Page 28 - YB1984

RAYMOND PHILLIPS For nearly all of my twenty-one years at Western Maryland I have sat at the same desk. T was a used desk when I got it, and it's a more used desk now. In fact, across its top lies scattered my life: manila folders holding letters from my childrens' colleges and from my lawyer, a letter from a son and a postcard from a former student, a grade book with class lists from as early as 1966, an ROTC caldendar, a list of neck exercises, some snapshots recently taken, a broken pipe, a wooden pencil holder shaped like a whale, a borrowed book, a battered American literature anthology, a letter opener my father first used in the 1930's, a Mother's Day card addressed but not yet sent, and more, much more. Most poeple would call my desk top a mess, and it is. From time to time, I try to bring order to my desk, and I succeed - for a week or so. The clutter returns, I endure it, then I attack the mess again. Somewhere in this process is my philosophy of life. Raymond Phillips 24