Reunion Weekend

Back in 1997, I went to Taft College and attended the Transition to Independent Living program. It is a program that teaches people with disabilities how to live on our own. Every five years, they put together a reunion for all of the alumni who attended in the past. This past weekend, I went to my third reunion. They had it at the Marriot hotel in downtown Bakersfield.  Everyone met up around five on Saturday evening in the front lobby for social hour. There were a lot of people, most I knew and others from graduated classes after me. Around six, we gathered in the banquet room where we were served dinner. During dinner, Sandy, who is the program director, stood up and spoke about TIL, how she was happy to see all of us and how much we have grown in the past years. Jeff, Director of Student Support Services at Taft College, was not able to make the reunion.  He made a video of himself which we saw on screen at the reunion.  He was in the middle of construction of the newTIL building.  He explained to us where the new dorms were going to be and the classes, and then he wished us all well. After dinner, we had our dance and basically everyone danced, mingled with friends, so on and so forth. The dance ended around 11:30, when we all went back to our hotel rooms. The Marriot was booked for the weekend, so I stayed at the Hill House across the street, along with a few others who booked their own rooms.