CLASS OF 1983 | 2023 | FALL ISSUE
Greetings everyone,
Wow, is it me or is time whizzing by? Summer began and now it’s over. We just had our 40th Reunion and that is surely a milestone. I didn’t make it back to Wes but I heard it was great. If you have any pics, please send them for the next issue.
In response to the question, “If you had one wish, what would it be?”
If I only had one wish
Turn back the hands of time
No regrets as I veer from destiny
Ride without reason or rhyme
If I only had one wish
Change that which will be
I wouldn’t have to search
For what I now can’t see
But since I’ve only one wish
It’s simple and true
I’ll live it right now
and spend it with you
—Steve Avezzano
“I wish that we would all care about each other enough to actually help each other—especially the poor, hungry, and marginalized.”—Kenneth Schneyer
“My one wish is to move to Boston . . . oh wait, I just did that on August 1. Watch out Hub-based Wes people!”—Ben Binswanger
“Perfect tempos every time.”—George Balanchine courtesy of Jan Elliott
And now the news . . .
Bob Gordon road-tripped to the reunion with Ellen Zucker from Boston and had lots of time “to marinate in the memories.” Ellen is a highly acclaimed civil rights lawyer, representing plaintiffs in employment discrimination and whistleblower litigation. At the reunion Bob reconnected with three of his Wasteland hallmates—Brad Galer, Willie Alago, and Dave Ackman ’84. All three are accomplished physicians. Brad (still married to his frosh-year love, Lele) is chief medical officer at a Boston-based pharma company developing pain medicine; they own and operate an award-winning winery in Pennsylvania. Dave advises a large insurance company on medical coverage policy matters; and Willie is a radiologist at Memorial Sloan Kettering in New York. Bob also caught up with Amy Appleton, Kivi Goldsman, and Ben Binswanger and is in close touch with Bruce Glassman and Tracy Hughes ’84 who are still in San Diego. Tracy has a clinical psychology practice, and Bruce and Matt Arkin ’82 co-founded a business manufacturing and distributing an alcoholic spirit called Batch 22, an American Aquavit, that makes an awesome cocktail. Bob recently visited Chuck Schneider ’84, an oncologist at the Hospital of U. Pennsylvania. Chuck lives just outside Philadelphia with his wife, Dessi. In the fall Bob is getting married and “couldn’t be more excited.”
Jean Weille lives in NYC with her husband, Bob, and cat, Boris. She is a licensed clinical social worker with a private psychotherapy practice. She works part time at Weill Cornell’s Geriatric Psychiatry Department in an innovative research program investigating psychotherapy modalities for older adults who are victims of crime and elder abuse. Her son just married his high school sweetheart, and her daughter lives in Brooklyn.
This fall Steve Avezzano will be returning to WESU to accompany his son, Picasso, who is a member of the class of ’27. “It took me over 40 years to get there, but despite what Thomas Wolfe once wrote, apparently you can go home again.”
Alice Jankell’s new play, The Sweet Spot, will premier off Broadway this winter. Alice just had a raucous dinner with Eileen Kelly-Aguirre and Bennet Heart.
Kenneth Schneyer sold his story called Winding Sheets to Lightspeed Magazine and it will be published in 2024. This is his third sale to Lightspeed (several more stories are currently under submission to various magazines, and several others are in various stages of drafting and revising). This fall he is teaching both the American Constitutional Law seminar and the advanced Shakespeare seminar at the same time. “Con Law is going to take quite a bit of revising, since the last time I taught it was before the bombshell Supreme Court decisions of 2022 and 2023.” His spouse, Janice Okoomian, teaches English and gender and women’s studies at Rhode Island College, and has several research and writing projects in the works. Their eldest, Phoebe, recently played Feste in a production of Twelfth Night in Brattleboro and their youngest, Arek, is finishing his Sarah Lawrence College degree.
Eric Heinz ’86 attended Wes for two and a half years in the class of 1983, then studied abroad, and graduated in 1986. He is a professor of law and humanities at the School of Law, Queen Mary, University of London, and executive director of (CLDS) Centre for Law, Democracy, and Society. He has authored several books including: The Most Human Right: Why Free Speech is Everything, Hate Speech and Democratic Citizenship, and The Concept of Injustice.
And a few photos:
Stay well, be happy, and do good!