Class Note 1997
Although Covid-19 prevented our planned mini-reunions celebrating the 97th day of the year, our class still made it happen online. Forty-five ’97s joined a Zoom call on April 6 to chat, exchange quarantine stories, answer online polls, and find comfort in a scary and uncertain time. Thanks to Jenn Tudder Walus for organizing and for treating us to two spirited renditions of the “Salty Dog Rag.” Our mini was even international, with Sarah Grow in London, Tony Field in Canada, and Dickon Verey in Vietnam. Other ’97s participating included Trish Bailey, David Belden, David Bruder, Xantha Bruso, Mark Davidson, Marty Dengler, Traci Entel, Jodi (Priselac) de Riszner, Aurora (Leute) Drew, Jennifer (Pollina) Echlov, Russell Echlov, Kristin (Brenneman) Eno, Julie (Gottlieb) Fisher, Anthony Foglia, Meredith (Epstein) Goodman, Amy Henry, Kris Jadd, Miranda Johnson, Emily (Orzel) Jordan, Lea Kelley, Abby Klingbeil, Cabell King, Michelle Lewis, Daphne (Chen) Matthews, Jill McCammon, Lynne (Ricketts) McClory, Taidigh McClory, Megan (Barry) McGuire, Michael New, Lindsey Noecker, Natasha (Lam) O’Rourke, Boris Rose, Amanda (de la Rosa) Sherlock, Phaedon Sinis, Pete Sisitsky, Ananth Srikrishnan, Danielle (Benware) Thompson, Matt Walus, Chris Whalen, and David Zipkin.
From online polls, we learned our favorite weekends were Homecoming and Tubestock. For those counting, July marks the 25th anniversary of our class’s Tubestock, which ended in 2005.
Patrick Hansen and his family were in the Czech Republic when Covid-19 hit there. He and wife Cynthia Hansen ’99, a professor at Grinnell College, had planned a family sabbatical for several years. Since Cynthia earned tenure last year she could take a full year to travel, research, and develop courses. Patrick left his gig as VP of customer success at TrustRadius last fall to also take sabbatical.
Patrick wrote: “Our plan was to travel as a family for all of 2020. The Czech Republic, and Prague specifically, is one of our favorite places in the world and was first on our list. Cynthia was developing a class with course-embedded travel, so she was supposed to take students to Prague next spring.”
They arrived in Prague on February 18, intending to stay three months. The coronavirus hit Italy soon after. By mid-March, the Czech Republic declared a national state of emergency. “The country had fewer than 100 cases, just one patient in the ICU at that point and no deaths. Shortly after, the whole country went into lockdown. We left after about five weeks (including about 10 days of lockdown). Had we stayed longer, it would have been extraordinarily hard to get home, especially with small children (8-year-old Elisa and 2-year-old Annika).
“By comparison, the United States had more than 2,000 cases when we declared a national emergency on March 3. The Czech Republic has handled the pandemic so differently from the United States. As in the United States, the Czech people are divided in opinions on their elected leaders, but it’s amazing how just the basics of competence, compassion, and political courage can overcome ideological differences. Czechs are united in defeating the virus in a way that will allow them to bounce back much more quickly. Sadly, this is not the situation we now face in the United States. I saw firsthand in the Czech Republic how locking down immediately while quickly scaling up testing for Covid-19 actually reduces the hardships people face.”
Jenn started a #9D7thankyou hashtag to thank our classmates on the pandemic’s frontlines. Much gratitude and appreciation to Drs. Nina Dutta, Courtenay (Barlow) Peterson, Carla (Sioux) Rogers, and Karin (Kelley) Sloan for your dedication and sacrifice. I know there are others and we thank you as well.
Stay safe and healthy, everyone.
—Jason Casell, 10106 Balmforth Lane, Houston, TX 77096; jhcasell@gmail.com
