Once upon a time, there was a little girl from the west side of Chicago, City of the Big Shoulders. And there was a little boy from Kekaha, Kaua‘i, a tiny town of big cane fields, part of that paradise called Hawai‘i.
The little girl grew up to attend the University of Wisconsin, in Madison, city, at the time, of Oscar Mayer and and the Rennebohm Drug Stores empire.
The little boy grew up and made his way to UW Madison as well. Then World War II broke out, and, after his freshman year of college, he was drafted, served for five years in Europe with the 82nd airborne, 504th paratroop infantry regiment, 3rd battalion, and survived 10 jumps from North Africa up to the Ardennes Forest.
When the Army finally let him go, he used the brand new GI Bill to return to Madison to finish his degree in political science. In between classes, he and his ex-military buddies used to frequent the renowned dining hall on the Badger campus known as Der Rathskeller.
One day, when the little girl was eating lunch with her sorority sisters in Der Rathskeller, the little boy came in with his buddies to drink near-beer by the trays-full since only 3% alcohol beer was served on campus. For a moment the battle-hardened veteran stopped short, unable to breathe, paralyzed by the beauty of the little girl.
Abandoning his pals, he walked over to the little girl’s table and said, “Stand up, and if you’re not taller than I am, I’ll take you to a movie.”
The little girl stood, and after discovering that she was a bit taller, the two went to see a movie anyway, she being instantly in mad love with the one whom she called, “the handsomest man I’d ever met.”
The little boy and the little girl married and moved to Honolulu, land of Lē‘ahi (aka Diamond Head) and of Waikīkī Beach. There they had their own little boy in Kapi‘olani Hospital, where Barack Obama would be born seven years later.
Their little boy grew up to earn his BA in English literature at the University of Hawai‘i. Pursuing graduate school, he applied to several schools and ended up, as fate may well have dictated, attending UW Madison.
As soon as he arrived on campus, he proceeded to Der Rathskeller where he sat and drank real beer, the rules about alcohol on campus having relaxed since 1945. Sitting there, he thought about his history. He’d come full circle, and he wondered how many people could visit the exact spot of their origin.
Lanning Lee 