1977

These notes represent this month's effort to contact our classmates for news. In lieu of news about people, I have a review of our class's phone answering systems. I called Rich Eifler's architecture firm in Cambridge and was connected to a very professional-sounding operator who offered me access to Rick's voice mail. His is a courteous, formal message, very business-like. When Rick called me back I discovered Rick's firm is a one-man operation using a professional answering service to project an air of legitimacy on this start-up. He's contemplating using his wife's voice on his next message to make it seem like he has a staff.

I made a series of calls to other workplaces but the maze of options on people's voice mail at work was overwhelming, so I restricted my calls to home numbers.

Ann Duffy has one of those interesting "No one can come to the phone right now" messages. What is it that people are doing that prevents them from coming to the phone? Don't you wonder? Or is it just a way for people to suggest to would-be thieves that they are home when they are not?

Ann Muenzer and Mark Beams (a rare class couple) have a formal message at their home in Newtown, Conn. Maybe, working at GE, Mark gets a lot of calls at home and has to maintain a proper corporate profile.

Kathy Kelley Cimina doesn't have an answering machine. I guess she's too busy teaching Jazzercise to get one.

I actually spoke to Stacy Dibbell when I called Dave Dibbell's house. I was a little disappointed to actually speak to anyone, but we got around to the topic of her answering machine. She informed me they reluctantly bought a machine last year and hate it. Their message is very traditional but effective. Dave had not returned yet from performing plastic surgery on some poor soul in Eau Claire when I called, but since he was due home any minute, I hung up.

I got a house-sitter when I called Rich Elmore in upstate Vermont. Rich and his family were on vacation on Lake Champlain, but the person who answered told me Rich's phone message was boring. He suggested I call their vacation spot but, sadly, it had no machine.

Calvert Barksdale, Tom Cohn, and Dave Bennett don't have machines, either.

What started out as your basic "We're not home now" message got considerably more interesting at the end when Jonathan Elkind suggested to his callers that if they were coming for Colin's party they should come a few minutes early and leave their shoes at the door. What kind of party would that be? A wine crush? A geisha party? Or just your runof-the-mill sneak attack?

The most soothing message was on Dee Dee Bentley's phone. The way her husband, Burton's, voice invites you to leave a message, I drought I had called Mister Rogers. Maybe it was, but without a video phone I had no way to verify it. No doubt in a few years that option will be available and we'll learn a whole lot more about our classmates. Until that time we'll have to make do with our imaginations.

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