CLASS OF 1998 | 2022 | SPRING ISSUE
Amy Davenport is still in Carrboro, North Carolina, where she lives with her spouse and their three children (6, 6, and 8). She’s entering her seventh year as a nurse-midwife at UNC Chapel Hill. She recently stepped down from her role as postpartum medical director, because, well, “pandemic and that whole work-life balance thing.” She plans to spend that extra time reading, knitting, baking, and riding her Peloton.
Kate Wetherhead still lives in New York, splitting her time between NYC and Putnam Valley with her husband Jeff Croiter (who, coincidentally, was the lighting designer of Broadway’s Freestyle Love Supreme, co-conceived by and starring Wes alum Anthony Veneziale!) This summer, Kate will be in Chicago, Illinois, premiering the Broadway-bound musical The Devil Wears Prada as part of the writing team, along with Sir Elton John and Shaina Taub. Directed by Anna D. Shapiro, Prada begins performances at the Nederlander Theater July 21, 2022. If you’re in Chicago this summer, come check it out!
Peter Isbister lives in Decatur, Georgia, with his wife Robyn Painter and their three kids, Mira (12), Eliot (8), and Ezra (8). He is an attorney at the Southern Poverty Law Center in the Southeast Immigrant Freedom Initiative, representing immigrants detained in the custody of Immigration and Customs Enforcement. He is still in touch with his good friend David Lubell, who now lives with his family in Berlin, Germany, after spending a few years also in Decatur, Georgia, and with Rachel Wellborn who has long lived in Atlanta.
Sara Brenneis and her family were in Madrid in the spring of 2020, just hitting their stride during a year-long sabbatical when . . . well, we all know how that worked out. After Spain’s strict six-week lockdown when their two young boys were not allowed outside, they were grateful to return to the wide-open expanses of Northampton, Massachusetts. Sara has her hands full as professor and chair of the Spanish Department at Amherst College and full-time childcare juggler. She caught up with a very bearded Nick Coleman on a recent trip to Wisconsin and has enjoyed some Zoom happy hours with Margaret (Solle) Salazar and Rebecca Alson-Milkman. Sara wants to know: Anyone else up for a swing through Middletown for our 25th?
Speaking of Margaret Salazar, she was just appointed to a post in the Biden Administration. She will be serving as HUD regional administrator, advancing the administration’s efforts in the Pacific Northwest (Washington, Oregon, Idaho, and Alaska), starting this past February.
Marianne Benet lives in Rye, New York, with her three sons. After her divorce, she started rowing crew again, and competed at the Head of the Charles last October, for glory and to raise money for the Angelman Syndrome Foundation, an organization that is close to her heart because her middle son was born with this rare genetic disorder. This May, she and Heather Marciniec celebrated their combined 90th birthday (45 + 45) in Key Biscayne, Florida, with Erin (Fieler) Collins, and Miki Kawashima, whose daughter, Elia Matrician (’26) will be attending Wes next fall! While there, they partied and reminisced with Ken Anderson, who lives in Key Biscayne and works in finance. Finally, she has a new love (and Wesleyan connection), Mario Manna ’00, also divorced, and a wonderful father to three extraordinary children. This year, they traveled with their six kiddos to Disney, Key Biscayne, and skiing in Vermont. Of note, she sent her notes in from Cartagena, Colombia, where she had just spent a day visiting the historic walled city with her dear friend, Isabel Vega, who is now living in Colombia and working on her independent film projects. Isabel is happy, healthy, and always involved in creative endeavors: She produced and directed a documentary called La Corona (The Crown) that was nominated for an Oscar and now, many years later, is at Sundance for the second time. The film is about a beauty pageant at a Colombian prison for women.
Abe Forman-Greenwald was nominated for a Primetime Emmy Award last year as a producer on the Netflix series Big Mouth and was looking forward to the debut of their spinoff series Human Resources, which came out on March 18 of this year. Also, now that live music is back, he’s been enjoying going to concerts with fellow ’98er Sascha Paladino here in Los Angeles.
John Speck is excited to be in the midst of his third year as a software engineer, and still finding time to make music with exceptional New Yorkers. He has two daughters, ages 3 and 7, who are thriving in the quality public schools of South Brooklyn. They explore nature as much as possible these days: Prospect Park, Jersey, and Miami(!). He had the good fortune of seeing Harrison Owen and his son, Russell, recently, and recommends Harrison’s book Niji Umi (“for children ages 0–100”). He also had a fun hiking adventure on the Appalachian Trail with Jason Gonzalez and Dave Montgomery ’97 last summer. Jason has recently completed an MBA and continues his impressive tenure as an attorney at the New York City Taxi and Limousine Commission, and has four adorable children with his lovely wife Ayisha.
In harder news, Cassie Colletti Mecsery shared that her husband Sean Mecsery has been fighting glioblastoma for the past two years while she manages their family and their family business in Cos Cob, Connecticut. Unfortunately, there are no approved treatments and she asked people to look for their GoFundMe to help as they work to pay for his experimental treatments and support their two children, ages six and two.
Finally, we sadly lost Angie (Montgomery) Arnold in December 2021. At Wes, she was a triple major in English, film study, and African American history, and afterward got an MFA at Columbia, and an MBA at MIT’s Sloan School of Management. She published her first book, Rivers Under Water, in 2018, a story of a woman who searches for love and spiritual liberation over the course of three generations in the Deep South; and she wrote and produced an off-Broadway play, The Standard Upgrade. She also won the Miss Black Connecticut Pageant. She leaves behind her beloved husband, Artis Arnold III, and many family and friends.
We also sadly lost Christopher Lawrence Rosaschi in February. He will be missed by his children, his family, and so many who knew him.