[fintstone]

Originally Posted by Scuba Steve

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3. Drugs can destroy people. It really hit hard when someone I considered a friend back then wound up an addict. He was voted most likely to succeed. A couple of years later on a visit back home I ran into the younger brother of a real snob trying to push his car into a parking space on the square. I helped him out and listened for a while to his story about how George Bush was personally out to get him and how he needed to move to Alaska to escape. No clue what he was on but that guy's mind was gone...

I found this interesting. I did not attend any reunions before my 30th. All the heavy drug users in high school (and there were a lot) were long dead (as were all those who seemed truly evil). So were the heavy drinkers. It could be a coincidence since many were not clearly related to their vice (car accident, cancer, etc.). Some were pretty bright and talented...yet all seemingly burned out early. Those who experimented a little seemed to move on and do well. I guess anything in extreme.

Also interesting was that some of the poorest (and some of the richest) seemed happiest. It seems that they had been long since resigned to their fate/position in life unlike many who were still fighting their relative measure of "success".