Easton Area High School — Class of 1987
Forty years ago today I was a senior at Easton Area High Schooll. Which means next year will mark forty years since I graduated.
Forty. Years.
I’m going to let that sink in for a moment because, quite frankly, I’m having a difficult time wrapping my head around it.
It seems like only yesterday that I was sneaking out of restricted study hall during lunch to make a quick run to Burger King, counting down the minutes until Friday night at the Palmer Park Mall, or spending what little money I had on an Orange Julius and another attempt at conquering Dragon’s Lair in the arcade.
Those were simpler times. Or at least they seemed that way.
There were no cell phones then, no social media, and no Internet. If you wanted to talk to someone, you picked up the telephone, hoped their parents didn’t answer, and prayed nobody else in your house picked up the extension downstairs to listen in.
For me, high school was a combination of choir trips, awkward crushes, friendships, and endless hours spent practicing on my black Gibson Explorer guitar.
And, of course, there was the music. Lots and lots of hair metal. Bon Jovi. Def Leppard. Ratt. Dokken. Motley Crue. The bigger the hair and louder the guitar, the better.
When I wrote about attending our 25th reunion back in 2012, I reflected on the dreams I’d had as a teenager. At the time, my life’s ambition was pretty straightforward: write music, record albums, tour the world, and eventually become a rock star.
I didn’t care if it meant sleeping on the floor of some filthy tour bus or surviving on peanut butter sandwiches and whatever change I could scrape together for guitar strings. Music was going to be my life.
My goal was to open for Bon Jovi. At least until the day came when they would be opening for me.
Of course, life had other plans.
I still remember waking up one morning in my college dorm room at twenty years old with little more than my guitar and $1.37 to my name. It was around that time I realized that being a starving musician sounded a lot more romantic than actually being one.
So, I entered the workforce. But I never gave up music.
Over the years, I played in several bands, wrote countless songs, spent time in recording studios, and had the opportunity to perform in front of thousands of people. One of my favorite memories will always be playing Musikfest in 2004 before a crowd of roughly 6,500.
Not quite Madison Square Garden, but I’ll take it.
And somewhere along the way, something else happened. I became a writer.
What started as a personal blog eventually led to opportunities to interview musicians and entertainers I’d once admired from afar. I’ve written for publications like Guitar World, The Morning Call, and others. I’ve interviewed some incredible people and even managed to publish several books, including my latest novel, The Seventh Echo.
Funny how life works. The kid who once dreamed of appearing on the cover of Rolling Stone eventually found himself interviewing the people who actually did.
Maybe the dream didn’t disappear. Maybe it just changed. And that’s what I’ve been thinking about as our 40th reunion approaches.
When you’re seventeen, forty years might as well be an eternity. You imagine all the things you’re going to accomplish, the places you’ll go, the people you’ll meet, and the person you’ll eventually become.
What you don’t imagine are the detours. The jobs you never expected to have. The friendships that fade. The people you lose. The unexpected opportunities. The heartbreaks. The triumphs. The ordinary moments that, years later, turn out to have been extraordinary.
And perhaps the strangest part of all is that, despite everything that’s happened over the last four decades, I still feel like that same kid from 1987. Somewhere inside, I’m still the guy who wants to plug in his guitar, crank up the amplifier, and pretend he’s opening for Bon Jovi.
As I look forward to seeing my former classmates again, I find myself wondering how their lives turned out.
Did they follow the paths they’d imagined? Did they achieve the things they’d dreamed about? Did they discover something entirely different along the way?And how many of us still feel like those seventeen-year-old kids whenever we hear a song from 1987?
Of course, there’s another side to reunions that becomes more apparent with age. Not everyone who walked those hallways with us will be there.
Some of our classmates are no longer with us. Others have faced struggles we couldn’t possibly have imagined when we were worrying about algebra tests, Friday night plans, or whether someone would say yes when we asked them to the prom.
At seventeen, we thought we had all the time in the world. At fifty-seven, you begin to understand just how quickly that time passes.
Which makes the opportunity to reconnect all the more meaningful.
As for that old black Gibson Explorer? I still have it. The same guitar I spent countless hours playing as a teenager. The same one that accompanied all those dreams of rock stardom. It’s a little older now, with a few more scratches and stories to tell.
Come to think of it, so am I.
Back in 2012, I ended my reunion post by saying that I believed things happened for a reason and that I was looking forward to hearing how everyone’s dreams turned out. Fourteen years later, I still believe that.
But I’ve also come to realize something else. Maybe life isn’t necessarily about becoming the person you thought you’d be when you were seventeen. Maybe it’s about appreciating the person you became along the way.
So here’s to the Easton Area High School Class of 1987.
Forty years of memories, friendships, music, mistakes, accomplishments, and stories that probably shouldn’t be repeated in public.
I look forward to seeing everyone again in 2027.
And if anyone wants to sneak out for Burger King afterward, I’m in.
Just don’t expect me to run.
The Seventh Echo is available now from
Adverse City Publishing
© 2026 James Wood
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