guest profile: Ilsa, Brian, Gus & Eli

So I'm in New York, having just moved across the country to go to Sarah Lawrence for grad school and I'm at the first orientation session with my cohort. We're sitting cross-legged in a circle (not kidding) and I'm thinking to myself...what am I doing here?...when across the parking lot I see Ilsa Lund. She sits down next to me, introduces herself, and I think to myself...oh, that's why. With a name like Ilsa Lund, you just don't argue.

There's this time in our lives, usually after college, when you think you probably have all or at least most of the friends that you'll carry with you through your life. But Ilsa defied all that. We stuck together like glue throughout the most challenging academic experience I think either of us had ever been through, and I expect to carry her friendship around with me in my pocket for the rest of all time.



Back in the day, me and Ilsa and her husband Brian used to, well, have a real good time. Usually, it's true, there were cigarettes involved. "I can't believe this is a primary source," Ilsa once said (my thesis was on cigarettes), "and I'm just gonna smoke it." There is no one cleverer than Ilsa Lund.



Now almost fifteen (!) years later, Ilsa and Brian have a beautiful new family - Gus and Eli - and are about to move cross country for a new job. Brian's about to take a tenure track position as a paleontologist and did I mention he discovered a new species - and got to name it? It's true.

Oh. When you see Ilsa, ask her about anything related to famous people. She is literally encyclopedic on all things Entertainment Weekly, People Mag, SNL, etc.