HAPPY HOLIDAYS - 2007

The Messing's have had a very busy and mostly happy year. We have traveled a lot, accomplished many things and have enjoyed each as well as many friends and family.

Lauren graduated from the Tisch School of the Arts at NYU with a BFA in Drama. She has been in a Bjork music video which is quite interesting to say the least. We all are very confident and know that we will be seeing her on stage and film very soon! She's continuing with acting and voice lessons to keep up her chops, so to speak while auditioning for a variety of possible projects. (One of the directors she worked with in school has just contacted her to work on a new project of his!) To support herself, Lauren works at a vintage clothing store in Brooklyn. There is a wonderful young man in her life, Marc, who will graduate this spring from NYU. They have been together almost a year and we are very happy for her...and no he is NOT an actor!

Sam is a junior at Johns Hopkins double majoring in Cognitive Neuroscience and Philosophy. He still plays the guitar and manages the radio station at Johns Hopkins. He was very sick this fall with a rare gastrointestinal problem; it seems mostly under control now and we are hopeful it will not recur. Despite this he expects to make the dean's list once again, something he has accomplished every term so far. Sam continues his romance with Rachel; they are very close even though she studies at Washington University in St. Louis. (Rachel is from the Boston area, so they rendezvous here quite often.) Last summer they traveled and studied in Italy together.

Sam is leaving shortly to spend his spring semester at Victoria University in New Zealand where he will study Discrete Math and other heady courses...I wonder where he got those genes from! Howard, Lauren and I are planning on visiting him in April if Lauren isn't in a play.

We have been very fortunate to have traveled a lot this year. We were back in South Africa with our dear friends the Treslings. We watched the Argus in Cape Town, SA which is a bicycle race of over 40,000 bicyclists riding over a very beautiful, though treacherous course. The ride includes going up and down mountains that overlook the Cape of Good Hope with sharp curves, narrow roads and of course baboons playing in the road.

MEDITECH South Africa sponsors a team and so we were able to keep cool inside their tent. Greg LeMond came by to say hi and had his picture taken with us. (Being the sports-minded person that I am I had to ask exactly who he was?) We also helped MEDITECH SA celebrate its 25th Anniversary.

In June, we went to Switzerland to visit CERN and the new super collider with an MIT group led by Jerry Friedman. Jerry won the Nobel Prize in Physics for discovering the quark. He was so gracious and humble and able to talk to all us at each of our levels of understanding. What an opportunity of a lifetime this was! When the Collider goes live this spring no one will get the up close look that we were able to see. Someone in our family asked Jerry a lot of questions and someone didn't. I just wonder who that could have been. Touring Geneva, Zurich, and the Alps completed the trip. By the way, the food was fabulous the whole trip!

We also went to Barcelona in July with the Museum of Science trustees and friends. Yannis and Beth (the director and his wife) led the trip. The food was more scrumptious at each meal and the art extraordinary! Our friends the Kistlers drove with us up the Costa Brava to visit Salvador Dali's home and gallery/museum and his wife's castle. What a treat!

In August, Howard's friend, Robert, from Denmark, came to visit us. Howard and Robert have been playing on-line games for over 12 years, but had never met face to face before. We enjoyed taking him around Boston and getting to know him better.

I had my college friends to Florida...an annual event. It's such a revitalizing time. Julie, Kris, Marcia, Sharon, Susan and I had such a laugh-filled week. We also met up at Sharon's cabin this summer in Minnesota. Again lots of talks, cries and laughs.

My father continues to struggle with his hearing and memory loss. It is so sad for him to be alone. His misses my Mom so much. I miss her more this year than last. I think the grief settles in a little deeper as the time passes.

We are both still very active in our philanthropic endeavors, Howard as a trustee at the Museum of Science and the Chairman of the Economic Advisory Board here in Westwood. I am on the board of the DeCordova Art Museum, The Rose Art Museum and the Society of Arts and Crafts. And I help with the Craftshowcase.

We continue to wish for all of you a warm and happy New Year as we continue to hope for Peace.

Our love and best wishes,

Colleen, Howard, Lauren, Sam, Bogart and Reuben