1955

In response to my recent plea my old buddy John Le Fever wrote a fascinating letter about himself. He has succeeded admirably in a path which very few of us have travelled. His career has spanned writing, teaching, acting, music, and truck driving. He has lived in Cuba, Maine. Germany and New York. He has a kindred spirit, Edith, for a mate (they were married in 1960), three children and a mother-in-law who "is one of the most interesting people I have ever known." He is currently unemployed after being laid off by the trucking company but working on a new book and acting the part of the Devil in Don Juan in Hell.

Rather than tell you a little bit about a lot of people this month I'm going to devote the whole column to John's career with some choice quotations interspersed. "How can I walk away from a cry for help when the helpee singles me out by name?"

"While the rest of the Class has been doggedly (or accidentally) climbing rung by patient rung up the ladder of the success expected of all of us, I have been bullheadedly (sometimes unconsciously) climbing an entirely different one - one which seems to go, in fact, in the opposite direction. Something like an Escher drawing, I suppose. I still have confidence, however - more than ever, really - that the rungs pressing into my arches lead to the kind of success I want. I wouldn't wish it on anybody, though."

He started at Albany Law School in '55 but left in January to join Luis Torroella in Havana. He worked there as a reporter and wrote short stories but his draft board caught up the next May. He was sent to Germany where he started his acting career in an Army production. Upon discharge he returned briefly to law school, met Edith, but decided teaching was better. They were married while he was teaching in Maine but after a year moved to New York. Here he worked for the old Herald-Tribune as a reporter. When it folded he became a freelance copy editor. This enabled them to move to Woodstock, N. Y., where "the work became seasonal, the income insufficient, and I was beginning to develop hardening of the brain cells, or rust of the synapses, from too many hours of laboring over pages designed for beginning nurses or something like. I found a job with a local crossword-puzzle publisher who fancied himself an ante-bellum light horse colonel. He was plenty sophisticated, though; he forewent wearing string ties. He fired me after 19 weeks (in time to avoid unemployment payments), charging me with not liking the work. My defense was that I did, but we weren't in court, and he won."

There he and Edith became more involved in the arts and John learned to play clarinet. He started a part-time career in jazz which is a continuing interest.

In 1964 he earned a masters degree and started teaching English in the Kingston school system. After five years of this he wanted more time for writing, music, and acting so he left teaching in favor of truck driving. He wrote his first novel and produced his own play; "I sent it to five agents/editors who all turned it down with glowingly complimentary letters. It would seem, at this point, that I bet on the wrong dog, and now your correspondent has a resume that reads 'truck driver' at the top. It looks as though I succumbed to rapture of the depths and am proceeding confidently down the rope instead of up. I maintain that remains to be seen." Unfortunately the trucking company lost out to the recession and John became unemployed. "Now we're living on a savings account, running a race against time. The bright side of this is that I am working on a new book full time, acting the Devil in Don Juan in Hell, about to debut at the New York State Theatre Association Regional Competition, from whose former competitions I have walked away with prizes, and living almost comfortably with Edith, three children, and a close-cropped, diabolical beard. I can still speak Spanish and have learned household French (Edie was born in Paris). Also, I am an incorrigible optimist, rapture of the depths or no rapture of the depths."

John, I thank you for a most interesting and provocative letter. Vaya con Dios.

And may all of you enjoy a wonderful Christmas and joyous 1976.

Vice President Rockefeller '30 went toDenver to assist the City's NeighborsAgainst Crime Together, and meet withDave Martin '54 (c) executive director ofNeighbors Act and Mayor McNichols.

Secretary, 66 Abbotsford Road Winnetka, Illinois 60093

Treasurer, 30 Warnock Drive Westport, Conn. 06880