For my first year of college, I took a random draw for roommates. I ended up in a room with two other guys, one from Minneapolis, and one from St. Louis. I was from a suburb South of Chicago. We got along pretty well, and we decided to keep the same group for second year.

I did not finish college on the four year plan, and almost two years later I enlisted in the US Air Force. After basic training at Lackland Air Force Base in Texas, I was assigned to technical training at Keesler Air Force Base in Biloxi, Mississippi. The barracks was three blocks from a beach on the Gulf of Mexico.

One day, for some reason, I was late for a meal at my normal mess hall, so I went to another one that was open a little later. Since it was late, there were not many folks there, maybe thirty, but one of them was my college roommate from Minneapolis!