CHANGE OF ADDRESS

"WE MUST BE OVER THE RAINBOW!" Remember when Dorothy said that to Toto, right after she said, "Toto, I don't think we're in Kansas anymore."

At least we're back in the land of the 74___ zip codes.

It's been weeks since I've tried to actually type a sentence or paragraph much less an entire essay. We've been in a sort of self-induced whirlwind. We had often talked about where we might settle for our "golden" years. Tulsa, Oklahoma, is our home. Maybe that's where we should land. But, can you go home again? We left there in the early 70s as newlyweds for parts west, returning to Tulsa often for visits, still feeling like it was home.

The question was not only where, but when.

Then the real estate market blew up and we decided to see if we could step in and get our share of the madness. We reached out to a young man that we've known for years to seek his advice as a real estate pro. He studied our situation and said we should list the house for this amount. "That's crazy" I said, "No one will pay that!" He confidently countered that this would only be the beginning, that in all likelihood, we would get multiple offers for more. The next day his prediction came true. And the next day we were smack in the middle of a Dorothy-esque tornado.

Tulsa called. Reason whispered. Then from the advice of our mentor, we decided to move to Shawnee, Oklahoma. The pieces began to fall into place and peace was restored. We're now in our new home.The only downside, and it was a huge one--the move took us a bit further from our other kids and four grands. It's not like they're in another state. We'll make up for the distance somehow.

I was telling a young friend about our move. "Why Shawnee?" He asked. I explained that our oldest son and his family live there and we've moved there to become a burden to our kids. He told me his parents had just moved near them from Idaho. One day his dad was offering more help than he needed. His dad explained, "Jerrod, remember we've moved here to be a blessing to you."

Blessing or burden? I keep watching episodes of "Everybody Loves Raymond" hoping to learn how not to be THOSE parents.

I'm also hoping to be a good citizen of our new community. This is actually my second shot as a Shawneeite, or is it Shawneeian, or Shawnoid. My first experience here was as a freshman at the university where our son now teaches. It didn't end well. I was encouraged by the administration to find a new school for my sophomore year. I'm somewhat more mature now. Hopefully, I'll get to stay this time.

Over the years I've lived in Tulsa, Jenks, El Reno, Hinton, Oklahoma City and now Shawnee for the second time. Looking back, Dorothy was right: "There's no place like home."

This would have been much easier to write about and celebrate a few weeks ago, before we saw the faces of refugees forced to leave their homes, not knowing where home might be even the next day. How to respond?

Maybe if I'm just really, really, really grateful for a home, the guilt will be lighter. Maybe if I stand atop the shaky soapbox of moral superiority. Maybe if I reflect on a work-ethic, self-discipline, responsibility and a relative frugality. Maybe if I read a Joel Osteen book. Maybe if I give money to the Red Cross or hand a few bucks to the guy on the corner. Maybe if I polish my own bootstraps which I mistakenly might assume I pulled myself up with. Maybe if I pray for the refugees, the homeless, and the least of these.

Questions born out of confusion and desperation are as old as mankind. Here's the answer I always come back to:

"He's already made it plain how to live, what to do, what God is looking for in men and women.
It's quite simple: Do what is fair and just to your neighbor, be compassionate and loyal in your love,
And don't take yourself too seriously—take God seriously."
--Micah 6:8.

Hopefully it is also okay to wish for the demise of evil, dehumanizing tyrants.

Going Home Again

“You can only be young once. But you can always be immature.”

— Dave Barry

My father was once pastor of a Baptist Church in Tulsa, Oklahoma. Looking back, I probably didn’t make it easy for him or my mom, the pastor’s wife. I think I was just about Sixteen at the time. Do I need to say more?

There are witnesses to the fact that I may have been at most obnoxius stage of life; to this point. As I slide into full-blown senior adulthood though, it could be that my worst self is yet to come.

"Like I said, things never turn out exactly the way you planned. Growing up happens in a heartbeat. One day, you're in diapers; next day, you're gone. But the memories of childhood stay with you for the long haul. I remember a place... a town... a house... like a lot of other houses; a yard like a lot of other yards; on a street like a lot of other streets. And the thing is... after all these years, I still look back... with wonder." From The Wonder Years.

---

Now about this church in Tulsa. They have something now they didn’t have when I was a teenager there — a Facebook page. I’m a “follower”. Chronicled on the church’s FB page is a sort of reinvention for the church, which is something that probably could have happened to me during my few years there—reinvention that is.

I found myself a little troubled about the church’s actions, something they called a “reboot”, which included redesigning the church auditorium and changing the church’s name (for heaven’s sake). Why should it matter to me? I only spent a few years there, but they were important years. My dad and mom though, gave all there.

I think this is why it matters. It’s not as though the reboot necessarily does away with the seeds my folks planted there so long ago. It’s just hard sometimes when the bedrock stuff of your life shifts. Not long ago we drove down the street where I spent most of my growing up years. Our little house is gone now, and the Bordens Cafeteria where I can remember getting fried chicken with mashed potatoes and gravy for Sunday lunch has been replaced by a “dollar” store.

My folks are 92 and 89. My mom still checks “The Facebook” from time to time, when they have a good wireless connection at the assisted living village. If they have taken note of the changes at the church, they haven’t mentioned it. Probably they would see it as progress, and therefore, cause for thankfulness. They are like that.

For me I have the memories: like playing that little game during the sermon where you match up song titles from the hymnal to see what funny combinations you can come up with. My personal favorite: “Have Thine Own Way!” & “O, Why Not Tonight?!” And, I remember the wonderful people there who served with humility. I remember the man who taught my Sunday School class and wrapped up every, single lesson with this: “Now, boys, the lesson in a nutshell is…”

Maybe the point of this essay in a nutshell is this:

"You can't go back home to your family, back home to your childhood ... back home to a young man's dreams of glory and of fame ... back home to places in the country, back home to the old forms and systems of things which once seemed everlasting but which are changing all the time – back home to the escapes of Time and Memory." — from the book, You Can’t Go Home Again by Thomas Wolfe

Having A Place

HOME SWEET HOME. You have to love a band that would call themselves Edward Sharpe and the Magnetic Zeros. No doubt you've heard their music, at least the song called, "Home" with a chorus that says, "Home is wherever I'm with you." That's a sentiment I can appreciate.

I know for a lot of people having a place seems important. Maybe there's something agrarian in their blood, or maybe that's just normal. After all, some of mankind's earliest stories are about a people seeking a Promised Land. And now, a bazillion years later they're still fighting over whose dirt is whose.

On the other end of the spectrum is the "this earth is not my home, I'm only passing through" crowd; also a sentiment I can appreciate. Back in 1972, a guy named Larry Norman made a record called, "Only Visiting This Planet". He was an important person for me back then.

As I mentioned in a post a few days back called, Coming of Age in 1969, I was swept up in the whole "give peace a chance" deal. Larry was one of the catalytic characters for a bunch of us who wanted to shake things up and saw in Jesus a model we could identify with: universal love, pacifism, radical worldview, etc. So the "Jesus Freak" became a part of the counter-culture movement.

One of the prevailing themes of the day (at least in my memory of it) was to be good stewards and caretakers of this big round ball that is our temporary home. Communal living and farming became grand experiments in the new paradigm.

Today, there is something very familiar in the air (and I'm not talking about the air in Colorado and Washington). Every time I go to Whole Foods® for groceries, there's a wash of nostalgia--young guys with full beards and flannel shirts, young moms with a baby swaddled to themselves. There is one big difference though: back in the day, the girls wore long dresses and beads. Today they wear yoga pants (regardless of their size) and a North Face® pullover.

The magazines on the rack by the cashier have to do with organic cooking and raising chickens rather than the public and private lives of pop culture's finest. I'm a sucker for subliminal advertising and I will admit right here that if our fair city of Oklahoma City had passed a recent consideration to allow us gated-community suburbanites to raise a couple of chickens, I would be building my coop as we speak. It didn't pass.

And it's not just places like Whole Foods®. The other day I was in Lowes® home improvement store. On the rack with books about building your own deck or converting your den into a garage was a book on raising goats. This was something I know something about. I had a goat when I was young. His name was Cocoa. I'm not sure what ever happened to him. I don't remember seeing him after my Uncle David, who had lived for years in Corpus Christie introduced us to a delicacy called the fajita.

While I do enjoy having a place to call my own, I believe that Woody Guthrie was right; in a sense. "This Land Is Your Land; This Land Is My land" sort of; at least for a while longer. However, I would be perfectly happy to hook to the Airstream® (once we own one), and with my Amazing Missus head off on some nomadic adventure, swapping stories and good food in the wayfaring commune of other adventurers.