Reunion Crasher
I spent this weekend as a 'spouse' at my wife's twenty-year reunion. This basically meant being relegated to the spouse pool table, and occasionally being pointed at by my wife as she told people we were married.
Early on, I decided that since no one knew who I was, (and many times they didn't recognize each other) I might as well pretend that everybody knew me. So, I started greeting people (actually just my wife and her friends) like I had known them for twenty years. Eventually, a few other of the alumni realized that I was a poser, and one of them came up with a persona for me. I was dubbed Mike Potratz. Mike was not going to be at the reunion, and no one had seen him for twenty years. Although everyone remembered his name, few people had a clear idea of what he looked like.
So, I began to introduce myself as Mike Potratz, and greeting people at the reunion. The charade generally broke down a few exchanges into a conversation, and when it didn't, I stopped them and reintroduced myself as Kevin. Most of the alumni thought it was funny. A few of the inebriated alumni were left a little confused. The reunion organizers thought it was a good joke.
The next day at the formal event, the organizer had gone out and made a nametag for me as Mike Potratz, with his yearbook picture on it. His picture happened to look a lot like my own high school yearbook picture. I met a lot of the people in the class, got a lot of hugs, and fooled probably 75% of them for a short period of time. I was part of the official reunion group photo. Later, during the presentations, I was introduced as "someone they didn't expect to make it today" and then I got up in front of the group and said a few words as Mike Potratz.
By the end of the night, the joke was wearing thin, but it was a good run, and we had a great time.
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1 comment:
Unbelievable. Its like you didn't get enough of Tony and Tina's wedding so you had to create your own interactive show that people didn't know they were buying tickets for. We laughed very hard reading your story. I feel blessed to have a friend like Mike Potratz in my life.
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