1970 Reunion
To say that the 40th reunion of the Year of 1970 was a success is a bit like saying that 31 December 1999 ushered in a new year. It is true … but it does not capture the magic.
Right from the moment that half the old boys sheepishly gathered on the far side of A ground at 6.55 (for a 7.00 pm kick-off) you knew that ‘old’ was not too wide of the mark. After an hour on the hallowed turf and fuelled by a Mauritian beer aptly named ‘Phoenix’, each of us managed the ascent to the Emery Room where dinner was punctuated by transformation.
Tim Goodman was a credible, if improbable, former headmaster. Phil Wood took the roles of both choirmaster and sergeant major. John McAskill, a century of drills in a remarkable school career, broke his duck for pink cards. Peter King paid the penalty for losing to a Grammarian.
At the microphone we were treated to personal anecdotes which mixed pathos with perception … the end result was a curiously personal night from which most came away with an unexpected insight into the arbitrariness of life and a different appreciation of members of the year.
It was hardly the new millennium, there were after all only 55 of us (in a portent of future reunions, perhaps John Utz simply forgot) but it felt like a privilege to re-make the acquaintance of so many good men.
David Alexander, Covener