For everything that is given, something is taken.  Forty years previous, at age eleven, I stood, one sun-lit morning, in this same spot.  A bench yielded before me.  Beyond this bench, at that time, lies a huge beautiful park one city block in circumference.  The walkway elevates as I pedal my bike up nature’s path.  The wind roared the night before as the rain fell heavily.  I glance at the sky where the sun rose calm and bright out of the rain-drenched dawn.  The birds are singing a sweet melody throughout the numerous oak and weeping willow trees.  The blue jay answers the red robin’s greeting.  Children playing in the park brim with joy.  Groups of sparrows glide over head and some taper off into the trees joining their waiting offspring in the nests they have so energetically constructed.  The air is filled with the sweet aroma of rose petals, rhododendrons and white and pink magnolia blossoms.  The sky rejoices in the morning’s birth because all things that love the sun are outdoors.  I glance down the elevated pathway to my left and the grass sparkles with raindrops. The squirrels run swiftly through the dew of nature’s woods.  The fountain stands erect sprouting clear water in the center of the man-made pond.  The ducks flap their wings as they bathe themselves amidst the floating white lilies.  This lovely park harboring no locked gates opens it gracious arms to all.  A ticket of admittance extends to all.  The well-dressed elder gentleman does not read the newspaper he holds, instead, his eyes gleam with joy as he sits on a bench provided and throws bread crumbs to the squirrels and the cleansing ducks.  Alas, here come the chirping birds in flight to join in the feast.   A warm glow beams his face.  The key to my happiness is my thoughts.  Happiness is something remembered; yes, a Splendor in the Distance.  For me, that day reached its perfection, when the perfumed air is filled with the sweet melody of blue jays and red robins,  the fluffed white cumulus clouds, the full leaf branches of the big oak trees reaching up to the glorious sky, the glimmering dew drops blanketing the grass, the sun light illuminating the rhododendron’s  flowery breast, the birds in flight, the distilled aroma of perfumed flowers, and the elder gentleman feeding the species of the woods encompassed a harmony in perfect synchronization with God’s plan.  Yes, a splendor in the distance; for presently there is no park bench before me, no harmony echoing the melody of chirping birds, no elevated pathway, no elderly people greeting peace and tranquility, no oak trees or rose bushes; nor clean clear pond and fountain, or the distilled aroma of flowery buds sweetening the air.  Change is here, but who are the monsters that caused this change?  Their pockets are full; they have left.  The profiteers echoed change.  They are happy.  Now stand party-walled apartment buildings in place of the beautiful park.  The buildings are run-down, garbage lines the streets, drug cartels have taken residency, children play in the street, and elders lean out apartment windows overlooking their exhaust fumed slums.  The heavens continually change minute by minute and reflect their glory or gloom on the plains beneath.  I see no more beauty here; I see gloom, want, and despair.  I see change without progress. I see reckless change through blind progress at a tremendous pace changing human life for the worst.  Forty years have passed; my hair is gray and the slum is the measure of progress.

As our story of action, adventure, romance, and closure unfolds, we learn that some people and events are a Splendor in the Distance.  Many are legitimately illustrious for they have mingled something good in their cause and others in their ravages.  And yet, others have been only injurious.  There is an immeasurable distance which separates those who radiate from those who misdirect and stagnate.  We admire people and events on the condition of their disappearance.  Their epitaphs read change, but, change is one thing, progress is another.  Representatives, politicians, ambassadors, liberators, and soldiers are hated and despised by the many that have not benefited from change and loved and remembered by the many that have profited.  Those that profit label it progress. 

It is only they that radiate whom God will cause to be remembered and preserve from oblivion.  God comes without invitation.  God rings the bell.  God shall judge all.

James De Havilland