With less than a month to to go before their 30th reunion, the reunion committee of the Upper West Side progressive high school that no longer exists is getting a little testy as this email chain demonstrates. It begins with a query from GRACIOUS HOST, the guiding force behind the reunion itself.

    The invitations are out…Are the replies rolling in? I’m just curious if we have any sense of how many people (and who) will be attending this shindig. Those of you who know should let the rest of us know.

HEDGE FUND, the Chairman of our Finance Committee, is getting the RSVP’s at his office. He told me that he’s only gotten eight so far but he hasn’t let the group know yet. LIFE INSURANCE wants to know what happens if people do not RSVP.

    What are the plans for people who show up and haven’t RSVP’ed. Will there be the appearance of the expectation of a contribution?

Obviously, the reunion committee doesn’t want to be left holding the bag. CORPORATE LAWYER had this to say.

    I would expect so (other than faculty and staff).  There’s no such thing as a free lunch (or cocktails and heavy hors d’oeuvres).  I presume that people realize there is no longer a school (or even an alumni association) to bankroll this thing (and if they don’t realize that, they really must have smoked their way through high school (and college and beyond).

CORPORATE LAWYER even took a stab at solving this rather vexing potential problem.

    Do you have any particular freeloaders in mind? Beyond the question of "if" there is the question of "how" (if we have name tags, we will need a table to put them on, and we can put a sign up there, perhaps).  Or HEDGE FUND can walk around with a little change apron and a green eye shade (probably his usual office attire, anyway)…..

Later in the day came this missive from a newcomer to the reunion committee.

    For the address I had for OUR ART TEACHER, mail returned no forwarding info.

It was met by this rather sobering reply from EXECUTIVE PRODUCER.

    I think he is dead, hence no forwarding address.

Ouch. As you can see, things are a tad prickly in Reunionland. HEDGE FUND is off on a business trip — and, apparently, not checking his PDA. So far, he hasn’t responded to the  anxious queries from his fellow classmates. I informed the group of the eight responses so far.

In the good news department: I received a small package by Royal Mail from the eBay seller. The CD,  "Papa John Creach," arrived in perfect condition. Accompanied by a stellar group of musical luminaries including, Grace Slick, Paul Kantner, Jorma Kaukonen, Jerry Garcia, and other luminaries, Papa John Creach plays jazz and blues violin on songs like "St. Louis Blues," "Somewhere Over the Rainbow," and "The Janitor Drives A Cadillac."

This evening, I listened to Papa’s mournful version of "Somewhere Over the Rainbow" and was transported back to our graduation day just about 30 years ago. It was such a perfect choice for that solemn march — all of us on the precipice of something new.

For the reunion, I envision seeing yearbook pictures of every one of our classmates as the song plays. I might add, that we had creative control over our yearbook pages and many of the pictures are really cool. I haven’t figured out how we’re going to do it but I think it will add a lot to the evening’s schmaltz factor – an essential component of a reunion – even the reunion of the Upper West Side progressive high school that no longer exists.