The holidays are filled with a lot of emotions, mostly good and some maybe not so good. Things cross our mind—did I get the right gifts? Did my kids really need all that stuff? Can I get them to write thank-you notes? Are my parents still in good health? How far will the Detroit Lions advance in the playoffs? Critical stuff like that. It’s also a time when college acceptances start arriving and parents of seniors devise creative ways to read their kids mail and e-mail without the kids knowing. Your kid gets into the school of his/her first choice and you feel like you’re a great parent. If not, you wonder when exactly your spouse screwed things up without your knowledge. Whatever your situation, remember there are other options and things will work out for the best for your kid—easy to say, tough to make a 17-year-old understand.


Speaking of college acceptances, I can only surmise that Dartmouth is not conducting background checks on the parents of applicants, as I have learned that Jeffrey Bass, son of Barry and Pam (Lower) Bass was accepted early decision into the class of 2016. Join me in congratulating Pam, Barry and Jeffrey and hoping that various establishments around campus do not hold Jeffrey accountable for his father’s behavior a generation ago. Actually, I am writing that in the hopes that my kids’ colleges are as forgiving.


Since most of the recent news I have received has come in pictorial form via holiday cards containing minimal actual news, I can only infer what is happening in many of our classmates’ lives, though you can learn something from these cards. Generally speaking, I learned many of our kids have really blond hair and are taller than we are. I learned that Becky Osborne and her kids Casey and Matthew have moved south to Newburyport, Massachusetts, and at this rate of southerly migration, we should be neighbors by 2050. I learned that many parents put their kids’ ages on the card but seem to forget to do the same for themselves—such as Mike and Cheryle Young, who joined kids Robert (18) and Lauren (9) on their card. Come to think of it, I don’t need a card that says Mike (49). I learned that Bill and Beth (Gilman) Hobbs will have major tuitions bills around 2019 for their kids Billy, Elizabeth, Hunt and Sam. I learned that Piper and Leila Newman are certainly more photogenic than their father, Jim Newman (their camera-friendly look comes from mom Annie). I learned that Steve and Marie Moss must have a dog named Harriet unless, of course, they decided to feature only daughter Maisy on their card. I learned Amy (Durno) and Peter Harned, along with kids Clarke, Ellie and Will, have been to a lot of cool places this past year, such as Tuscany and the Masai Mara. I learned also that we must have fallen off the distribution list for about 15 families and remained off the send list for about another 974 classmates, but hey, who’s counting?


Finally, I learned that Sue Finegan was appointed chair of the standing committee on pro bono legal services by the Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court. Her Mintz Levin colleague Jack Sylvia is more pro-Cher (than Sonny), but that’s a different topic.


As a final thought, remember our Dartmouth application and the question about choosing a mentor? Would you choose the same person today? Maybe I’ll give Ted Turner a call.


—John MacManus, 118 Ringwood Road, Rosemont, PA 19010; slampong@aol.com; Leslie A. Davis Dahl, 83 Pecksland Road, Greenwich, CT 06831; (203) 552-0070; dahlleslie@yahoo.com