A tumultuous spring of transitions for this class secretary: final, full retirement at end of June on one day and on the very next day, sale of our large family home and downsizing to smaller, two-bedroom condo. Downsizing and moving is an exhausting process, physically and emotionally; every saved book and record (yes, record!) and piece of furniture is saturated with fond memory, but hard to keep in much smaller quarters. And I don’t even have a record player anymore! Extensive donations to charity, yard sales and trips to the dump reduced the volume, but it still was hard to part with a lifetime of collected items and just as hard to move (and unpack!) the things we kept. And at the same time a liberating experience; we have lightened our load. One chapter closing, another starting. The same for many of our classmates: John Peirce recently sold Gedco, the geophysical software company he co-founded in 1991. John and Nancy live on Gaboriola Island, a community of 4,000 that is a 20-minute ferry ride from Nanaimo on Vancouver Island. They are involved in community affairs and grow most of their own fruits and vegetables. Guest and visitors to the Vancouver area are always welcome. Another Canadian, writing from Montreal, David Williams, like many of us, recently had his prostate out. “Caught early and should be fine, but a reminder to live every minute.” Gary Bayrd recently joined the growing class Social Security and Medicare crowd, yet has no plans to retire. Gary recalled a colleague noting to him that “dermatologists never retire, they are just found dead at their desks someday (a day I am planning to be well in the future).” Wife Polly is now self-employed in child and adolescent psychology with no thoughts of retirement, especially now that she has the perfect boss. They are traveling more, most recently to Patagonia with stops at Cape Horn and Torres del Paine national park. Joe Parrillo,M.D., recently received the Lifetime Achievement Award from the Society of Critical Care Medicine. Joe is currently chair of medicine at Cooper University Hospital in Camden, New Jersey, and has previously led programs at the National Institutes of Health and Rush Presbyterian Hospital in Chicago. He also serves as editor of the journal Critical Care Medicine. And an opening chapter for Kai Tamura Stritter, daughter of Leilani and Skip Stritter, accepted into the class of 2016. And another future look: less than one year away and counting—our 45th reunion will be June 13 to 16, 2013, in Hanover. Save the date! And less than two months away is our fall mini-reunion in Hanover, during Columbus Day weekend (October 13-14). It is the Sacred Heart football weekend and would of course include tailgating at Alpha Delta prior to the game and a planned Saturday evening dinner. Executive committee would meet that Saturday morning. Come one, come all. Keep the news coming.


—David Peck, 157 Sandwich Road, Plymouth, MA 02360-2503; (508) 746-5894; david.peck@ childrens.harvard.edu