More Scenes (and a promise)

I have two new books to read this week—Dinaw Mengestu's How to Read the Air and my friend Susan Straight's Take One Candle Light a Room—and I am eager for those quiet hours, eager to escape into the worlds that others have created.  I'll be writing about those books here, as soon as I know just what to say.  

In the meantime, and finally (I promise), these last images from the Radnor High Hall of Fame weekend: 

In the first, my friend Ellen, who knew me in my years at Penn, stood beside me at my wedding, invited me to stand with her at hers, and has remained so dear.  In the second, "Precious" (and precious) filmmaker Lee Daniels, the extraordinary athlete Chris Sydnor (we ran track together, but let's just say he was a tad more talented in the speed department than I'd ever be), and yours truly, on four-inch, non-sprint-able heels.  In the third, my former English teacher, the inspiration for my fictional Dr. Charmin (Undercover);  she said she had hoped to write a perfect introduction, and oh, she did. Finally, it all begins with our parents, and here is my father, who I am so glad could spend the day with me.

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Radnor High Hall of Fame, Induction Day

Today I'll be inducted into the Radnor High Hall of Fame.

I type those words.  Sit back.  Wonder how that ever came to be.

I spent last evening in the home of Radnor graduates, parents, and administrators who are all working toward giving students the best education that can be gained.  I spent it talking to Nancy Carpenter Barnes, a fellow inductee, a well-known artist, the former president of the Barnes Foundation, and an Emmy-winning producer for public TV.  I'll spend today not just with Nancy, but with Lee Daniels, the film producer and director; John Galloway, the theologian; Christopher Goutman, the award-wining producer, director, and writer; Paul Michel, the federal judge who, among other things, served as an assistant prosecutor in the Watergate trial; Charles Ryan, the investment banker who created Russia's leading investment bank; and Chris Sydnor, the extraordinary athlete and coach.  The Egyptologist Henry George Fischer and the music writer and producer Andy Mark, both sadly deceased, will be remembered as well. 

The inductees will share this moment with the teachers and students of Radnor High, and I will be introduced by the very woman who inspired the smart, encouraging English teacher in my first young adult novel, Undercover.  She could not have been more than 25 back then.  She paired my reading of Juliet with a Romeo reading by my secret crush.  She read between weak, overwritten lines and saw the seeds of a writer.  I'll stand with her today.


There's more about this day here.  There is so much in my heart.  I don't even know who to thank.  But few honors have affected me in the way that today does.  I wish my mother were here to see this.

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