Share Your Journey! Personal Essays Are Now Due By April 30^th

Even my briefest exchanges with our classmates of the Yale Class of 1969 have brought me good cheer and encouragement–and much wisdom. One of you just reminded me that “the best thing in life is second chances.” He was referring to the chance to connect or reconnect with men we had known in our undergraduate days. But he could just as well have been referring to our Personal Essays!

Your essays are pouring in at a rapid clip, and we now have more than a 150 essays. Most came through web page for submitting essays, others have come directly to me at y69content@gmail.com and a few have arrived via the U.S. Post Office at my home, 94 Watchung Avenue, Montclair, NJ 07043.

In an effort to make sure that the flood continues and that all of your stories find their place at the heart of our ClassBook, we are extending the original deadline for submission from April 1 to April 30. This will give those of you who are now distracted by pesky tax deadlines plenty of time to finish those unpleasant filings and turn in your essay!

As you may know, our ClassBook Publisher, Art Klebanoff (PC ’69 and founder / CEO of Rosetta Books), has made it possible for us to have, not just a standard off-the-shelf yearbook, but a rich, full-color tome that will be pulled down from the shelf and admired regularly in years to come. For a look at our ClassBook’s design, go to https://yale1969.org/classbook-revealed/.  There you will also find helpful instructions for submitting your essay.

The task is easier than you may think. Here are a few suggestions derived from our experience with the essays and pictures we have received so far:

• Your essay may be as short as you like–some are only a few sentences.   Try not to exceed 500 words. Exemptions may be granted at the Editor’s discretion.
• You are encouraged to submit up to three photographs. Any common image format is fine, and you can mail in snapshots if you prefer.
• Bear in mind that these pictures will be printed on high-quality paper – not just displayed electronically – so they should be kept at the highest available resolution: The longest side of any image must exceed 640 pixels and preferably should be much bigger, e.g., 1200 pixels or more.
• We encourage you to submit captions for your photos in the section provided on the web form, or in the email or printed submission so that they can be properly identified in the ClassBook.

Each one of us has been on a journey since our days at Yale. According to a bit of Eastern wisdom favored by the late Steve Jobs, “The journey is the reward.” We want to hear your life’s journey. Let your reward be the sharing of your life’s experience and insights with your classmates in the pages of our ClassBook.