Aspen : 1984 Reunion crashers

Written by Andy Collen

A few members of our class of 85 crashed the class of 84’s reunion this year. It was fun to see Ed Dent, Adam Ziets, Kate Denton, Missy Brinkman, and Jenifer Secrist, and were the Class of ‘85 Crashers. Opening night was at the Limelight Bar, which has become opening night for all our reunions, the 10^th, 20^th, 30^th and most likely our 40^th next year as well.

Reunions are there to remind us about our journeys; for some of us it goes back to grade school. I came to Aspen in 1977 and met most of these kids playing baseball in little league. Eric Klandrude who graduated in 84 was my freshmen year bodyguard. It felt like the classes of 84, 85, 86, and 87 were all pretty close so it was cool that we all crashed this year’s reunion. I think the kids of 86 were Mark DeCarlo, Lo Semple, Sheridan Smith (Semple), Megan Kashinski.

This reunion seemed like more conversations about aging parents and in reality, we are following them. As I looked around, I remembered parts of my life and each one of these kids were part of something… so, we are all in this growing old thing together.

I recently wrote a book about growing up in Aspen during the 70’s and 80’s. Most folks asked about my book but at this reunion I realized that a lot of them are in the pages of my book. It made me think… Wait! It is our book not mine. While we all gathered and shared old stories of times gone by, I began to see that these were the stories that Chris, Dean, Lo and I tried to capture in Growing Up Aspen – Adventures of the Unsupervised.

I do have to say, folks were looking pretty great at this 40^th hope that it’s the same for my class next year. They had a hike scheduled but since I came with David Burson and his wife Nazan (and David has a lung problem), we traded in the hike for an e-bike experience up Maroon Bells. I used to live up Maroon Creek Road so we stopped by my old place and found a new house there. One much larger but in a town now filled with Gucci and Prada. It was rather tastefully done.

As I walked the streets late at night, I noticed many more galleries than when I lived there. The town back then was a community all the stores, hotels, restaurants were owned by our school mates’ parents and some still are, like Barclay Dodge’s restaurant Bosq. It used to be The Pinball Palace and before that The Village Pantry. At the event I began to realize that everything changes but seeing all these folks just brought me back to women’s softball at Wagner Park and pizza at RP’s.

One night we asked a waiter at the French Alpine Bistro where to get something to eat this late at night? Back in the day it would be something like The Cooper St. Pier. The guy had no idea. It seems almost everyone lives down valley and spends most of their time away from Aspen. Sure feels like a much different community. We stumbled into what the new Aspen created for the locals under the old Cooper Street Pier something called Buck. One of the more reasonably priced late night eateries. Both the food and drinks were great and it was lined with pre parabolic skis of which I still have an old pair of Elan’s in my garage right now. They are now collector items.

One person that I was glad to meet was Andy Godfrey. My father had this idea that getting into Aspen early so my brother and I could meet the local kids on the field and earn our local respect before school through Little League. Andy was one of those kids. What surprised me about Andy was after all that he and his brother went through in their lives... he was just another cool kid on the bench. Later Andy made a documentary of their story called “3 Days 2 nights” on Amazon. One thing I noticed Andy has a brother Mark and so do I. I feel so lucky that we grew up under the stars with John Denver and Tom Crum.

Before the reunion the Aspen Historical Society had a book signing of world renowned Aspen alpine climbers and skiers. Names like Luis Dawson (Avalanche Dreams), Jay Cowan (Going Downhill Fast), and Mike Marolt (Shishapangma, Skiing the Highline). In my day it was names like Spencer Videl or Pierre Willie. Pierre’s big brother Raoul was one of this group of older masters. I learned a lot at this book signing from these old Aspen locals that were always living on the edge. There is always another challenge out there. Take it one step at a time!

This reunion brought me back to my childhood but also gave me a glimpse into the present and possibly the future. I feel so lucky that my reunion will always be held in the old mining and now ski town of Aspen Colorado

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