UMD 

 The University of Minnesota Duluth, what a beautiful campus

overlooking Lake Superior, I went there in the spring of 75. I

was fortunate and was able to get a bed in the village which was

a cluster of mobile home type structures on campus. They had one

bedroom at each end of the unit that 2 people shared. The one that

I was in had a beautiful view of the lake and I used to love to

watch the sunrise over the lake with all its grandeur and the colors

of a masterpiece, the awakening of a new day. My roommates were

some nice guys, they were seniors and I was a freshman so it

took a little while to get used to each other. It was harder for

Bono my roommate, because his roommate from the previous quarter

wasn't going to school and he had thought he was going to have

the room all to himself. So I understood his position and I

didn't make it easy in the beginning because I made a couple of

rules that we were going to live by. He was a really good guy

and I hope all has gone well in his life. The rules, well the

first was that we were going to take turns cleaning the shower

and that it was going to get cleaned on a regular basis. The

other, well I kept and old tennis shoe by my bed and if late at

night it got too loud, well generally saying be quiet was enough 

but the shoe always worked. I do remember we had a great food fight

once in the house, it was our side against the other side. Bono 

also kept a bird feeder outside the front door and Morning and 

Evening Grosbeaks would come by dressed in their fancy colored

attire for their meal.

 Well back to business, one of my classes was about Roman History 

and one day while following the lecture along in the text book, we 

were listening to a story about what the Romans would do when 

things would get to screwed up and the politicians couldn't get it

together. Well some things haven't changed, politicians being

lost. What they would do is suspend the rules for 6 months and

pull someone off the street and let them rule while the Senators

got there act together. While the professor was talking about it

my teacher/tormentor said "and you can't run away from this". I

said I'm not going to be that hard, but now that the time is

almost upon us, I can say I have tried to run away. I can relate

to Jonah, though I'm afraid you will not respond the same way

the Ninevites did. When Jonah showed up unannounced and spoke

against the city, the King ordered everyone to put on sack cloth

and repent. I came announced, and the Church and others don't want

to hear. They foolishly think they can not listen and it will go

away. I have sort of gotten used to what will happen to me as much 

as a person can anyway. My fear is for those of you who hear but 

will not listen, who will see but will not change. It is those who 

will fulfill what I just wrote, that I feel the most sorry for.

 We had an assignment for the class to write a paper on a topic 

of our choosing. While wandering around the Library looking up

different topics about Roman history I started to get "the feeling".

Then I was lead toward the subject of Ciscero and while paging through 

a book on his life the voice said "and you will be like Ciscero". He

was a famous Orator in ancient Rome and gave advice to politicians

and the people. This is something that I will do, is to give advice to

people, nations and individuals, and those who listen will fair better

than those who don't.

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