"HEY, WHEN ARE WE GOING TO GET OUT OF HERE?"

                                                 "Headed Home"
************************
"AND GO HOME!"
************************

A good question.

Along about 1974, there were some really nice new brick homes for sale, out Comanche and way past Tramway Rd! The builder was a top-notch, talented, quality individual. We always wanted one of his houses, especially the white slab brick one, but were as poor as Job's turkey.

Across the street from our coveted house, was a four bedroom, reddish brick---a nice one--- and our friend, a gov't. employee bought it!

A great story follows. Simple, but great, to me anyway, for I am a "place oriented" guy. I love familiar surroundings. I love home. Can't help it; that's just the way it is.

So P.J. (we'll call him), one happy Saturday, moved into his fine new red brick home, with his wife, and his little boy, Eddie.

After a long, laborious day (we've all been there), of getting mostly moved in, some stuff put away, and the beds set up, P.J. was tucking little five year old Eddie into bed in his strange new bedroom. After he talked to the little boy a bit, he hugged him, turned on the night lite, and started out the door.

The little boy said: "Hey, Dad, when are we gonna get out of here?" P.J. turned and said "What do you mean?" Eddie replied: "I mean, when are we gonna get out of here...AND GO HOME?"

I felt the same way once, when we moved out of our little "early marriage" home of twenty-four years. The boys had grown up there. When we brought little brand-new, bundled-up Brian home from the hospital, that cold November day, right before Kennedy was shot, little Alan was standing out front, scuffing his toe, waiting to see his new brother. All the growing up through the years and family stuff that went on there. Like the poet Khalil Gibran said, "Too many fragments of the spirit have I scattered..." (in this place). Yes, I did hate to leave there; I knew how little Eddie felt!

People who are "citizens of the world," and love to travel---are to be admired! Me...I'm not a traveler. I relax better, sleep better, eat better, digest better, read better, write better---name it---and I do it better at home!

I once had a job that necessitated that I be away from home weeks at a time. I often sat in five-day-long daylight to bedtime meetings, where people talked. I was in hotel rooms. I, like little Eddie, thought a lot of times: "When am I gonna get out of here...and go home?"

Now I will tell you a funny thing: people have said to me---"Don't you LIKE to travel?" They've got to be kidding me! I say to them, "More power to you if you like to stand in airport lines, sleep in hard hotel beds, in stinky rooms, with strange pillows, and freeze under one blanket!" But me---I figured for years how I could GET HOME---now I'm not about to try to figure out ways to LEAVE!

No, sir. I'm with little Eddie!

********30********
BY MIL
10/08/12




Sent from my iPad