Glory Days

There’s nothing nicer than going to somebody else’s high school reunion because you can just relax and watch it all unfold. No one is looking for you or at you and except for when people hand you their cameras and ask you to take their picture you’re just on the sidelines.

This was David’s reunion that we went to last night. He was Class President which meant that when he walked into that function room a beefy guy yelled “Marotta!” and began loudly humming 'Hail to the Chief, ' which  of course  turned David redder than a sunset.  Then, when he heard he was the one meant to stand up and make the welcoming remarks, he immediately took his bottle of Budweiser and tried to lose himself in a knot of guys all laughing about some crazy long-ago stunt down at the Cape. He’s still pretty shy is the truth of it.“He’s just like he was!” one woman said to me later. "Just always quiet like that, and nice!" His theory? People liked him because he was quiet; because that way they could attribute all these good qualities to him.Well I’ve live with the man for 40 years, and except for that one football game when, thoroughly padded and helmeted, he punched a kid square in the face, he has never done a mean thing to anyone.  (And there’s more to that story too: At game’s end, kids from the losing team's side leaped from the stands and raced onto the field. One grabbed him from behind and swung. It’s just that when Dave swung back the Boston Herald got the picture and put it on the front page of the Sunday paper.We have that picture around here somewhere, in a scrapbook assembled by his high school girlfriend. If I can I’ll find it and put it up here too, as a companion to this picture, of how he looked the summer I met him, a mere three years after the Glory Days at Medford High.