2025 – the 48th Edition of the Barnesian Year-end Letter
This year’s three stand-out events—a wedding, a flower garden, a published book!
Natalia and Bert Fusco tied the knot on February 22nd in Baltimore, where the above photo was taken—and what a special group of millennials! Working hard, doing well, loving life…
Natalia is a Physical Therapist Assistant and Bert is a chef at The Eagle’s Nest Country Club.
They share their apartment with a menagerie of four-legged friends, and both Natalia and Bert
have a close-knit group of longtime friends. Bert’s folks, Tim and Willa, of Connecticut, came
down to Baltimore the previous summer so all the future-in-laws could celebrate their offsprings’
choices. That went really well, culminating in George Washington now sharing his birthday with
Natalia and Bert’s nuptials. The photos say it all!
Ariel lives and works in Los Angeles in the
Silver Lake section. Her work is the final-
final stage of movie making, right before it
reaches the silver screen on which you will
see it. It is fine-tuning with the best editing
technology that Hollywood has to offer. Her
work space, in both her company office and
home, has three large monitor screens lined
up to work her magic. India doesn’t want
smoking in movies, Malaysia might not want
alcohol drinking, and China is stricter, setting
movie directors and producers on end, until
Ari fixes it all and sends them on their way. In
the meantime, she gets more exercise than
most humans could deal with, the result of
Lou, her big, protective, Black Lab-Great
Dane mix. Stay away if you haven’t been
invited into the inner sanctum, or walk too
close to her. In December, Cynthia and I
strolled Malibu Beach with her, just down the
hill from the horrendous fire damage. We also
walked around the reservoir, through marine
layer fog and smog—Lou, leading us all for the morning hikes.
Thomas came to Fort Lauderdale, to Seb and Sandy’s house to put on a pre-Thanksgiving dinner in early November for a multitude of Barneses, Vegas and Benjamins. Sandy and Haim pitched in alongside Tom’s years-and-years of such complex preparations, having learned them through the wisdom and organization skills of Cynthia. Tom continues as a government attorney in Wash., DC, working on matters with the Veterans Administration. Thank goodness for remote working, one of the few benefits from Covid-19. His own Black Lab, Weber is now 11.
Gavin and Erika live in Aurora, just south of Denver. He is skillfully applying his two Master’s degrees—in Mechanical Engineering and an MBA—in the aerospace industry. Erika is a Customer Success Leader, Educator, and Writer with Zeta Global in Denver. Spare time involves various Cosplay activities and caring for Bruno, their very active Goldendoodle.
Sandy and Sebastian have a wonderful life with their home in downtown Fort Lauderdale. They are both deeply involved in management at their companies, one, a healthcare-related provider, and the other, a leader in the industry with security for computer systems. But it is really, Noah, their four-year-old son, who is the apple of their eye. He has friends at school and the neighborhood playgrounds, but the socializing is best whenever all three Benjamin children—
Cynthia’s grandchildren—come over to play. The four of them interacting is worth the price of admission. Then again, sometimes they just collapse and stare at the television…
Sandy’s birthday bash, Christmas Eve at Fleming’s Steakhouse on Las Olas in Fort Lauderdale,
was more than memorable, for the diners and waitstaff. Front row, Sandy and Noah, with her
mom, Sandra. Back left, brother Rome, family friend Jeff Ross, Sebastian, Cynthia, and Wayne.
Cynthia’s family in Florida, the Benjamins, and in Virginia, the Bakers, have given her six
grandchildren, with the only girl, Mila, a twin to brother Liam. Her daughter, Marissa, and Haim
benefit the most from having grandma close by. But she regularly takes United Airlines from
FLL (Fort Lauderdale) to IAD (Dulles), so growing grandchildren have a benefit an older
generation never did. FaceTime on Apple phones brings her into their living room, too.
A few more good shots of youngins—grandson Noah on his fourth birthday in May. And my
grandniece and grandnephew, Hayley and Derek Yuenger, teenage children of my niece,
Morgan, from an offshoot visit from my trip to Virginia, to their home in the Baltimore suburbs.
Cynthia and I traveled to Virginia, Colorado, and ten days recently in Southern California—Mt.
Baldy, via ski lift, Joshua Tree National Park, and San Diego, walking the Cliffs of Del Mar. In
Palm Springs we stopped in to see my Villanova Law School roommate, and fellow dorm
counselor, Ken Moran. We had not seen each other in 53 years! And did I mention—Cynthia had
a double-hip replacement last December and March, and still hiked her way around America!
The below, from a three-generation, Cynthia-family experience in Key Largo. Yes, I am growing
my hair, again. On my 75th birthday in 2022, I donated 12” to Children with Hair Loss. On my
79th birthday, in six months, I should have 15 inches of undamaged hair (in a stallion-tail), for
another wig for a teen whose has lost hers from chemotherapy. If you can do it—do it!
A Flower Garden: In July, I decided that my front lawn looked shabby. Having been a nature
guy all of my life, it was time to put something into motion. The huge mahogany tree,
magnificent up high, needed work around its roots to make it more presentable. I wanted to
spruce up the whole neighborhood!
With a yellow plastic rope, I outlined what would be the 37’ circumference, then went to the
backlot of a local nursery. A customer-returned pallet of just the right building blocks was what I
needed, and at half-price! Two layers, 107 of them, at 12.5 pounds apiece, came in at 1,337
pounds of backbreaking labor, into the car, onto the lawn, then placing them. Oh, and 750 lbs. of
compost/dirt—that’s 13 seven-gallon buckets full. Don’t forget the black screening along the
inside edge, a sleeve to keep in the dirt. A nice green trim of liriope around the inside border
framed what was to come. Requirements included low growing and brightly colored flowers, as
many as possible for butterflies to nectar on. Some larval plants for butterfly eggs, and then
caterpillars munching their way to be large enough to go into a chrysalis, was the goal. After a slow four
months, it all came together, and I have Zebra Longwing and Gulf Fritillary butterflies
chewing up native passion vine (Corkystem) and fern-looking coontie plants that are waiting
patiently for little black Atala butterflies to lay their eggs. I am hopeful. Meanwhile, feedback in
the neighborhood has been good, but there is internal satisfaction in using one’s hands—yes, and
back, too. It is the refreshing view of a colorful palette right outside my door, and even a large
staghorn fern clings to the tree, eight-feet up, crowning it all.
And voilà! A Flower Garden!
Not just that, but now a “Butterfly Garden!” A Gulf Fritillary nectaring on red Penta. Then she
laid her eggs on a Corkystem. A few weeks later, a caterpillar munching. Success!
A Published Book!
I was a special agent in the FBI for 29 years, almost all of it investigating counterintelligence
cases. In Washington, DC, I worked the Eastern Bloc countries for several years, and then a
decade against the Russians. In 1998, I found myself in San Diego, long out of the nation’s
capital, when three senior agents from Washington flew out to see me. Their goal was to send me
on a mission that anyone in their right mind would have seen as impossible.
There was a KGB penetration at a senior level in US Intelligence, and the compromise was the
worst in our history. A man was coming from Moscow to attend a film festival in LA who, they
believed, knew the identity of the traitor in the FBI. I was to go to the festival, find him, befriend
him, recruit him, and show him a photo array of the FBI agents who were suspected of being the
spy, with the goal of having him point out a picture. At the time, there were two superpowers,
and all Russians thought theirs was the best one. So, why would he talk to me?
At the time, this was the most sensitive case in the FBI, with greater intricacies than I had ever
seen before. There was no option but to take on the task. Eventually, the traitor was caught and
arrested, but my story was not known by more than a dozen people in the FBI.
In 2013, it was all still highly classified, but I saw this as part of FBI history—and American
history. I decided to write it all down. In 2016, I submitted it to the FBI Prepublication Review
Unit, which has 45 days to respond. Three years later they sent it back to me with every page
completely redacted, but for one half of one page. That was when I had told a lawyer joke over
dinner. I guess the reviewers thought it was funny, but not classified.
I flew to DC three times to negotiate and argue. Finally, in the fall of 2023, after a full seven
years from my initial submission, I was granted authority to have my story published. I was
fortunate to have friends in the publishing field who led me to Alfred Regnery, president of
Republic Book Publishers. After a long discussion he asked for the full manuscript. A couple of
days later, he told me he would publish it. There are many more details, like finding Biba
Kayewich, who did the extraordinary cover art, and old friend John Douglas, who contributed
with the Foreword, but what is important is the current status.
A Traitor in the FBI, The Hunt for a Russian Mole is now available for pre-publication to order
on Amazon. If you would like to purchase a copy, simply go to Amazon and Books, and type in
my name, Wayne A. Barnes. It will come up right away. For those of you who have been
following this saga for years and years, it is finally coming to a conclusion. Bringing this story to
the public is an honor. I leave you with a paragraph written to me from the copy editor who went
over the book in great detail: Comment from Clayton Ferrell, Copy Editor, Post Hill Press, 2025
A Traitor to the FBI is a fascinating look into the operations and methods of the FBI—or at least
your own, since as the book itself states, “it’s how Wayne catches spies.” Following the trials
and tribulations that take place to fulfill this one goal—get this one man to identify a potential
spy he may or may not even know—over the course of months and even years gives the reader a
ground-level insight into just how much coordination, planning, analysis, and misdirection it
takes to investigate something at this level. There are a lot of moving parts involved, and getting
to follow several of them over the course of these events makes for a terribly compelling story.
I’ll remember this one for a long time, and I think most readers will feel the same.
P.S. So many have asked that if this book becomes a movie, who would play the lead?
Let’s see—I was 50 when it all took place, so who is 50 now, 6’1”, blue eyes, fit, and a boy from
Philly? I can only think of—Bradley Cooper. (Anybody know him?)