50th Reunion Nights

REUNION NIGHTS

We have all marched the Pomp and Circumstances trail

Tassels now turned, we all knew we would not fail

Each class knows that it alone is unique

Fame and fortune waiting for it to seek.

But in one year the sands were shifting in a flooding tide

Taking all of us for at least a wild decade ride.

We arrived in the fall of 1965

Eager and anxious to at Stanford thrive

I loaded with a purse seine check dollars ahead of tuition at $1575

Without fear, ready to become the next great Hewlett Packard engineer

Not knowing that Engineering 9 and France would me away from a slide rule steer

Off to France a Tours, le jardin de la France in France XIII

6 months without Indian football, baseball or the KA party scene

A Viking from Coeur d’ Alene symbolic of Viking ships of old that battled only currents and unknown fears

Sheltered by compass, sail, oars,  strong arms, axes, swords and spears.

This later Viking of 65 faced a chasm cultural shift,

All icons parted and were now in constant swirling drift.

Constant in Alaska only to set the salmon net, haul in the halibut hook, fell the tree

Lower down, all was moving, compass shorn, tidal waves from an Asian sea.

Radar blips most likely false on a ship of Joy

Soon a generation offered to Mars to maim and destroy

Be you of the class of  65 or 70 when the end was almost near,

Our time at Stanford was a far  different chaotic  set of years

The jungle claimed our bodies, the music changed our souls

The pill released us, but the highs took their toll

A tough time for a nation, a tougher time for its youth

Where in shifting sands would one ever find the truth?

Lower away the cities burned, shots heard, flags stomped to the ground

A nation for many years torn apart, in chaos always unbound

At first Stanford was an island of stability in a sea of storms

Later sit ins in Sterling’s office burning of Naval ROTC became the norm

Support for a war that we never should have been in slowly began to fade

Respect for the icons of authority began to degrade

We were the chosen few unlikely to the jungles to be sent to die or in the humidity wilt

As we look back at the high school dropouts a profound sense of guilt

50 years later we have come to grip with the past and have in most cases thrived

Some with legacies off to Stanford, careers in law, business, politics, a sense of social good to have arrived

The Winds of Freedom still blow, our minds still learning and questioning set free

The journey of improvement beyond the Farm is a never ending spree

For some so lucky the warm summer rays are just now beginning to fade

For others, the leaves are now turning color to fall, never to shade

Lastly, some of us feel in our bodies the first hint of snow;

Fire waiting as we now reflect on what we did sow

But common to all as we move upon this life’s journey trail

Heads high, toasts through the mist, hail Stanford hail, hail Stanford hail.

©  June 24, 2010 Michael P. Ridley