My 15-Year High School Reunion

Spirit fingers waving, I attended my 15-year high school reunion this weekend with a small crowd of fellow classmates. We roamed the halls of the school — which sort of looks like Hogwarts, as you can see from this photo — catching up on everyone’s careers, families, and relationships, and reminiscing about our past lives as scholars, athletes, dreamers, and schemers. I went to a remarkable private school in Chicago, St. Ignatius College Prep, thanks to scholarships, loans, and work-study programs, and frankly, I still can’t believe I had the privilege of attending such an academically rigorous, spiritually caring, and well-credentialed, well-rounded school.

I’m simply in awe of my fellow classmates — one works in a high-profile White House position,  and loads more work in Washington, D.C.; several have doctorate degrees or are on their way to them, and at least one has a professorship at an Ivy League school. Others are writers, entrepreneurs, finance professionals, teachers, doctors, and lawyers. They are a humbling group to be around, and I feel proud to call them my peers.

As you might expect, the economy came up several times. Most of the folks who attended the reunion were happily employed, and eager to share news about their career, but most also mentioned friends or family affected by the recession. And since we were about 300 graduates short at this particular event, who knows how many more classmates are unemployed or underemployed at the moment.

Aside from the economy though, another facet of our reunion struck me. One of the graduates honored at our reunion was previously an infantry officer in the Army, having spent years in Iraq and Afghanistan before starting his civilian career.  Another graduate I spoke with enlisted in Navy years ago, and had completed four tours of duty in Iraq. The loss of one of my classmates who was was killed in the World Trade Center on September 11 was poignantly felt, too. A far away war, which has gone on for most of our working lives, was acutely present at this reunion in a way that I’ve never felt before. It got me thinking about how deep the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan have affected each of us. I myself formerly did communications work as a civilian for the U.S. Army, and the experience changed the whole course of my career. I wonder how many other lives in my class have been touched by these hard years, how many losses have been felt.

For our class of 1997, who graduated from college in 2001, our working years have been filled with drawn-out wars and economic uncertainty. We graduated high school full of optimism, ready to go into the world and make a difference after four years of college. But almost immediately after getting to the working world, with freshly printed diplomas in hand, so much changed the instant we arrived. There has never been a “normal” for us since the day the towers fell, which for many of us was during the infancy of our first post-graduation internship.

I wonder what the rest of our careers hold for us. So much of what has defined success for this class has been surviving. Surviving rounds of mass layoffs, surviving the attacks, surviving recessions, surviving  tours of duty … surviving.  We feel lucky to have been the ones to survive it all. I hope that the next decade brings a little more stability and normalcy for the class of 97, and that we see more classmates, not only surviving but thriving, at our 25-year reunion.

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Contract for the American Dream

I have yet  to read the fine print but first glance looks pretty intriguing. Especially in light of all the economic issues currently affecting me and those I love, namely:

- Lack of job opportunities for those fresh out of school
- Housing market
- College loan debt
- Lack of job opportunities in what were supposed to be growing “green” fields
- Health care expenses and insurance coverage
- Retirement questions/social security
- Taxes and covering our federal/state debt

Some of the other categories look intriguing, such as investing at home and in our national infrastructure. Seems like there are lot of good ideas here. I’m admittedly late to the game on this one, as I haven’t yet looked into where the support for this is coming from, other than the laundry list of progressive organizations found at the bottom of the web site and that Van Jones is affiliated with it. In fact, the first I heard of it was on Facebook today. Would love to know more.

I also don’t know whether it’s tied into the Occupy Wall Street (and other cities) protests; the last I heard was that group was still working to get its message out.

Interesting times for the young and disillusioned, indeed. The question is, can we do something about it?

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But I’m not here to complain about the job market for lawyers in Chicago. Instead, today I’m sharing a fascinating episode of This American Life that asks: In this economy, how you create a job? If you have the time, listen to the episode. It will change the way you hear your local (and national) politicians when they talk about job creation. Indeed, today as I was telling B about the episode, no less than three politicians appeared on TV talking about job creation during our local newscast. Unfortunately, as you’ll learn, it’s much easier to SAY you’ll create a job than to actually create one.

Which brings me to another point. Every summer here, when the weather goes up, the crime rate goes up. However, this year, the acts seem a little more coordinated, a little more frequent, a little more desperate. In fact, last weekend on the block where I currently work, just one building away, a “mob” of teenagers attacked and mugged several people in the middle of the day. Sure, this stuff happens all the time in city — but in broad daylight? In a heavily policed area? A group of 15 to 20 teens committing random acts of violence?  And according to all accounts, this particular type of coordinated activity – the media are calling it mob action – is taking place all around my work neighborhood as teens text each other with smartphones to set up the “hit,” then disappear.

While the city is rushing to move more police officers from desk jobs to the streets, I question whether jobs creation plays into this matter too. I don’t have the stats, but I don’t think it’s a coincidence that these high-profile incidents are happening as teens, young adults, and recent graduates struggle to get summer jobs and as schools cut budgets for summer and after-school programming. I know jobs creation is difficult, but we can’t give up on the cause, we can’t give up on our young adults. Too much is at stake.

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