When Mary Evelyn Harju was angry with or frustrated by Abby Heller-Burnham, she often hurled this epithet at her: the little rat. Among other epithet-hurlers who dwelt among us was Gretchen Stump. Gretchen Stump, when I met her, was Jennifer Strawser's best friend. When Jennifer and I began to go out, in early '96, Gretchen was jealous, for a number of reasons, and none too pleased. Remember: Jeremy Eric Tenenbaum then has lines running to, and minions in, State College, from Villanova/Manayunk. When he bothered to write dear gr, which appeared in print in Columbia Poetry Review in 1999 and online in P.F.S. Post much later, he was wryly commenting on Gretchen's travails, watching a shotgun marriage unfold. Not incidentally, when Gretchen later appeared in late-Aughts Philly, I wrote After Andrew Marvell for her.
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