Nuns, friars, I may never get used to 75 degree holiday season weather in South Texas, and as I sit here trying to imagine the live oak leaves and limbs (still green) covered under millions of burdensome flakes of snow I am transported back to a time of magic and wonder that we all experienced this time of year on our beautiful Hood College campus, with a surprising aftertaste memory of Goldschlager and half-frostbitten phantom tips of woolen sock-covered toes in smelly Birkenstock sandals (don’t deny it!) and I hold myself there in that memory as if I were back in time for only the few minutes it will take to write this column to you. Remember for a moment the excitement of Messiah and the snow-covered steeple of our picturesque, yet simple chapel. The smell of our historic residence halls, old creaky wood that sagged ever so slightly under snow-covered heel, the immediate warmth from the radiator, and the buzz in the air that tonight there was a party on some floor of some hall and midshipmen coming in for the weekend, not knowing yet that the end result would be running out into the heavy snowfall of the evening, laughing, into the snow covered pergola, and landing hard on one’s back to make snow angels while watching your cinnamon schnapps breath steam upwards like a locomotive. And maybe in a moment of quiet bliss you could hear the snow falling in a failed attempt to bury you, and maybe you would hear Amy Zavada ’99 serenading you while hanging out of a 3rd floor window of Shriner Hall with “Mele Kalikimaka is the thing to say on a bright Hawaiian Christmas Day! That’s the island greeting that we send to you from the land where palm trees sway!” could not be much further from a palm tree, but it was the spirit that captivated us on our beautiful little snow globe of a campus each holiday season, buffered from the world of professionalism and duty. With the reunion coming up this June it is hard to believe that our Hood rings really ARE that old, but so fun to recall that at one point in our lives that did not seem so long ago we made Goldschlager fueled snow angels and ran through the pergola and made our own mistletoe with whatever we desired. If there was even a speck of snow here in San Antonio I would relive the memory, after I put Stone to bed, of course, as I am far more responsible now than I ever have been, as you can all relate in your own way. And, with that, onto the news!

Congratulations to Jessica Myers-Staley, her husband CP and daughter Hannah who welcomed Christopher David Staley on Dec. 26, 2011. Pamela Wilson-Colaluca’s new phone number is (540) 631-5928 and new email address is pamelacolaluca@gmail.com. Erin Goley has started a Facebook group for our class entitled “Hoodlums ’98” to connect classmates for the upcoming reunion this June. Please join the group if you haven’t already! And, as for me, Blythe Chambers, I received my first professional athlete action-portrait commission, in watercolor, for a former defenseman of the San Antonio Scorpions’ soccer team who has since continued his career in Germany. I would like to close with this: I would like to hear from more of you. I welcome all submissions for the class news for the Hood Magazine. My email address has changed to blythe.chambers@gmail.com. I hope next time I can report some news from your life, too. Until then, happy holidays and a magnificent new year! Love, your faithful class reporter, Blythe.

Class Reporter: