by Yvonne Y. Yang
Have you visited the web site lately? We've recently updated the web site with many new and corrected e-mail addresses! We're happy to report that several of our fellow alumni have found us through our web site, and we are hoping for more. Check back from time to time and see whose addresses have been added. You can also help us out by making sure that your e-mail address is correct.
This web site is for you! What else would you like to see included? We have some ideas, but we need your help! We'd like to be able to link to some more Pine Ridge alumni. We have a few personal home pages, but we bet that more of you out there are also on the web. Please send us links for your personal pages, professional pages, hobby pages, anything that tells us something about you!
Here are some ideas to get you started. Does your personal page feature photos of your family and friends? Do you maintain a fan site devoted to your favorite TV show? Are you in a band with a web site that offers sound clips? Do you have a class syllabus or resume on-line? Do you have a web showcase for your extensive Rubik's cube collection? Are you profiled on your company's web site? Whatever you have, please share it with the rest of us. Don't have your own web site, but have some photos or news that you'd like to share? We can add your pictures or information to our site. Don't be shy! If you have any input for the web site, please write to [email protected]
Visit the web site today at http://members.fortunecity.com/pineridgeweb/ -- and please be sure to sign our guest book! Thanks!
It's time to start the wheels in motion for our 2002 reunion. We have a large and talented group, so it should be a breeze. First priority is getting a volunteer to run the committee--newsletter staff can assist you in getting contact information for everyone. Step up to the plate and reply to this address! Event-planning experience looks good on the resume, and it's hard to imagine a more delightful project.
Keep your eyes peeled when you hit the fairgrounds this spring. If it's renaissance time, you may just catch a glimpse of Winona Wilson hawking natural broil Amish goat. Be sure to pick up a quart of roasted buffalo marrow for the road. You'll hate yourself for it if you don't.
Well maybe not this spring, but plans are in the works.
Currently the Research Representative at Denver-based Janus Funds, Wilson is laying the groundwork for a jump from the crowded city to a fairground near you.
"I've always wanted to open up a General Store in a small town here in Colorado... far from the maddening crowd," she explains. "While Denver is smaller than D.C., it's still too big for my tastes. This would be nice because I could balance the obligations of work and family - when I have one."
The other option is that of both owning the shop and working the renaissance fairs.
"This way I could winter in the small town and hit the circuit again come spring. The only issue is that gas prices are up and it may not be cost effective in a recession," Wilson muses. " A small store selling essentials in a postage stamp sized town can keep afloat even in trying times."
It looks like the Janus financial experience paid off.
Time will tell if Winona's culinary escapades into "whole animal" cookery and buffalo heart and tongue delicacies become dining essentials in the Colorado back country. We're betting they do.
How does one just swap financial analysis to taking her turn as a medieval line cook?
Better yet... how does a history major find her way back into the game?
After a brief stint in the Old Dominion, the Wilson family packed their bags and headed back west to New Mexico.
As Winona tells it, their days in Virginia were numbered from the get go.
"Dad was trying to get us back home to New Mexico almost as soon as we got to Virginia," she reminisces. "For a child raised in a fairly traditional, extended Native American family, becoming a nuclear family in Virginia hit me like a bomb. This is one of the reasons I was so skittish in the fifth grade."
"While we loved Virginia, it just wasn't Home. So in the summer of 1983, Dad got a job with BLM and we moved on back to New Mexico."
The move would take the Wilsons to Santa Fe, 60 miles north of Winona's hometown of Albuquerque. She went on to attend Santa Fe High and later graduate from Metropolitan State College as a history major taking a special interest in the Colonial era.
"I guess you can take the girl out of Virginia, but not Virginia out of the girl," she quips.
Ill at ease to explain it even to herself, Winona offers no explanations for how she got into projecting fiscal futures.
"Don't ask me how I got into Financials... as soon as I figure it out myself, I'll let people know."
Her history background has even given way to researching the fine points of the modern renaissance experience while honing a mid-evil marketing niche.
"Most of these festivals aren't historically accurate," Wilson observes. "The only one which really was (in Southern California) was destroyed by a developer in spite of a court injunction. I usually go shopping and look for business ideas. Court costumes aren't practical, but things like weaponry and leather doublets and corsets sell well in spite of their higher cost. It's really tempting to create a business plan for something like that."
Winona knows the leap from financial futures to Renaissance past is a big one. But if her bungee experience is any indication, it looks like she's ready for the jump. Staring down challenges is part of the plan.
"I used to be afraid of heights," Winona confesses. "I was also concerned I might freeze up during something important and become a liability. Then too, when I was 11, I panicked in the Cape Hatteras Lighthouse and tried to rip the grill off the fifth story window. Then I just got tired of being afraid."
And out came the bungee cords.
"Bungee jumping taught me that without the cord, the realization that one has just jumped off a perfectly good ledge was much worse that the fear of heights. Other times at Six Flags here in Denver you're pulled up several stories and then you pull the rip cord, drop 30 feet in free fall and swing back and forth... it feels like flying."
From Albuquerque to Fairfax, Santa Fe on to Denver, Colonial past to Financial predictions and along to Renaissance rollicks, Winona Wilson hasn't been known to set still. And WW updates may be even harder to come by in the near future.
Not to worry.
Hop in the Pontiac and take a spin over to the fairgrounds. Just look for the buffalo on the spit, slow roasting over Wall Street Journal back issues.
And ask for your buffalo tongue medium rare.
It's fun to catch up, but let's also take a look back. Tell us what has stayed with you all these years since Pine Ridge. Some possibilities:
Please send us your memories for publication in future issues. Anonymity granted upon request!
I ran across your web page when I was doing a search for Geoff Suiter on Google.
I'm living in New York (in Brooklyn, actually) and working as an information architect at Grey Interactive. Also, I am married.
Quick history: I went from Pine Ridge to Frost and then Woodson, but left after freshman year and moved to South Africa where I lived for 4 years. I went back to the us for college and went to Carleton, in Minnesota. Steve Curtis also went there. Then, I graduated with a BA in Sociology/Anthropology and went to Russia. I ended up working for Time Magazine there, and after a few years, came back to the United States to work at time.com. It was in Moscow that I met Jennifer Meyer, whom I married later on. Jenn was a Georgetown student doing a year abroad in Moscow. Then, in 1997, I went to ABCNEWS.com and worked there for about two and half years. In 1998, Jenn and I got married. Yay!!. Then, I switched jobs and worked at a web startup called APBnews.com. APB went out of business, and that's how I ended up at Grey, starting this June.
Hope to hear from some of you guys. Anyone in NYC?
I'm, perhaps unjustifiably so, a bit timid about the prospect of a sweeping update, but I'm currently working with Nepali popular music as a PhD student in ethnomusicology at Cornell, after having taught music and environmental science (though usually not simultaneously) for a number of years in CA and CT, and having lived on and off in Nepal for a few years.
Married to college buddy who is, not coincidentally, also working in Nepal. I'm also playing in a band in NYC - info at www.rabbitsongs.com
My folks are back in Annandale, so the prospects of attending a Pine Ridge reunion are as potentially feasible as they are intriguing... do let me know how things progress on that front.
Some months back we reported the loss of our classmate Jina Kim. We came across the following article online with a bit more information:
http://www-tech.mit.edu/V113/N62/memorial.62n.htmlRecently we caught up with Glenn McPhee (PR class of 1980), who sent the following update:
After leaving Pine Ridge I attend LJ and Oakton, before pursuing college life in Nashville, TN at Trevecca Nazarene College. While there I had the privilege of playing in the Vanderbilt Marching Band (which was a blast!) and enrolling in the Vanderbilt ROTC program.
In 1994, after graduation (B.S. Music/Business) and eight wonderful years in Nashville I returned to NOVA briefly before moving where I am now, which is in Frederick, Maryland. I still enjoy playing music (tuba) whenever I get the chance. Life is great here I hope the best for everyone!!!!
Currently I work in the Information Systems Department at Music & Arts Centers doing computer support/repair/networking etc. A full-service music retail company that spreads up and down the East Coast and as far west as Denver, CO.
I enjoyed Pine Ridge and especially Mrs. Herb ('78), Mrs. Shaffner ('79), and Mrs. Bush ('80) even though they probably didn't enjoy me :) !
If anyone is interested I still have relatively recent contacts:
David Masri ('78 - left Pine Ridge in fourth grade) who last time I checked was teaching at Westminster Private School
Jeff Hawkins ('79) who still lives in Annandale, and
Chris Shirley ('80) owns a successful carpentry business and lives in Centreville.
My older brother Greg ('77) and his beautiful family, live in Centreville also.
Please feel free to contact me at [email protected]
Unfortunately, we're still out of contact with Cathy Edmonds Wehibe and recently got rejection e-mails from Jill Hanbury and Marilyn Deady Paitel's mother (who had been relaying the newsletter to Marilyn). Does anyone have a way to reach these folks? If so, please write so we can get them back in the loop.
The good news is, we have several to add to our confirmed contact list. Carol Shubinski tracked down Kiran Beyer for us, and Terence Nelan, Steve Curtis, Jennifer Juul, Angela Coin, and Andrew Wills all found their ways here, as well. Welcome aboard, Kiran, Terence, Steve, Jennifer, Angela, and Andrew! Here are their addresses:
Anyone else had luck finding old classmates?
Here's the latest on who we've contacted and who we're still trying to find:
We have some leads on the following folks, but haven't heard back from them and so could use more information:
We don't have leads on these folks yet:
While we still have a list of unlocated classmates, we will spotlight one or two each issue in an intense data-gathering effort. This issue we're looking at John Lautenbacher and Patrick McNeil. Send in your memories and information and maybe together we can find John and Patrick.
Kinds of information to think about: did you know middle names or names of parents or siblings? Where did they go to junior high or high school? Did they move out of the area? Where and when? Have you had any contact since Pine Ridge? Where and when? Send in what you know, and we will compile and share it and follow any leads. Our goal: 100% location.
Please send us an update on your life, post-Pine Ridge, for publication in a future edition. Here are some ideas to get you started:
We look forward to hearing from everyone and sharing our stories.
Are you experiencing difficulty receiving this newsletter? Send a description of the problem. We are not technical experts but will do everything we can to solve the problem. The newsletter is also available at www.bigfoot.com/~pineridgeweb.
For those without electronic mail, please direct correspondence to:
or call:
Content depends largely on what YOU send in. Drop us a line; your classmates would love to hear what you have to say.
Be true to your school! Pine Ridge rules!