All have heard our pleas for missing email addresses so that this web site can reach more classmates. And we do want those addresses so keep ‘em coming. But what about the guys who are logged in but still don’t read www.Yale62.org ? Yes, they exist. I know that because good friends of mine have confessed to not having read it even though I told them they were featured! Thank goodness for the many satisfied readers, but it still gives pause. It makes me realize there are a lot of claims on our reading time, and attention spans are not what they once were either. So I write this column with due humility. I have to ask myself, even for those loyal website readers, how fascinating do I have to be to keep them scrolling on after they have worked their way through the AYA report, the Secretary’s bulletin, THIS JUST IN, the 50th Reunion update, our feature articles etc., etc. – maybe future technology will allow us to imbed a voice version of the whole site that you can download to an iPod and listen as you head off to sleep.
One area I am going to try to avoid hereafter is commentary on the heavy issues of the day. After all, who cares what I think about Afghanistan? Or health care? Etc., etc. I do know more about the US health care problem than the average person (and more than the average doctor, I might add), and I have strong views, but who has time to read me on this when there is so much else out there already, and from real experts? But can’t resist a couple of highlights for color: How about the enraged tea party lady who shouted “Keep Government out of my Medicare!” Or the cardiologist treating my mother-in-law who told her, fully seriously, that under Obama-care Medicare was going to drop cardiology services. Footnote: Florida attracts some of the nation’s worst and most unethical doctors.
I got to thinking on this topic when I got a Christmas letter from a (pre-Yale) friend that went on and on about his only son’s academic achievements, and then concluded with a lengthy discourse on current events (i.e., his take on state of the union). My friend is a bright Harvard grad but with no particular credentials to opine on these issues. So is it just me, or do we all have very limited appetite for amateur Limbaughs, Maddows and O’Reillys?
And yet, there have to be lots of people eager to hear ignorance and stupidity because what else is afternoon talk radio?
In sum, my plan is to stick to human interest in this column.
And let me start by reporting that my approaching 70th birthday has been thrust into the background by my oldest daughter’s decision to get married two days after that date. It should be a wonderful event, much grander than my birthday would have been. She has been busy planning for months now, a drama that is familiar to many of you, but new to me, late to marriage (38) and fatherhood (40). Fortunately or not, my input is not in great demand, so except for enjoying the festivities and refreshments. I hope to relax and enjoy it. And her fiance‚ is a great guy who went to Brown undergrad and Yale MBA, so the Harvard flavor in the family from my wife’s side (father, brother) is being watered down further.
Wife Nancy and I last summer journeyed even farther Downeast from our rental cottage near Bar Harbor to the home of Roger and Judy Clapp in Addison, Maine. I should say “estate” , not “home”, because we are talking here about a compound of three large and relatively new buildings, set on a bluff with spectacular views westward over salt water, and reached by a mile-long dirt driveway, all on his property that doesn’t even start until you are about 10 miles from US Route 1. And yes, Roger is the bearded lobsterman pictured in our last web posting (no one has guessed this). The Clapps treated us to wonderful hospitality, including a picnic on his lobster boat, and let me go off alone for a joyride in the little whaler outboard rig. Next day while Roger and I hauled lobster traps, Judy took Nancy shopping where she bought a 5-lb box of Maine blueberries that lasted us through about 4 pies back home in Newton.
At my urging Roger has sent in this New Year’s report and I am shamelessly bulking up my column by quoting it here, instead of in This Just In:
“Classmates have asked why we moved to the Downeast coast of Maine, 50 miles east of Ellsworth and 50 miles from Campobello, Canada. My answer is that we wanted a big, new adventure. We’d lived on a farm in northwest New Jersey for the previous 25 years and when I retired from practicing law, we chose to make our home on the rocky, ruggedly beautiful coast of Maine, in an area new to us where we hardly knew anyone, an area not frequented by tourists. I’m having fun hauling five lobster traps in the summer and giving back all year round in land trust, charitable and community activities (18, but who’s counting). We are enjoying the challenge of sinking our roots into a culture unlike any we’d ever lived in before.”
view of the Clapp estate from the water
Roger Clapp and Your CorSec, August '09
Roger went on to report that later in ‘09 he and Judy traveled down coast to Boston, where they met up with met up with Chris Cory and Helen Rattray, and all toured the Tom Luckey climbing structure at the Boston Childrens’ Museum. This was packed with happy kids, a nice postscript to the drama about constructing this contraption that many of you saw in the Sundance movie about Tom that aired in October.
And now to press, and to rest up for another edition.
Best to all,
Mike Kane
Hey, Mike — My wife’s name, for the record, is Helen Rattray.
Your comment was right on about how nice it was to see Tom Luckey’s dream fulfilled by kids crawling all over his “Climber” at the Boston Children’s museum. I recommend a visit to the museum for all classmates with grandchildren in tow — and for those who like sculpture. You don’t have to pay to see the sculpture, and the museum is right on the vastly-immproved Boston waterfront, about six blocks’ walk from the Institute of Contemporary Art’s smashing new building.
As for public issues among the alumni notes, I was pleased you strayed over your own line after drawing it and gave us a grassroots tidbit about the health care debate. I’d be for flexibility in classmates’ comments on public issues. I agree that random bloviations are not worth my time, but I think mini-essays are when they come from people with standing. When someone like Jonathan Ater, who is on a statewide health reform commission, can be tempted into writing his views, or a former state department person has thoughts on an area of the world where he knows a lot, or someone with a strong business backround is willing to write reasoned thoughts about a topic he’s up on, or the member of a nonprofit board has ideas on the realm of his activity, well, many times I’ll listen.
For instance, I happen to know you’re tapped in to a good deal of forward thinking on medical care through your association with one of the few Harvard professors who has joint appointments at the busines and medical schools, namely your good wife, so I might even be willing to sit still for what you distill from the circiles that puts you in.
Best,
Chris
PS: Is the terrific shot at the top of the column used for your movie auditions, or what?
Comment by Chris Cory — January 25, 2010 @ 7:58 pm
I second Chris’s comments. Qualified, experienced observations are of interest to me, and a welcome break from the blather that easily passes for news on most electronic media.
As for that picture, Chris, have you tinkered with Photoshop lately?
Comment by D. Floyd Russell — January 30, 2010 @ 2:57 am
Hey, what time zone is this website located in?
My comment above is time stamped as 2:57 am.
I am sitting at home in in Arizona and my computer is telling me it is 19:57.
The East Coast of the US, therefore, should be operating at 21:57, not some time tomorrow morning or almost yesterday?
Comment by D. Floyd Russell — January 30, 2010 @ 3:00 am
Mike,
A lot of us will be having 70th birthdays this year.
Mine was two weeks ago. I was feeling pretty cocky as the date approached–I’m pretty healthy, very active (two high altitude treks a year and lots of other travel), and I recently shed about 25 pounds–so I thought I was pretty cool. But, when the big 70 actually arrived, I was very subdued. Seventy is indisputably “old.” No way you can kid yourself that you are just “middle aged.” And that launched me onto thinking: What did I accomplish in my life, what can I (should I) still do with the time that remains. No easy answers.
So, Mike, I wonder if it would be helpful if our class members shared thoughts on reaching seventy. Maybe you could organize some kind of email or other forum on that subject. I am very interested in what other classmates think about all of this.
Steve Howard
Comment by steve howard — January 30, 2010 @ 7:37 am
I add a belated “great idea” to Steve Howard’s suggestion for some kind of email or other forum on reaching 70. I’ll hit 70 on May 6, and like Steve, I will no longer be able to say I’m not “old.” It also brings feelings of mortality, since my Dad, Trumbull ‘37, died when he was 70. It makes reunions a bit bittersweet, since his class and mine always share reunions, but we never did one.
On a brighter note, for a number of years now I’ve been “Grandpa” in Boys to Men, a program for teens where I have mentored many teens . This gives me great hope for the future, particularly helping troubled kids get to a better place. The kid I’ve been with longest, an African-American orphan from the worst part of the District, is now in his second year on full scholarship at a good college. For me this overcomes whatever fears that come up over decrepitude and mortality.
Should anyone want to look into mentoring, the national website for Boys to Men is http://www.boystomen.org and our local website is http://www.boystomengw.org. There is an excellent movie following two boys, “Journeyman” available on Netflix. Much of the movie involves teens in our Washington DC area program.
Comment by Steve Buck — February 28, 2010 @ 10:01 am