Hi everyone!

Sorry to be so late in replying to this!  My yahoo account has become a bit of a black hole full of spam and all manner of junk, so I go weeks without checking it.  We were also in Tucson for the Easter break visiting my mother (who now lives in Tucson), so that also contributed to my laziness!  Now we are back in Edinburgh and back to work and school and back to the usual Scottish weather--which is not very warm or springlike.  That said, it's at least very light out (still light now at almost 9pm), which is a really welcome change from the dark and damp winter.

I was completely planning to go this year, as my dad now lives about a 2 minute walk away from Shipley, so I wouldn't even have had to worry about driving!  But unfortunately, it conflicts with the Ullapool Book Festival, where I agreed to appear ages ago to give a reading from my novel, which was published in June, 2016 (title is UNDER THE HEARTLESS BLUE for any who might be interested in taking a peek or reading it.  Historical fiction, a feminist western plus a love story and other stuff).

So, as always seems to be the way, I do nothing EVER except go to work and then spend weekends shuttling children to swimming or hockey or whatever, than suddenly, I have 2 events scheduled for the same weekend!  So, this is a sad turn of events for me, as I was really keen to go this time.

As to my life… I'm still living in Edinburgh, still a full time academic teaching English Literature at the University of Edinburgh.  Tom, my husband, teaches down at the University of Nottingham, which is a 5 hours train ride away, so he spends Monday-Thursday down there during the term time, which makes things a bit challenging with work and kids, but it's better than being unemployed--a situation he battled through in 2009 (as did many others).  So, overall, it works.  Nicole is now 12 and she's an avid swimmer, competing all over Scotland and loving that. Callum is 10 and he's more chilled out.  He likes to read and play golf (and of course computer games!).

So, that's life over here in Edinburgh.  Please give my best to everyone this weekend.  I miss all of you and hope you are well.  Give a shout if you are ever over here in Scotland.

Xx Allyson

Thanks for reaching out, Allison and hello, fellow lifers! I really wish I could be there-- as it turns out, I have to be in Pennsylvania two weeks before, and it's just too tough to come back again two weeks later-- the price I pay for living on the west coast! I come back east with my family twice a year, but rarely make it to Bryn Mawr since we usually go to Maine in the summer to see my parents or Vermont to see my sister.  I moved to San Francisco in 1992 and have pretty much been in the Bay Area ever since, minus a two year stint of graduate school in Iowa. I've lived in Larkspur, just 20 minutes north of the city, with my husband and kids (12, 8, 6, girl, boy, boy) for 8 years and have mostly been mothering since my middle child was born, with some writing and teaching mixed in.  We are lucky to have great public schools here which my kids are in, so I don't have an apples to apples comparison to make with Shipley, but I do often think of have lucky I was to go there!

I hope you're all well,

Eliza

Hi Wendi, 

How are you? I hope all is well! I'm so sorry I can't come to the reunion, but it's so nice of you to do all this work for it.

As I mentioned to Erika, I always smile when I think of our class at Shipley. It was a unique and accepting group, and I will always be grateful for the friendships that were there for me during the wildest stretch of my life (so far!). I live outside of San Francisco with my husband, Dennis, my son Thomas (16) and my daughter Elizabeth (14). I have lived in South America, Europe, and Asia since Shipley, but I think we are pretty settled here, so please, anyone in the class, give me a call if you are in the area. I have so many good Shipley memories, it would be hard to pick a favorite, but just a few: French class shenanigans, cookie dough fights, laughing until I thought I'd throw up at Binney Nuissl's impressions of teachers, pranks with the much-loved always-remembered Kelly Wagner, patient but exasperated talking-tos from Mr Staples, lighting the table on fire in Physics class, napping in driver's ed, driving around with a group of girls with the windows down listening to Chaka Khan way too loud. Perhaps disappointingly, I am now a law-abiding, composting, trying to be present and thoughtful adult now, corralling my own teenagers into good behavior. Ay, karma!

Would love to hear how everyone is doing! Have fun!

All the best, Vandy