Jim Collins

I never would have believed that I'd be a summer person in New Hampshire, but that's what I've become... After living in New Hampshire my whole life, I moved to Seattle in August of 2012 along with my kids and my wife, Kristen, to the place that she loves, and the place where we met en route to the wedding of Becky Todd back in 1994. Time flies. We've been able to hold onto our house in Orange, New Hampshire (kind of up near Hanover/Lebanon, home of Mount Cardigan) and get back there for holidays and part of each summer. Highlights since FMRHS: playing baseball and majoring in English at Dartmouth; doing trailwork in the White Mtns. for the AMC; joining the staff and then becoming editor of Yankee magazine; building a cabin on an island and living there for a few years without electricity or running water; writing a book about the Cape Cod Baseball League (The Last Best League); marrying a great woman and raising a couple of kids who are turning into interesting, smart, kind young people.

Some quick hits:
* stealing apples and having apple fights during soccer season in the orchard behind Bruce Ferland's house in North Charlestown. (And beating Hanover and Keene in soccer the same week during our senior year.)
* lifting weights with Tony "the Beautiful Island" Belisle after school during the winter
* making it to the state Class I baseball championship in 1979
* epic late-night winter sledding in Walpole with Becky Todd
* memorable Mexico trip as a junior with Mr. Maxwell
* Senior Night -- dinner in Bellows Falls, dancing in Springfield, with Karen Putnam and others, wondering why I waited until spring of senior year to go out like that...