Sixty-eight-year-old Sandy Lafair is going back to West Philadelphia High School for the first time in 50 years. Lafair graduated in 1950, and this will be the first time she has ever attended a class reunion, not to mention the fact that this will be first time she has seen most of the people that she graduated with in half a century.
Lafair said she was an average teenager, who went to basketball games every Friday night, dated regularly and hung out with her best friend, Iris. Soon after high school, she and her then-husband moved to California.
Lafair will be attending the reunion with Iris, whom she hasn't seen in 17 years. They decide to meet up prior to the event outside an old favorite deli, where they have lunch and take a trip down memory lane through their old yearbook.
The pair also visit the apartment building in which they lived when they were neighbors as newlyweds. They said they are both shocked to see how tall the trees have grown around the apartments, and they have to remind themselves how long it has been since they have been there.
Lafair, Iris and Iris's husband meet at Lafair's hotel room and take pictures to commemorate the event. The three of them head for a restaurant, then step back into the past. The festive evening features a class photograph, special awards and speeches about the high-school days. Lafair is pleasantly surprised when she is awarded a prize for traveling the farthest to attend.
The following day, Lafair and Iris return to West Philadelphia High School to walk the halls again for the first time in 50 years. They stop in to see the school's auditorium, where their graduation ceremony took place so many years ago.
The flood of memories that came with the auditorium visit were the perfect way to end the homecoming trip.
