They Were All Good and Great Boys and Girls

By John Polk

On Saturday, April 9, thirty or so senior Panthers from the 1964, 1966 and 1969 classes gathered in Ft. Worth's Ashton Hotel for a mini-reunion. Our common denominator was Bob Black and his brothers, Dusty and Tom, who had planned the get-together because Bob had missed the August reunion and wanted the chance to reconnect. Bringing people together like this who are diverse in almost every way can be a serious disappointment - especially if you haven't seen each other in 20 or so years.

As it turned out, we were surprised at the extreme pleasure that would come from this intimate evening visiting with friends from so long ago. As we moved from the lobby to the meeting room, I heard Betsy Brooks say to Molly Morgan and Letty Eckhart, "Did you hear that? Bob called us girls!" I laughed at that, but then thought, that's what we still are, isn't it? - good and great boys and girls. To each other we are not approaching our 60th year but, still just boys and girls - just as we were then - and will always be when we think of each other. When we see each other it is always without gray hair and expanding middles, but just as it was in 1964. That may be something special - I think it probably is.

Bob Black and his brothers, Dusty (1966), and Tom (1969), as well as their families were all present, each inviting a few close friends from their classes. Present were Bob (now Robert) Black and his fiancé, Trish O'Keefe, Betsy Brooks, Molly Morgan, Letty Eckhart, Susan Webb, John Polk, Glenn Ingram and his wife, David Yates and his wife, Joan, Ronnie Savitz and his wife, all from the class of '64. From Dusty Black's class were Dusty and his wife, Dawn, Bill West and his wife, Dian, Lee Anderson, Rob and Deb Stowe and Hugh Savage. Tom Black and his wife Vick were the only representatives from the 1969 class. We called a few others, but they were unable to make it.

I think, because I choose to believe it's true, that each of us left this evening with a feeing of unexpected well being. There is a sense of wonder and of enchantment about that time in our lives as well as in the facts about the grown up people we have all become. We are now defined more by our adulthood and less by our children and our careers and, I think free, to look back at what now seems to have been an important and special time in our beginnings.

I listened to Bob Black talk about his Dad and the house where they lived on Forest Park Blvd and to Glenn Ingram talk about being the only Rosemont kid that showed up at Tech when ten others had promised to go there to school instead of PHS. We laughed about Coach Allen and his various eccentricities and Molly Morgan told us how she took her mother to work every night in her pajamas - that is, Molly was in her pajamas. We talked about the story I had written and shared about the 1963 football team aptly named, "Our Senior Season." and how it had captured those remarkable events and feelings that many had forgotten. We talked about who we were and about what we had become and how our beginnings had shaped all of that. And we talked quietly around a single round table, each sharing some piece of remembered past and present well being.

As the evening ended, each of us committed to do this again soon because it was important to hang on to what had just happened over the last few hours. I don't know if we will because holding the past as we go forward into our futures is tenuous and relies heavily on remembering the good and great boys and girls we were and still are. It seems like we should.