âWater is the best of things,â wrote the Greek poet Pindar, and surely he was right.
I grew up on water. Just a stoneâs throw from the Ottertail River, I would spend my summer days fishing for panfish and pike in the morning, and swimming all afternoon. By mid-July my skin was so dark, visitors to our little Scandinavian community would ask my mother if I was adopted.
âNo,â she would reply, âbut he is half fish, just like his grandpa.â
Grandpa Ralph was the one most responsible for my early love of water. Each year, as summer approached, he would take me downtown and tell the barber to shave my head. âThat much,â he would say, indicting ¼ inch with his thumb and forefinger. Then he would turn to me and wink, âYou will swim like a feather and dive like a stone.â
A student at Viterbo University in La Crosse, Wisconsin, claims she had been the victim of racist incidents, including arson. However, police discovered that the alleged victim of framed hate crimes was the one caught on surveillance video starting the fire in the university’s residence hall.
Viterbo University student Victoria Unanka is reported to have texted a friend on April 18, claiming that a small fire started in the girl’s residence hall must have been directed towards herself because it began in the next room over. More…