The book of Ecclesiastes in the Holy Bible says, "For everything there is a season. ..." Robert Frost wrote my favorite poem, in which he says, "Two roads diverged in a wood. ... And I, I took the one less traveled and that made all the more difference."
During Spring Break, I journeyed to Washington, D.C. While working in a homeless shelter there, I realized something about life. It is time to stop looking to others to make a difference.
Susan B. Anthony, Mahatma Ghandi, Nelson Mandela, Barbara Jordan, Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., Jomo Kenyetta, David Ben Guiron, Billy Graham, George Washington, Abraham Lincoln, Franklin Delano Roosevelt and Robert E. Lee all saw they could make a difference.
Making a difference means taking a leap of faith. It means sticking your neck out and standing up. It means speaking out when others wish to be silent.
Dr. King said in 1967, "Our generation will be held accountable, not just for the sins of the heinous acts of those who commit evil and intolerance in society, but also for the good and decent and honorable people who choose to remain silent in face of all of it!"
Therefore, today will be my final "On the Journey," at least for now.
I have decided to stick my neck out, to stand up and speak out.
I am declaring my candidacy for president of Student Government Association.
It is a leap of faith, because I am resigning my position with The Daily Helmsman.
My editors and I, however, feel it would place me in an unfair position of free publicity while also placing the paper in an unfair question of bias if I were to work here and run for SGA president.
I will miss all my friends at The Daily Helmsman. I would like to think if I did anything with this column, I made you think.
One of the chief complaints about our generation -- and I think it is unfair -- is that we do not care.
That somehow we are a lethargic and apathetic generation. Yet in essence, through this column I saw gun control, the ills of society, the question of salvation through Christ and service in the military debated in your letters to the editor.
If it was a catalyst for you to review your life, to take the road of life less traveled and make a difference, it was all worth it!
