Reporter Colleen Kenney interviewed incumbent Councilman Jon Camp about his hope to represent  District 2 on the City Council for a third term. In his own words:

I grew up at 3750 Washington St.

My parents bought the house in 1949, a few weeks after I was born.

It was a one-story house. It was very ordinary. My brother and I shared a room. He’s five years younger than I am. Later in junior high, I moved down to the basement.

They were tiny bedrooms, I tell you. I drive by the house periodically.

In the basement, I had my little desk to study at. I had a three-drawer file cabinet where I meticulously filed things. I probably had a few political posters up.

The worst job I ever had was sorting (returned) pop bottles at Safeway when I was in high school. I remember spending time in the back room sorting them, and there was lots of broken glass.

My favorite movie is “The Unsinkable Molly Brown” with Debbie Reynolds. It was the first movie I took my hard-earned money from working as a (newspaper) carrier and at Safeway to go and see twice. I took my parents to it, because it was so inspirational. It was a story about a person who came from total poverty and just had so much drive to her. The real Molly Brown survived the Titanic. Oh, what a story.

We were in a bad auto accident Christmas Day, 1968. My dad and mom and I were coming back from Kearney. It was just horrendous weather.

The last words to my parents were, “Wake me up if you want me to drive.”

The next thing I knew, it was two weeks later and I’d awakened from a coma at an Air Force hospital in San Antonio, Texas. (Camp had been attending the Air Force Academy in Colorado Springs.)

My dad lived six more days and died on New Year’s Eve. My mother was killed instantly. I had broken my neck and was paralyzed. I would have died. But that saved my life, what the Air Force did.

I was 19. I don’t remember anything about the accident. Probably self-preservation or protection by my body, my neurological system, to not let me have those bad memories.

I still have weakness on my right side. My hand doesn’t operate. My right foot drops, and a lot of people notice. It took me years of recovery. But I learned different ways to pace myself, and mask it. The way I shake hands, it’s hard for me to get my fingers around, get them curled up. So I just learned a different way to do it. As I get older, my limp is becoming more pronounced.

Unfortunately, I tend to work too much. And my hobby, whenever anybody asks, I try to say in a humble way is traveling.

One of the most fantastic places was the island chain of Tonga in the South Pacific. My brother likes to sail, so we rented a sailboat and four of us went around for two weeks sailing there. It was heaven on Earth.

My dream guest at a dinner party? Probably my parents. It’d be so nice to give them a big hug. I didn’t do it as much as I should have growing up. I was embarrassed, especially since it was the ’60s and wasn’t a cool thing to do.

I’d like to have Abraham Lincoln, too. I always thought he led such an interesting life, so many failures before ultimate success.

My favorite building (in Lincoln) is the Apothecary Building because I was so privileged to restore it to its original splendor.

I think I need to somehow share with people that I do have a much lighter side. They take me too seriously. Unfortunately, the attorney in me comes out at times, and I come across as being a little stern.

There’s a part inside of me a lot of people don’t understand, that I have empathy. It may be out of self-protection, but I put up that protecting shield. And yet I do have some very deep feelings about the community, and the people.

Reach Colleen Kenney at 473-2655 or ckenney@journalstar.com.