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I knew it was coming. I’d heard. I’d seen the handwriting on the wall. With gas prices approaching $4 a gallon in Columbia, it was inevitable. Then I saw it, buried on page 8A of the April 29 Daily Herald. It was naturally overshadowed by the devastating storm deaths and damage in the area and by all the hurting Bama folks driving north to find gas (at any price). The headline screamed, “EXXON makes $11 billion.” I read the brief Associated Press article from New York. I chuckled, gloomily, upon reading the first paragraph that contained the phrase that the oil maggot (not a misprint) “practically apologized for it.” The implication is that they didn’t really apologize, but they almost did…they thought about it, then reconsidered. I know what it means to apologize. You simply come out and say you’re sorry. Then, if the sorry-ness is sincere, you take steps to remedy the situation in favor of the person, or in this case people, to whom the apology was appropriately directed.

The news report goes on to indicate that the petroleum giant (monsterish, not just huge) sensed “public outrage” and “struck a defensive posture.” The really ludicrous part came a little later when the company complained that it “doesn’t even make that much money selling gasoline.” The article concluded with EXXON’s whine stating it was “not to blame for high gas prices.” I wanted to ask their corporate bosses if they would like a little cheese with that…Corporate bosses? Those just might be the big dogs that decide NOT to funnel, shall we say $10 billion, back to citizens by lowering pump prices at their gas stations all over the nation. A dime would help, or a dollar or two perhaps? Why not just stop the upward spiral?

My perspective as I fill up at the tank may be a little fuzzy. I think I’ve done my part by purchasing vehicles that get over 30 mpg on the highway. I have this image in my mind of the limo-chauffeured oil executives laughing all the way to the bank as they deposit those billions (yes, I know all that actually happens electronically and the corporate heads of EXXON probably haven’t seen the inside of a bank in decades). I have it on good authority (my own whimsy) that a normal conversation (whether texted or while sitting in plush, oversized, leather chairs in a board room – possibly in Cancun) between execs might go something like this: (names changed to protect the guilty) “Hey, Joe, how’s the lobbying going for our excessive first-quarter profits?” “Great, Charlie, got a study ready to roll out that shows our stocks are excellent investments for public pension plans.” “Marvelous! What about casting ourselves as the Scapegoats of Washington?” “Good idea. Then we could claim that the massive federal subsidies we receive, (under his breath Charlie whispers) that multiply our profits, of course, (returning to full conversational volume) are legitimate because they keep jobs at home.” “That’s right. We can suggest we don’t even make much money on selling gasoline.” “We need to publicize all the tax dollars that we contribute to the economy.” Yada, yada, yada…

My fuzziness continues…Last time I googled it (just now) the idea of “profits” is what we have left to stick in our pockets as discretionary income after paying all the bills (actually I just made up that definition). That’s the way my budget operates anyway. So my thought is this, “Hey, Charlie, yo, Joe…how about giving back.” Their response would probably be something like, “We raise pump prices because we can. The public is so reliant on gasoline that they will pay whatever. Besides, gas is still cheaper in the U.S. than anywhere else.” I can hear them laughing as they board the corporate jet for the second-quarter pow-wow in Tahiti.

No Place Like It in the World!

Dorothy may have been a little slow in the catching-on-department, but by the end of her excursion into, through, out of, and back to the Emerald City, she was repeating the phrase, “There’s no place like home; there’s no place like home…” Whether following a golden road with a couple of guys made of straw and tin and a chicken lion; riding a hot air balloon with a bogus sham wizard; or clicking ruby-slippered heels together three times (btw: they were silver in the original L. Frank Baum book); returning home after any trip can be extremely gratifying (whether a weekend getaway to your alma mater for a quick visit with a grandchild or a 30-day solo adventure to the Arctic Ocean). Home means the familiar positioning of favorite foods in pantry and fridge; the desktop pc that connects easily and efficiently to email or Facebook accounts; that plush, oversized recliner properly positioned for television viewing, reading, or snoozing; and, of course, YOUR pillow that attaches perfectly under head and neck to allow for a night’s serenity…all indicate the marvels of just being home.

It’s been inadequately yet domestically stated that, “Home is where the heart is.” Perhaps you’ve heard, “Home is where, when you have to go there, they have to take you in.” I’ve called a lot of places “home” in my 62 years. I began my life, so I’ve been told (even read it on my birth certificate), in Washington, D.C. During my first few years of existence, I supposedly followed (I didn’t have a vote) my reporter Dad and stay-at-home Mom as they barnstormed ‘cross country from our nation’s capitol to Huntington, West Virginia; South Bend, Indiana (never quite became an Irish fan); and Aberdeen, South Dakota. When I was three years old, we finally settled in New Orleans. I lived there for my school daze from kindergarten through grade 11 – longer than I’ve lived any one other place. Twelfth grade and college were spent in Searcy, Arkansas. Upon my marriage to my wife Delores, over 40 years ago, the home shifts – mostly career-related greener-pasture searches – continued to be extreme.

During those next three decades we were “at home” in Augusta, Arkansas; Ironton, Missouri; Shreveport, Louisiana; Tulsa, Oklahoma; Dallas, Texas; Phoenix, Arizona; San Angelo, Texas; Jackson, Tennessee; and finally to our house here in Columbia, Tennessee.

We’ve arrived over our rainbow! It only took us slightly longer than Toto’s mistress to decide our hearts have finally landed for good. Now completing our 13th year (lucky number for us) in the same house in this town that nicely mixes tradition, charm, and progress, we believe we are here to stay. No, our new hometown, like us and all our friends, is far from perfect; but we enjoy a quiet neighborhood (except when the public transport van backs up activating it's ear-piercing alarm as it picks up our neighbor at 5:30 a.m. three daze a week), loving church family, the conveniences of Nashville (including an airport to fly us to our seven grandkids who live in four different states), and are both in jobs for which we actually like getting out of bed each day.

So what is home really? Perhaps it’s just a place; or maybe a mindset – comfortable and comforting at the same time – where the “lions and tigers and bears, oh my” won’t get you (did you know there are actually 40 "Oz" books with the first 14 written by Baum). For certain it’s all about the people. As Dorothy told the good witch Glinda describing what she had learned from her yellow-brick trek through Oz, “If I ever go looking for my heart’s desire again, I won't look any farther than my own backyard.” Moles and ruts and dandelions aside, my Columbia yard has become very special...I’m HOME and there's no place like it in the world!

The Loneliest Day of the Year

‘Twas the day before Easter and all through the house…We’ve all known lonely times – times when we seem not to have any friends; times when the world closes in and dark clouds seem more prevalent than normal. Recently I was pondering one such day. No, it wasn’t a day that occurred in my life. I wasn’t even alive on that day. It was a memorable day in my imagination, though. This past Easter weekend I was thinking of what just might have been the loneliest day ever…of any year!

As many do at Easter, I reflected on the tragic events of that Friday long ago. The arrest, trial, conviction, whips, thorns, purple robe, nails, wood, cross, and spear all playing their roles in the dastardly crime. At best the world was executing a kind and wise prophet. At worst…the Messiah, the Son of God. Having died on that Skull Hill tree, my Savior was laid to rest in a newly hewn tomb. A large stone was put in place, sealed, and guarded. The soldiers stationed there were the best the Romans had in Israel. This had to be the end of this talk of insurrection. That “third day promise” of resurrection must never be allowed to happen. It wouldn’t! Not if the government had anything to say about it…

Sunday morning came to shed its light on sleeping guards, a moved stone, folded grave clothes, and an empty burial cave. The victory had come. He is risen! But what about Saturday?

I think the Saturday before Easter, that Passover Day, those hours connecting the horrors of Friday and the exultation of Sunday, just might have been the loneliest day of that year…or any other…for those lost and distressed followers of Jesus of Nazareth. Who were they? How did they spend that Saturday?

Nicodemus and Joseph of Aramathea, the burial team, probably went into hiding perhaps thinking they were next on the Sanhedrin’s hit list. They had been so close to eternity. What had gone wrong?

The ladies who watched Jesus breathe His last on the front row near the foot of the cross probably stayed together as a group finding solace in each other’s distress. Mary, the mother of the dead man, may have been taken to John’s Jerusalem home for a time of private mourning.

The apostles were now 11 in number, their ranks thinned by the traitorous act of Judas Iscariot for 30 pieces of silver. Neither Peter nor any of the rest of them even wanted to know what had become of that betrayer. They probably never saw the rope that stretched his neck in that successful suicide. They hid out in the shadows and allies of the darkened Jerusalem streets. Some may have returned to Gethsemane’s Garden on the slopes of the Mount of Olives finding comfort in the place where they had slept while the Master prayed. One by one they straggled back together possibly to the same upper room that had been the setting for one last supper many hours earlier. Wherever they spent that Saturday, no doubt it was with the misery and grief of absolute failure. They had all forsaken Him in that direst of hours.

Fortunately for them and for us, the loneliness of that Saturday gave way to the dawning of a new day. Sunday morning broke gloriously: a message from an angel to grave-visiting ladies in distress who became messengers of hope. A race to see the rolled-away stone only to find neatly folded mummy wraps. A case of mistaken identity in the garden looking for Jesus…and finding Him! Many were the miracle moments of that Easter Sunday. The followers, the family members, in fact the whole world…would never be the same.

No, there may never have been a lonelier day than the Saturday on which God’s Son lay in a cold, dark crypt forsaken by His Father. What about that heavenly Father? I suspect angels steered clear of heaven’s monarch for most of that time. Perhaps God chose to be alone, not trusting His emotions. Resisting the temptation to summon Michael and the angel army to destroy everyone who had stood against Jesus. Whatever His Majesty did that Saturday, He didn’t forget His Son or us. The rescue plan conceived before the cross, before the virgin birth, before the flood, before Eden, before time…that plan for the salvation of mankind had come to fruition. Why? Because… “God so loved the world that He gave His one and only Son that whoever believes in Him shall not perish but have eternal life.”

It was the best of times…it was the worst of times! It was the loneliest of days…