"I'm a volunteer. These are my resume-building years."

• Cartoon reminds me of my time as a volunteer, intern and staff assistant in three United States Senators' offices, 1974-1977, commencing at the tender age of 17.5.  
• Learning from wise mentors, it built my character.  Service was free at first, then modestly paid.  
• Honored and privileged to have worked for three ethical, honorable Democratic U.S. Senators, Ted Kennedy (D-Mass.), Gary Warren Hart (D-Colo.). and James R. Sasser (D-Tenn.).  
• I started my first internship with EMK the day before my first class at Georgetown University.  
• I was a volunteer, just as my dad was when he volunteered for the U.S. Army the day after Pearl Harbor.
• Got the gig thanks to my late Aunt Helen, through a fellow Georgetown undergraduate, a Navy SEAL veteran, Terry, who was the son of my Aunt Helen's  Philadelphia Inquirer classified ad-taking colleague, Vera. 
• Within days of the resignation of President Richard Milhous Nixon, I volunteered to work in the mailroom of Senator Ted Kennedy,
• It was the morning after I saw and heard my boyhood,hero, consumer advocate Ralph Nader, speak to our incoming freshmen class at Georgetown's Gaston Hall on the Feast of Saint Augustine (August 28, 1978).
• I am blessed and grateful for all of the wonderful people from whom I have learned!