stay connected... But the baby train doesn’t stop there! Expectant father Bill McGonigle wrote in, saying, “I had the opportunity to meet up with Barrett Hamilton the day after Thanksgiving. We both brought our wives to one of our old high school hangouts: Richardson’s Ice Cream over in Middleton, Mass. While it was great to see Barrett again (I hadn’t seen him since my wedding), I was looking forward to springing some other news on the old dormmate. Funny thing is, he was looking forward to springing some news on me, too. Long story short: We’re both expecting our first kids in June, with due dates about a week apart. In other fun news, Lindsay Hoopes moved in down the street from me here in DC. We ran into each other at the local cheese shop but sadly haven’t had a chance to catch up more.” Barrett is living in Wyndham, N.H. He spent New Year’s Eve with Kris Hedges and Kris’s wife, Caroline, in New Hampshire, and also had the opportunity to catch up with J.P. Chisholm a few days before Christmas in NYC. Barrett also recently saw Lindsay Hoopes (who is quite the globe-trotter) at a trade show for his company’s distributor in Boston. Both Hoopes Vineyards and Barrett’s company’s portfolio are represented by Horizon Beverage in Massachusetts. Kristin Cook works for Horizon Beverage, and the trio were able to catch up at the show in the ballroom of the Seaport Hotel, the room where we started our senior prom. Also in Boston I had the pleasure of attending Nathaniel Fowler’s beautiful wedding last fall at the Boston Public Library. The Class of ’99 was well represented. All the way from South Korea, Eugene Cho taunted wedding guests with the possibility of a reenactment of Psy’s “Gangnam Style.” Also in attendance were Colin Dinneen, Fletcher Boyle, Teddy Dunn, Matt Kalin, T.J. Durkin, Jim Ellis, Alex Mantel, and Lindsay Hoopes. On the professional side of things, Rob Crawford wrote in to say, “A college friend and I started publishing a poetry journal called Prelude (preludemag.com), which has won a Pushcart Prize. The second issue is now available at Barnes & Noble. Other than that, I’m still working as an editor and book researcher in New York City, and I actually did some research work on Jon Meacham’s recent biography of George H.W. Bush ’42.” I also heard from Kam Lasater, who reports, “I have ‘retired’ from the software company I founded, SeeClickFix. Instead of working full time, I’m now only on the board and live full time in Philadelphia. The plan is to take 2016 as a sabbatical year and recharge for the next venture.” Finally, Bill Lincoln and Piercarlo Valdesolo are both members of the faculty at Claremont McKenna College. Bill is an assistant professor of economics and Piercarlo is an assistant professor of psychology and the director of the college’s Moral Emotions and Trust Lab. The two see each other from time to time at faculty meetings. That’s it for this go-round. Please keep the news coming! Have a great summer, and I look forward to hearing from all of you in the fall.
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Andover | Summer 2016
2000 Jia H. Jung 550 11th St., No. 4R Brooklyn NY 11215 917-589-5423 (cell) jiajung@alum.berkeley.edu
Last November, Dan Ankeles, John Michael DiResta, and Barbara Rotundo converged on campus as Barbara’s parents, Kathleen Dalton and Tony Rotundo, received the 2015 McKeen Award, the Brace Center’s highest honors for work in gender issues (see photo, page 86). Dan said, “We had a great time and learned some crazy things about how campus used to be, which the powers that be might not let you publish. I’m only half joking.” He also tipped us off that John is getting married this summer. (At the time of writing, this had been neither confirmed nor denied by the alleged groom-to-be, so stay tuned.) Over the holidays, I swung by the Park Street Pub in Andover to reunite with Jessie Smith (still living it up in Tampa, Fla.), Adam Schoene (on the verge of receiving a PhD degree from Cornell), and Aaron Litvin. We talked long and deep enough that I lost my voice. We also cackled, recalling the greatest (and only) campus voice-mail shenanigan ever (who remembers?). Hungry for conversation even after the local haunt had closed for the night, we proceeded to Aaron’s pad, where he cracked open a bottle of whiskey from his recent trip to Tokyo and gave us an exclusive preview of his documentary on Brazilian migrants living in Japan. The topic of his undergraduate and graduate theses, the film was painstakingly constructed during a decade of working and living in Brazil and Japan. Wouldn’t be surprised to see this up on the big screen soon. Also over the holiday season, Mabel Ning Bernstein’s baby boy, Gen, turned 1! The Bernsteins moved to Jersey City, N.J., over the summer and continue to love living there. Tristan Perich had a baby girl named Bronwyn (now 2 years old!) with wife Lesley Flanigan. Tristan’s other shining moments have included composing a triple string quartet commissioned by the LA Philharmonic and releasing Parallels, recognized as one of Rolling Stone’s “20 Best Avant Albums of 2015.” Of course, Tristan didn’t tell me this himself—it’s public information for any art or music appreciator to find, so forgive me for doing some bragging for you, Tristan! J.M. Imbrescia and his wife welcomed their baby boy, Massimo, last March, then—after 11 years of residence and eight years of marriage in Brooklyn—escaped from New York to Somerville, Mass., at the start of this year. Congratulations on all counts, J.M. The grand finale of these notes has been made possible by Sterlind S. Burke Jr., whose gracious consent to share his contribution verbatim makes a proper close to this edition. Till next time, my friends.
Sterlind’s story: “On June 11, 2014, I met someone who would have more of an impact on my life than I ever thought possible. She opened my eyes and made me realize how bad my health had gotten. I started to turn my life around at that point and began the process of looking for somewhere to have bariatric (weight loss) surgery. As I was going through the required doctor’s appointments, I was discovering that my health was even worse than I knew. I needed to start making changes right away; I couldn’t wait for surgery. Between late June 2014 and Aug. 5, 2015, which was the day of my surgery, I lost 117 pounds. I felt better than I had for at least five or six years. “The gastric sleeve surgery went well. I did my three days in the hospital, and then I was gone. I didn’t even need to take the pain medication that was provided for me. I went to my follow-up appointments later that week, and I was cleared to resume doing what I love, coaching football. The first day of practice was on Aug. 12, and I was really excited for it. I went to practice and made sure I followed the doctor’s orders. I was just happy to be interacting with the kids. That night, as I was getting out of bed, I felt a pop on the right side of my abdomen. I instantly felt intense pain, my body felt heavy, and I had trouble breathing. I walked down to my kitchen to take some pain medication, thinking that was what I needed. It took me five minutes to walk downstairs to the kitchen and 10 minutes for me to get back upstairs. I knew something was wrong, but I sat on my bed and contemplated just sleeping it off. The pain very quickly became too much to bear, and I called 911. “Eventually, the doctors were able to figure out that a blood vessel near my colon had burst and I had massive internal bleeding. When I first reached the hospital, my blood pressure was 45 over 25. The doctor performed emergency surgery; he later told my parents he removed a basketball-sized amount of blood from my abdomen. He also said that had I not called 911 when I did, I would have bled to death in two or three hours. I woke up in bed with a breathing tube down my throat. I spent a week in the hospital and was out of work for another three weeks. “Knowing how close I was to death was the scariest experience of my life. I was so glad that I had already taken steps to change my life, since it is likely I would not have survived the emergency operation if I had not lost the initial weight. The time in the hospital was a time that I did a lot of thinking and praying. It was a life-changing event, to say the least. I am happy to say that I have lost 212 pounds since June 2014. I am now the lightest I have been since my junior year of college. I am looking forward to continuing my healthy journey and continuing to increase my workout intensity. I thank God every single day that He decided that I was not done on this earth. I am living every day to the fullest, and I will not waste this second chance that I have been given.”