O’Rourke sat back and frowned at his older brother. The source of Michael’s severe dislike for the political hierarchy of Washington was deeply rooted. Ten years earlier, when Michael was a senior at the University of Minnesota, his life couldn’t have been better. He was captain of the nationally ranked hockey team, he had a great group of friends, a wonderful girlfriend, and he was on schedule to complete his history major.
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There wasn’t a gray cloud in Michael O’Rourke’s life.
Michael was about to learn, not for the first time, just how quickly life could change.
On a cold winter night, after one of his hockey games, his parents loaded two of
Michael’s three brothers and his little sister into the family Suburban and started their two-hour drive back to the O’Rourkes’ hometown of Grand Rapids in northern Minnesota.
About forty minutes from Grand Rapids, the large Suburban was hit head-on by a drunk driver who couldn’t keep his car on the other side of the yellow line. Michael’s sister, Katie, and his brothers Tommy and little Seamus survived the accident, but his parents didn’t. The loving parents of five children were dead-killed by a thirty-four- year-old man with six previous drunk-driving convictions.
The deaths of his parents shattered O’Rourke’s life. After graduating in the spring he joined the Marine Corps as his father and grandfather had done before him. After returning from the Gulf, he blew his knee out on a low- altitude nighttime training jump with his teton platoon.
Several of the lines on his main chute fouled, and with no time to pop the backup, O’Rourke thudded to the ground at, twice the normal speed.
The same knee he had injured in college buckled under the impact and crunched like an aluminum can. The young lieutenant underwent a complete reconstruction of his knee, and his career as a United States Marine was effectively ended. O’Rourke left the service and joined Senator Olson’s staff in Washington. Senator Erik Olson was a close friend of
Michael’s deceased parents. Michael looked at Washington through idealistic eyes and saw the new job as an opportunity to do something that would make a difference. Over the next five years Michael became one of the Senator’s most effective aides. He worked hard and fought not to fall into the trap of Washington apathy, but as time progressed, the behind-the-back dealings of the nation’s power brokers wore him down. Washington politics was a disgusting game that only a certain breed could play. Anyone with honor and integrity was worn down and spit out by the political machine of party politics.
Right about the time Michael was ready to quit and head back to Minnesota the congressional seat in his home district opened. Senator Olson encouraged him to run, telling him if the system really bothered him so much, he should try to do something about it. Michael took on the challenge, and with the backing of his grandfather and
Senator Olson, the young O’Rourke won the barely contested seat easily. That winter, before Michael had taken office, tragedy struck again. The death of another person close to him had forced O’Rourke to look at Washington in a different light, and any joy he felt over his recent victory vanished.
His two-year term as a freshman Congressman became a two-year sentence in a town he despised more and more every day. The phone started to ring, and Susan got up to get it. A moment later she poked her head back in the room. “Michael, your grandfather is on line one.”
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“I’ll take it in my office.” Michael walked back to his office and grabbed the phone.
“Hello, Seamus.” Seamus O’Rourke was the President and sole owner of the
O’Rourke Timber Company. Seamus’s father had started the company as a small lumberyard in 1918. When Seamus returned from fighting in World War II, he took over the company and turned the small mill into one of the largest timber companies in the
Midwest. Seamus was calling from the deck of the O’Rourkes’ home in Grand Rapids. It was located on Lake Pokegama, a beautiful island-dotted lake almost ten miles long.
The home was a gorgeous, modern log cabin set on the tip of a point that overlooked the largest bay on the lake. The seventy-two-year-old grandfather clutched the phone and took in the panoramic view of the sky blue lake and the bright fall colors. “Is everything all right, Michael?”
“Yes, everything’s fine.” Seamus leaned on the railing of the deck.
Grandpa O’Rourke didn’t look a day over sixty. He walked three miles every morning with his band of dogs, which included two Labs, a husky, and several others of mixed origin. The early-morning walks with his dogs weren’t the only thing that kept him looking young. Ten years earlier, the unfortunate death of his son and daughter-in-law had turned him into the de facto father of a twelve-year-old girl, two sixteen year-old twin boys, and Michael and Tim, who were in college at the time. Seamus took a drink of coffee and asked, “What do you think of the assassinations?”
Michael tapped a pencil on his desk calendar while he struggled to phrase his answer properly. “I’m torn. Part of me thinks it’s exactly what we need, and part of me is very uneasy about it.”
“I think that’s understandable,” replied Seamus in his deep voice.
“What did you think of the men that were killed?”
“I don’t think the founders of democracy would be sad to see them relinquish their seats of power.”
Seamus laughed slightly. “That’s for certain.” Michael spun his chair around and looked out the window. He could see the Washington Monument jutting upward in the distance. “Seamus,” Michael said uncomfortably.
“There is something I need to talk to you about. Are you still planning on coming to town this weekend?”
“Yes.” Seamus detected something.
“What’s wrong?”
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