Gail Goldberg Nunziata

Gail was my first girlfriend. My family moved from Levittown to Dix Hills — both communities on Long Island, New York — during the summer before my senior year of high school, and Gail and I were both seniors at Half Hollow Hills High. On October 19, 1968, we had our first date: butterscotch sundaes after a forensic contest in which we'd both competed. She starred as Eliza Doolittle in the school's production of My Fair Lady (see photo) and also played one of the cuckoo Pigeon sisters in The Odd Couple. (I was in that show, too, as one of Oscar Madison's poker-playing buddies, but I don't think we ever actually appeared on stage together.)

After graduation, I went off to the University of Michigan, and Gail stayed in New York to attend the Academy of Dramatic Arts. The romance didn't survive my first year in Ann Arbor, but we've stayed friends all along — first via the mail, and in more recent years via email.

In 2000, while Becca was attending a five-week summer orientation at Choate, I spent several weeks travelling around New England — including a short visit with Gail and her husband Tom in Brattleboro, VT. (I also got to meet Mark, the younger of their two sons.)

Tom works in the natural-food industry (isn't that an oxymoron?) and Gail works for an architect and serves on various local boards of directors — her current project involves rehabbing a historic Brattleboro hotel, movie palace, and restaurant into a performing and visual arts hub for the community.

They're such nice people, all of them! And it was such a treat to see Gail again, for the first time since our 10-year 4HS reunion in 1979. Hopefully it won't be another two decades before the next time we're able to get together....

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