One man's pornography is another man's home

I was sitting in the Milwaukee airport when I found a piece of paper in my pocket, a Bible verse from Sunday school. It was Ecclesiastes 5:12 “The sleep of a laboring man [is] sweet, whether he eat little or much: but the abundance of the rich will not suffer him to sleep.” which explains why over 80 million Americans get less than six hours of the required eight hours sleep. Americans are wealthy by the world’s standards and according to some statistics we each have at least 1.3 houses, two cars and cholesterol levels high enough to start a grease fire.

And now the housing market has tanked, health care costs are daunting, oil prices are rising and we wonder how long before the Chinese cut off our credit. You lie in bed at night with the covers pulled up to your chin, your eyes wide open wondering if you should learn to speak Mandarin.

Sitting beside me waiting for the boarding call was a gentleman looking at real estate ads in a newspaper. He was holding up a full page advertisement for a $12.5M home and appeared to be ogling it. Aware I was watching him he turned and said “I’m in real estate. From Chicago.” He grinned, “This is like pornography to me!” You smile and quietly move to another row of seats.

I was raised in Greenville, NC in a $20K 3BR, 1B ranch style house with one large picture window that looked directly into the picture window of the neighbors across the street. But I saw beyond that--- all the way to New York City where I imagined I use to live with my real parents, Charles and Adelle Jacquard, famous actors from France who were involved in a train accident that left them with amnesia and not knowing who I was they gave me up for adoption to a group of Baptists. I would imagine my early years in Manhattan playing in my cathedral ceiling bedroom and my sophisticated celebrity mother rushing in wearing a black formal dress, a red feather boa around her neck holding a martini glass in one hand saying “Bonjour, mon cher!”

But the Baptist family I grew up with shunned elegance. There were peanuts, small toys and loose change beneath the couch cushions and clothes scattered about the house. If the door bell rang announcing guests, we exploded off the couch, everyone picked up debris, hurled it into the bedrooms and we shoved the dog out the back door.

I lived afraid that people may realize we lacked sophistication and so I never got close to anyone. I was drawn to blues singers and gypsies, always moving about, constantly looking over my shoulder. It was a lonely life. I wished to be wealthy.
But one day I realized I no longer yearned for a $14.8 M Cape Cod mansion with 6BR, 7B, 2LR, Guest House and a scenic ocean view. Instead I was a father buying Pokémon cards and attending PTA meetings.

Now I live in a house with 1WIFE, 3BR, 2B and 1DOG.
My cell phone rings. It’s my wife and she says “Hi, miss you. What time will you be home?”

What a wonderful question.

To be missed and longed for---God’s gift to both rich and poor—like cold water or flirting.

The humble home proper—what a blessing. Without it life would be nomadic and you would be nowhere at any point in time, neither “gone” nor “returning”.

But right now I’m 30,000 feet in the air thinking about my recliner, sweet kisses and a pampered dog. I’ll be home soon. Bonjour, mon cheri!