Rushing's Ramblings

Driving down the toll road from the Ft Lauderdale airport to my former next-door neighbor's house recently brought happy anticipation mixed with sadness. It had been almost 4 years since I drove in South Florida. It was my first time back since retiring and moving to another state. Each mile brought a particular memory of the 12 years I had spent in the area. I wanted to see dear friends I badly missed and one adored friend lying in a coma. Little did I know then that she would die shortly after I told her goodbye one last time. I thought about other friends I would not see because they had died in the past three years. Had I known that I would not be seeing them again in this lifetime, I would have hugged them a little tighter and expressed gratitude to them for being in my life. My former neighborhood is unchanged, but the surrounding area, once part of the Everglades decades ago, is filled with new housing developments, golf courses, and businesses. People have replaced al...

I was born with a healthy dose of wanderlust and have shaken off most of it in the past few years. Age has something to do with losing the drive to wander all over the planet, but it is more likely from being back in my home state of Texas after being gone for too many years.   I couldn't wait to leave my childhood home in the Texas Panhandle, as I was bored to tears. At the time, I didn't appreciate the beauty of the flat plains, the wide-open skies, and the friendliest and most honest people you'll ever meet.  I lived many years in Dallas, raised my daughter in the area, and had a challenging career and many friends. I spent a decade traveling the country on business and visited almost every nook and cranny in the United States. Most vacations were spent in Europe or South America with the airline miles I accumulated. As soon as my daughter left for college, I moved to South Africa for a year…just for the experience of living in a different country far from...

Every time I attend the Dallas Police Department's annual memorial service for officers killed in the line of duty, try as I may. I can't keep tears from falling down my cheeks at the first sound of bagpipes playing Amazing Grace, the final note of Taps after the service. Over 100 Dallas Police Officers stand at attention throughout most of the ceremony. Many of those officers are directly in front and facing family members of the fallen. I have to wonder if it crosses the police officers' minds o the possibility that their family might be part of the audience to honor them one day. Whether or not they can compartmentalize and carry on, they risk their lives each time they wear a uniform. My great-great-uncle, Officer John Crain, was killed in 1923 while investigating suspicious activity at a closed store. As he peered through the window, one of the burglars shot him in the head with a .38 caliber pistol. They had killed another officer with the same gun a month earl...