Update 8-21-07

Hi,

Late August, and everyone's gone to the beach.  Which is how it should be.  But a few notes and some filler.
   
    From Marc Jonas:  Sounds like Ira Mitzner is the Class of '65's answer to George Foreman.  Can't wait for the small appliance.
   
    From Linda Cohen Greenseid:  I've been reading the weekly newsletter and noticing what a tight-knit, spirited group the Brooklyn Avenue kids are, with such good memories.  Where are the Buck kids?
    Denise Frango, Jay Kinder, Ira Levy, etc.  Robin Feit, Ellen Epstein, and Zelda White write in regularly, but where is the rest of my class, and the other two classes as well?  We were three classes, if I recall correctly.  Or perhaps not -- my memory sure ain't what it used to be.  Let's see some William L. Buck spirit!
        P.S.  I know we are not kids anymore.  Take no offense.
   
    From Jerry Bittman:  This event occurred just a couple of days ago here in Kearney.  Please forward this to your friends to show support for our brave, loyal troops who are protecting our great country.  Sad to say, however, that some of our soldiers have to come back home in pine boxes.  http://www.imagefactoryphotography.com/slideshows/Heros/
   
    From Barbara Blitfield Pech:  I haven't seen anything from Grace (Dibble) or Larry Kincade in my inbox over the past few days, so I made a quick call to California and was referred to a new phone number with a Texas area code.  I called and spoke with Grace's son.  Larry and Grace are in Texas, where she has been in the hospital for a few weeks.  Apparently, there was a miscommunication on my part when Larry advised me that Grace was in the Intensive Care Unit. I assumed he meant that she was in a local California hospital, as he didn't mention that they had moved.  I do not have details or other information.  I spoke only very briefly and sent all of our best wishes...
        On a much happier note -- and I have not been advised or suggested that it is for publication -- but in an exchanged note I have received nice news that Barbara Endy has married her longtime fellow on July 25th.  Third time's the charm!  You go girl.
   
    [Rich -- Yes, our best to Grace and to Barbara, in different ways.]
   
    Finally, notes from some friends in and from Minneapolis:
   
    Friend 1, Sheree:  I had to e-mail one of my fellow grads.  She's fine though the bus she commutes to work on crossed over that bridge everyday.  This week, however, she's home grieving the death of her oldest brother.  So no commute.  But here's what she had to say about the bridge:
        "My bus uses, or rather, used, it every day. They had been replacing some of the concrete in the deck which gave me the willies.  In some places they had cut holes all the way through that were about five feet square.  I would sit on the double bus looking down at the holes wondering if it were really safe to be on that bridge. Clearly the answer was no. Brrr."
        Also, my sister-in-law commutes into Minneapolis, but since she heads south to go home, it would be unlikely for her to be on that bridge (no matter what my mother thinks!).  So, family is fine ... all as far as we know.
        Minnesotans know their state as the land of four seasons:  winter, winter, winter, and road-repair.  If this last isn't what caused the collapse, then at least it cut the number of cars using the bridge by about half what it could have been.  Any other time of year and the bridge would have been packed with University of Minnesota students heading home.  I rarely crossed it because the theater department was on the west bank of campus, the same side of the river as you see the Metrodome and about as far from the bridge, maybe a little closer.  The east bank is where the bulk of the campus is.  On the other hand, we're flying back there in about two weeks, and we'll have to make our way over plenty of bridges just to get around.  Yikes!
   
    Friend 2, Robin:  Fortunately, now that we live west of the city, we're rarely in that area.  We used to drive it all the time when we lived in Roseville.  It's really tragic.  We have a governor who prides himself on "no new taxes" and who recently vetoed a 5 cent/galleon tax increase that would have helped with road and bridge repairs.  Well, "no new taxes" means "no new bridges," and now many families are paying the price.
   
    Friend 3, Bob:  I've traveled over that bridge countless times, the last time just about a month ago.  No one I know of my Minnesota family and friends was on it.  Heck, you lived through the Northridge quake -- that's as close to a disaster as I've been.  Didn't Thornton Wilder write a novel about a bridge collapse -- The Bridge of San Luis Rey?
   
    Friend 4, Guy:  Haven't heard of anyone at this point.  My brother is still there, and he still has one friend unaccounted for, but then he might have been traveling.
   
    Friend 5, Nedra:  Didn't know anyone on the Minneapolis bridge, but we had been over it two times on Tuesday.  And the new Charleston bridge, which is very nice, replaced a 1934 bridge that we heard rated a 4/100 and was made from recycled Model A's.

    Friend 6, Mary:  I arrived in St. Paul for a visit on the day of the collapse.  If you live on the St. Paul side of the Twin Cities, there's little reason to take that bridge.  Several friends and I have commented on how infrequently we have taken it.  However, I was worried about one friend who is a Twins fan and lives in a southern suburb.  35W would be a route to the stadium for her.  She called yesterday to say they weren't there.  So, everyone I know is safe.
        I was impressed, particularly after once enduring heated criticism of Minnesota as too homogeneous from a colleague -- a Jewish native of New Jersey married to an Indian -- that the victims and the heroes were Hispanic, African, and Scandinavian-American, among others.  The blonde female firefighter who dove repeatedly for survivors, who was so beautiful, articulate, and strong, yet humble and eager to share credit with her Hispanic colleague who didn't happen to appear on camera as he dove elsewhere, is now my goddess.  Proud to be Minnesotan.