Andy Muck ’99 and Kelly Polinsky Muck ’98
Andy Muck ’99 and I met in physics lab after being randomly assigned as partners in my senior year and his junior year. The class rotated partners throughout the semester, but Professor James Lloyd liked our “chemistry” and let us stay partners. Our friendship grew quickly through working in the lab and studying together in Cooley Science Library, which was where we’d always find each other. (We are now proud to tell our children that!)
One day, on the way home from a late-night study session, Andy grabbed my hand to keep me from stepping in a huge puddle near my Newell apartment. And he’s never let go since.
I fell in love with him for so many reasons — one of the biggest was the way he can make me laugh. A photo of us caught laughing on campus was even featured on a Colgate bookstore catalogue that year.
Early on January 1, 2000, Andy took me back to the Colgate cross-country trails above the old ski slope to propose as we watched the first sunrise of the new millennium. We were married that June at Memorial Chapel and our reception was at the Colgate Inn. Between the ceremony and the reception, we visited our favorite spots on campus in a horse-drawn carriage.
Several summers ago, we visited the campus with our three children for photos in front of the physics lecture hall at Lathrop Hall and the chapel.
Fast forward, Andy is now an emergency medicine physician at the University of Texas Health Science Center at San Antonio, where he started the first civilian ER residency in the city. He is also the director of Global Health for Emergency Medicine and director of a free medical clinic for refugees in the city. I have a master’s in public health and worked as an epidemiologist. I now homeschool our three children who, at 11, 9, and 6 years old, are growing up too fast. I also manage our ranch in Texas hill country and write about farm-to-table living there at franchlife.com. We are so thankful for Colgate, where our life story together began.
— Kelly Polinsky Muck ’98
