Near the end of the summer, I was tagged on Facebook by multiple people that had seen a post of a young woman that was looking for the owner of a Greene Central class ring from 1984. I was able to connect with her and get the story of how her grandmother had found it in a used car that was purchased many years ago. Her grandmother had always wanted to find the owner but had no idea where to begin. Armed with the resources of social media, Makayla Meeks set out to find the owner of the ring for her grandmother. Throughout the process of finding the owner, I got to meet Makayla, a former student of Coach Wooten at North Pitt. I also got to meet the ring's rightful owner, Cheryl Moye. Cheryl now lives in Connecticut, but still has many strong ties to Greene County. I also spoke with many other graduates from the mid-1980s that knew Cheryl or were helping to find the owner. This community of people was amazing in their stories and the things that they remembered about the school. I also went through the 1984 yearbook and found some familiar faces, including Coach Edwards and one of my cousins who worked at the school as an assistant principal that year.
The school hasn't really changed much since 1984, and the community hasn't either, and that's a good thing. You still find good people that value personal connections and the time and space that they spent together. I heard stories of people that had not spoken in almost 30 years and could still remember great things about one another. I hope that aspect of our community never changes.
This week, Greene Central welcomed in almost 200 freshmen and several new faculty members. Each of these people is a Ram now and are a part of this complex, interconnected web of people that make up our community. In the years to come, some of these people will remain in the area and some will move far and wide. But no matter where they go and what they do, once you are a Ram, you are always a Ram.
