My first knowledgeable introduction to a place called California was through the magic of television. How fascinating to hear the tune to “When you wish upon a star” as the “Wonderful World of Disney” would begin each Sunday evening. Soon after that tune we would hear our parents say those familiar words, “turn the T.V. off now, we have to get to church”. How I longed for just one good sick Sunday evening that would keep me home from Sunday night church. There was some solace in getting home from school in time to see “The Mickey Mouse Club” –  I mean the one with Annette Funachello.

Everyone from my era remembers when Ricky and Lucy made their famous trip to California pulling that little house trailer. Then along came “The Beverly Hillbillies” and California was to us Midwesterners swimming pools and movies stars. I was a freshman in High School when my friend, Rick Zawake, took me to his basement and played his new 45 record of some guys singing real high like girls. They sang about surfing, hanging 10, Vans, baggies and California girls.  I then understood that California was never ending summer, great tanned bodies, sun bleached hair and above all “laid back lifestyles”. So with that propaganda millions heeded Horace Greeley’s advice, “Head west young man, head west”. Not so much for the gold of 1849 but for the “laid back” and “easy living” of California.

Well we are here now. All 35 million of us. To dream upon a star we have to go miles and miles out into the desert because the massive lighted communities fade them out. To get the golden tans we have to have regular skin cancer screenings. Swimming pools have become way too expensive not counting the maintenance cost.  The movie stars have to be censored from our children’s eyes and ears and Oh Yes! About that “laid back and easy life style”, well you have to drive one or more of the 23 freeways to get to your job. Those freeways have anywhere from 8 to 20 lanes of traffic and are as busy at 2:00 am as 2:00 pm. That light in the sky most evenings is not a star but a police helicopter and baggies are now some gang-banger with his genes under his posterior. Please don’t misunderstand, I love California. It still has more variety of beauty than any other state in the U.S. I love the weather and I even love excitement found in its bustle. But it is anything but “Laid Back”.  I guess the point of all these words is simply the reminder that our happiness is in our family, friends and personal relationship with God. I am happy in California. Just as happy as one might be in a Vermont autumn, a Georgia pine forest, a Montana mountain stream, an Alaskan glacier or a Hawaiian beach. I am loved, I love others, God loves me and I love God. That works anywhere our GPS takes us.