You get a really quick lesson in existence in the Infantry. It's and "either/or" thing -- either he's dead or you are. So when I came back to college after learning that shit I just wanted to finish and get on with life. Did that; went to -- Northern Illinois University! -- for a couple semesters of grad school, ran out of money, followed this chick to Ohio, married her (and am still married to her), took some courses at Kent State, finished grad school at Case Western Reserve, took about half another masters in writing at the U. of Akron, moved to Indiana (wife was now a lawyer and working at Notre Dame), moved to Northern Kentucky (or Cincinnati South), moved out here.

Yeah, I know Ohio, Illinois, Indiana, even Virginia and West Virginia. And DC and Maryland, too.

I just noticed: Kent State, NIU -- am I following massacres or something? Massacre Rocks State Park is just about 20 miles away (there weren't any massacre there, just the Shoshones ambushed some wagons and around 1930 somebody started calling it a massacre). Maybe it's me, huh?