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Mary Gilliland ’73, MAT ’80

Mary Gilliland’s newest poetry collection, The Devil’s Fools, won the Codhill Press Pauline Uchmanowicz Award and was released on November 1, 2022. Infused with eco-logic, informed by feminism, and taking cues from Eve, Cain, Proserpine, Ulysses, Parsifal, and selves present and past, the 50 poems of The Devil’s Fools question and illustrate myths of nature and the nature of inherited myth. 

Gilliland’s other recent book, The Ruined Walled Castle Garden, won the Bright Hill Press Poetry Prize and was published in 2020. Her poems are widely published in print and online literary journals and most recently anthologized in Rumors, Secrets & Lies: Poems About Pregnancy, Abortion, and Choice; Wild Gods: The Ecstatic in Contemporary Poetry and Prose; and Nuclear Impact: Broken Atoms In Our Hands

The poet is a past recipient of the Stanley Kunitz Fellowship at the Fine Arts Work Center in Provincetown, MA, and a Council for the Arts Faculty Grant from Cornell University.

Nyaneba Nkrumah, PhD ’01

I am excited to let you know that I am about to publish an adult fiction novel. Wade in the Water is to be published by Amistad, HarperCollins in January ’23 (available for pre-order), and is a gripping coming-of-age story about the increasingly complex relationship between a mistreated Black girl growing up in 1980s rural Mississippi and a mysterious white researcher from Princeton who appears in her racially divided town. The novel exposes the consequences of secrets left untold and the power of the past to dictate the future. Do visit my website to read more details. In other news, I continue to work (20+) years for the World Bank in Washington, DC, where I continue to meet, not surprisingly, several amazing fellow Cornellians.

Jeffrey Woodring ’93

I hung up the trading jacket 8/25/2020, retiring to spend more time with family. My wife, Nicole, started a new career: got her PT degree and is working as a therapist. Marra soph at Penn State, Parker starting at Cornell Fall 2023! (yes, he will play football) and Todd soph in high school. Though I have also been getting back to my college interests: VP of Sigma Nu alumni board, secretary of Friends of Cornell Football (the new booster club), and president of the high school football booster. I guess I haven’t grown up yet!? I spend a bunch of time with fish: boating / fishing on the Long Island Sound, stocking trout with the Burlington Fish Hatchery, doing fish surveys, and volunteering with Trout Unlimited. I also joined a men’s hockey team…a new appreciation for the Lynah skaters. I regularly see Greg Dinkin ’93, Marc Bruno ’93, and Tim Barry ’93, and plan to bond with many more for Reunion. teamwoodring@gmail.com

Michelle J. Vaeth ’98

Michelle returned to Ithaca in 2018 to serve as the Associate Vice President for Alumni Affairs at Cornell after a nearly two decade career in crisis management, communications, and marketing at Procter & Gamble in Cincinnati, OH. Michelle is an avid community volunteer and is an immediate past board member of the 125,000 member Association of Junior Leagues International, is a past President of the Junior League of Cincinnati, and has served on the Board of Trustees of the Landmark Theater in Syracuse, NY. Michelle, her husband Pete Thorman, and their three dogs split their time between Ithaca and the Kettle Lakes in Tully, NY. Michelle is SO honored to serve Cornell and her fellow alumni. Please reach out and say hello—especially if you are returning to the Hill! GO BIG RED!!!