Journal 9

It was the beginning of January when a recruiter from the U.S. ski troops showed a film to the students. Leper was very interested in this idea. He was ecstatic at the idea of being able to do something he enjoys that will ultimately better the war. I heard him say to Gene after the presentation, “How do you like that!” I wasn’t sure if he would actually take action and sign up for the job until he said, “I’m going to enlist in these ski troops.” Within a blink of an eye time flew by and Leper was gone. The group occasionally met in the Butt Room, this is where we all hung out. We read newspaper about the war and discuss about how we think Leper is doing. Besides hanging out in the Butt Room the weekends were pretty boring. When Gene and I were in our dorm one night I said to him, “You know what we’d better do next Saturday?” I paused, “We’d better organize the Winter Carnival.” He said that there’s never been a winter carnival I told him that there is now. I explained to him that we had to have snow statues, food, and music. He said that he’d take care of the snow statues. Gene took care of convincing Brinker to come as well I don’t know how he did it but he did. Brinker brought cider along with his roommate Brownie.  Chet also came he played the trumpet for the Winter Carnival. A lot of other people came to I think it was the prizes that attracted them. We had several different prizes from dictionaries to hand woven rope ladders. After the ski jump was down getting put together, the games began. Then halfway through the Winter Carnival Gene got a telegram from someone. I thought it was the winter Olympics asking for Gene but he thought otherwise. He took the letter from me faced the other way and read it to himself. His face while reading the telegram was shocked yet concerned. I wish he would have let me read it.