might have been written by a stranger.
Thank you, Suzy, for the thought that each of these anniversaries recalled are landlines that can’t be given up, because they keep us moored to who we are and have been.