I owe a lot to Dr. James McHenry.

No, he’s not my doctor. He’s not my professor, either. He’s not even my preacher.

He’s, well, a Marylander.

And he’s cool enough to have gotten an invite to the coolest party in town.

He even took notes — I know, because I’ve read them.

(Parts, anyway.)

You see, Dear Reader, Dr. James McHenry wasn’t just any Marylander; he was one of five to have represented the Old Line State at the Constitutional Convention in 1787.

This, obviously, was an experience that the good doctor knew he would never forget — but one, too, that he wanted the whole world to remember.

Three years ago — about a month before Election Day 2005 — I received an e-mail that I’ve kept stored away ever since.

It was a response to a letter to the editor I had written that same month upbraiding the administration for its laughable reaction — rather, lack thereof — to the Redbud Woods protesters who had stormed Day Hall and occupied then-President Lehman’s office the semester prior, only to then argue that the idea of being held accountable for their actions was so overrated.

“It’s often an Alice in Wonderland world here in Ithaca,” the e-mail read. “It’s obvious that I need to move to Texas, but I will put that off, I hope, for at least 4 more years.”

On the morning of Wednesday, Feb. 27, I sent Ryan Lavin ’09 an e-mail.

Ryan is the Executive Vice President of the Student Assembly, and, as such, it is his job to write up the assembly’s weekly agenda and send it out before the Thursday meeting. The smiling Southerner at the top of this page is an S.A. representative who wanted something on last week’s agenda — hence the e-mail.

Simple enough, right?

Alas, how wrong you are, Dear Reader, for how complicated this particular Wednesday would soon become! (Dun dun dun!)

Exactly 119 minutes after I sent Ryan my e-mail, yours truly got an e-mail back from another member of the S.A.

“You’ve established a good name for yourself over time,” the e-mail read — “and I'm afraid you’re about to throw it all away…”

Whoa, whoa, whoa — wait a minute. We’ve been back for two weeks and I haven’t once dropped by the Opinion section to give you even the tiniest tip of the Stetson yet?

Well.

Aren’t I the rude one.

Let me start February off right, then, by forgoing a tip and taking my hat off to you entirely.

I have, after all, been slanting the same sombrero in your direction for almost two years; that you want to keep me around for long enough to make that a whole two years surely deserves a little more than the standard salutation.

Now.

I don’t need to tell you that a lot has changed since you saw me last.

Happy Winter Break, Big Red!

’Tis the season — to be jolly, yes, but also to run for president.

(How’s that for a curveball?)

You see, Dear Reader, while most of America gets settled in around an open fire these next few weeks, chestnuts a-roastin’, Rudy, Hillary, Barack and Co. will instead be busy pursuing that grand quadrennial tradition of trying to push each other on that fire as both the Iowa caucuses and the New Hampshire primaries fast approach.

But wait! What’s that you say? You, too, think you have what it takes to lead this nation?

Then keep reading.

“The kids on the S.A. are hardworking and mean well, but the fact is that most Cornellians just don’t pay attention. When they do, they see the S.A. as a cage match’s worth of backbiting, infighting, self-aggrandizing Tracy Flicks.”

So wrote my friend and colleague Dave Wittenberg ’09 in his column “The End of the Student Assembly” (Oct. 24, 2007), anyway.

Why do I bring it up? Because this hardworking, well-meaning kid thinks that it’s high time he told his side of the story — and, yes, Dear Reader, you heard me right.

When yours truly is not visiting with you here in the realm of the Fourth Estate, I can most often be found doing the same with those representatives on — and those of y’all represented by — Cornell’s very own version of the Estates-General.

The term, Dear Reader, is jet-setter, a derivative of jet set.

The person it describes? Why, your humble columnist, of course.

Take it away, Wikipedia: “ ‘Jet set’ is a journalistic term” — [et cetera, et cetera] — “used to describe an international social group of wealthy people, organizing and participating in social activities all around the world that are unreachable to ordinary people.”

Do go on.

“The term, which replaced ‘café society’, came from the lifestyle of traveling from one stylish or exotic place to another via jet airplanes.”

Whoa! “Came from the lifestyle,” Wiki? Tsk, tsk, tsk. Some of us are still living it, old sport — that is, unless taking off to the U.K. for Fall Break doesn’t count for anything anymore.

Mm-hmm. Yeah.

Those of you who read my column last year will undoubtedly recall my partner in crime on these pages, Mr. Ari Rabkin ’06.

Ari and I published together every Thursday, and our columns were, consequently, never more than a crossword puzzle away from each other.

Both regular patrons of Risley Dining, the two of us would often run into one another at different times throughout the week in this shared domain with copies of a given day’s Sun and our respective demitasses in hand.

Conversation inevitably ensued.

I will never forget what Ari told yours truly during one conversation in particular.