President's Report

PRESIDENT’S MESSAGE

This past month, my family took a trip to Dollywood. Maybe you might be asking;

why would we leave the land of a thousand theme parks and drive twelve hours

to Eastern Tennessee? For those of you who have been there, you know

Dollywood is a nice diversion from Orlando. The drive is pretty simple until you

leave Interstate 40, and you take country roads to Pigeon Forge. As we exited

the Interstate, my wife fired up her cell phone and connected to Waze to guide us

the rest of the way. As we got closer, we were instructed to make a left turn at

the next traffic light. I did not feel right about turning this soon, so I expressed my

concern to the phone. It didn’t care. We drove along until the four-lane divided

road became a two-lane road. I got to thinking that this is not right, and again I

expressed my concern about going this way. I really got nervous when the two-

lane road became narrower and narrower. Then the pavement turned into

gravel. I started seeing little wood houses with all kinds of old cars littered in

their front yards. The front porches were occupied by men folk sitting in rocking

chairs holding something in their laps. I knew we were lost, and Waze had led us

astray. Just then as we rounded the bend, the Dream More Resort appeared just

down the hill. I thought, how did she (the voice on Waze) do that? I would have

preferred another route. Several times I have disagreed with Ms GPS and thought

we should have gone another way. When I did try to stray from the course it set,

it recalibrates with grace and promptly redirects. It is good to know someone

knows where we should be going and that they can direct us there. It is the same

on our journey in life.

When I was the Superintendent of the Southeast Conference, for sixteen years my

job required a lot of traveling. In fact, I am a “Million Miler” with Delta Airlines,

and they also bestowed on me the title of “Flying Colonel”. These were the days

before our cell phones could direct us by satellite. It always felt good to safely get

to my destination. What felt better was always coming back to our home in

Tuscawilla. This is my starting and returning point on each journey. With the GPS

there is a higher power guiding us to our destination. To successfully navigate

this world, we need guidance. We need someone to safely guide us on our path.

Last summer, we were taking my son to a camp in the Northwoods of Wisconsin.

As we got closer to the camp, our phone signal got weaker and weaker. In fact, I

had to resort to the old-fashioned way before GPS. I stopped at a gas station and

asked a nice lady for help. She was familiar with the camp and gave us directions.

My eyes glazed over after she got to the sixth turn. We headed out and by some

miracle we got there. After registration and goodbyes, we headed out. With no

signal and a lot of forest roads that all looked the same, we got lost. It was getting

dark, and deer were running across the little roads. Finally, I stopped at a place

where several men were loading a truck and asked for help. We all need some

sort of Global Positioning System or we are going to wander and maybe never get

where we want to go. My GPS is my faith, my family, and my home here in

Tuscawilla.

“Flying Colonel”

Dr. Kurt Miericke

THOA President

Publisher, Tuscawilla Today