A Life Sentence

Sometimes, when I start thinking about this journey I am on as a six year voyage, something comes along to remind me what one of the Past Grand Matrons told me. She said that serving in the Grand Line is not a voyage at all, but a life sentence without possibility of parole. I was reminded of that this weekend as I attended a reunion dinner for the 2006s. Traditionally, for ten years after the end of the year, Grand Families, along with the Deputies and Worthy Matrons and Patrons and Grand Representatives who served together have reunions, which are hosted by different associations throughout the state who volunteer to have everyone come to their area to get together, go on fun activities together and reminisce about how much better it was in their year. The first four years can be especially busy because of the residual obligations towards the lady who served as Grand Marshal for that particular family, but even after that, you want to see the people. After all, when you've spent an entire year traveling with a group of people, you miss them. It's hard to make the transition back to normal life, where someone doesn't send you an e-mail every Tuesday telling you what to wear and when you need to be in what location. Life can seem so . . . . directionless. So reunions are usually a weekend thing and having it in your area is both wonderful and a bit of a nightmare. It's wonderful because you get to see a bunch of people that you've loved and missed and they are in your area so going is easy, but it is a bit of a nightmare because you have to make all the arrangements and keep everyone entertained. Have you ever tried to come up with enough different things to do so that fifty or sixty adults all have something to do for two days that they all like? And they are all your Family, so you really have to do a good job, right down to making table favors and everything! I have missed most of my reunions so far because I have been on the road without a break, which is not the normal way, although I am not the first person who has had this problem. I missed the 2008 reunion entirely in 2009 and this year only got to the dinner because it was in my area. I missed the 2009 reunion this year too. By the time I am free of other travel obligations, the 2008 reunions will be half done. But missing my own reunions is not why I crashed the party on the 2006s. To be honest, I didn't serve in 2006. So I was a bit surprised when I got an invitation to the reunion and I called the Chairman to find out if perhaps I got the invite by accident. But nossiree bob, she told me that all the 2010s were invited, and I know a fair number of the 2006s, so I thought, what the heck, at least the dinner is in the hotel, why not? The coolest part is that I knew just about everyone in the room, so I got to sit with friends and talk with friends and visit with friends and I thought, wow, so this is what a reunion is like. And everyone said that they were happy that I joined them and really made me feel welcome. It was awesome and I am very happy that I bought that dinner ticket. The food was okay, about what one expects for a banquet meal. The only creepy part was the cream. I think we had a bad one at our table, because it did bizarre and scary things in the coffee, but we were able to get new cups and cream and coffee before anything was able to crawl out of any of the cups and get us. The entertainment was a lady singer with a keyboard player accompanying her and she did a good job of being amusing between the songs. She had some nice accessories to go with some of the songs, played a little guitar with the country ones and had a tambourine for some of the others. But it was during the entertainment that I really saw the effect of a life sentence. You see, it is hard on the ladies because we are expected to do so much and deal with so much through four years going up the line, where the men only have two and are not expected to do as much, and then we have four years of being the advisor for our Grand Marshal on her journey up and coordinating her Installation and her pre-Revealing of her man and a bunch of other stuff and the man is expected to help, but doesn't carry the heavy water, so you'd think we have the short end of the stick. No Way! Because it is the man who gets to have the really great sense of humor when they want to embarrass someone. Last year, at one event, the Grand Line men had to put on grass skirts with strings of fruit and coconut bras. The whole crowd was dying as the lead dancer taught the men to do Polynesian dancing by counting off, hit the orange, hit the banana, and so on. Well at the reunion, the lucky 2006 Worthy Grand Patron got to wear the pink feather boa during the serenade, among other things. Sometimes the ladies get stuck on some of this, (in 2008, they both had to wear a dog on their head at one Official Visit), but more often, the members are kinder to the lady, since after all, we are frail, fragile flowers of femininity, don't you know, but with the men they are merciless, since the men are tough and rugged and strong and can take it. For some reason, I am totally at peace with this division of labor among the sexes and I think that it is one tradition that I am going to hang on to. But it does mean that a really good sense of humor and an ability to laugh at oneself, not just for two years, but for the rest of your life, are very important traits for my man to be. Just what I needed, more requirements on the list. I just hope that my paragon is out there waiting for my call. Next weekend, we are off because of Memorial Day.