A wise man said "The past is a foreign country."  Perhaps I need a passport to take me back twenty-plus years when I was starting out to become a bigtime columnist.  So I thought.  Do I have any regrets for dreaming of a lofty goal?  No way.  Do I have any regrets for not achieving those youthful goals and dreams?  No way, again.

What happened?  Marriage and children.  Not that I blame my wife, my marriage or my kids for not making the big leagues of reporting: becoming a syndicated columnist.

There are more important things than writing, politics and the excitement of big issues to cover and interesting places to see.  After all, when you've been told by prospective employers that taking a job with them might imperil your marriage, you really have to take a deep breath.  Very deep.

Oh, I was still grousing and grumbling about my situation as a frustrated library employee at a women's college and writing part-time for a local diocesan bi-weekly. "Man," I'd say to myself, "you have experience in Washington, right on Capitol Hill, no less while interning at the National Journalism Center. . . Why am I still here?"  Twenty years ago I had my eyesights on Washington and my hopes on getting my family out of the so-called "Pioneer Valley" of western Massachusetts.

Let's face it, this place is a virtual "Death Valley" for conservative writers.  I live in Hadley, smack dab in between Amherst and Northampton after selling a home that'd been in her family for four generations -- all thanks to Amherst's revolving credit-card liberal government and the continually rising taxes that went with it.  Sometime I'll explain how it really works up here, but here I am in Hadley, inspite of how many times I used to express myself in colorful language how badly I feared becoming a "lokel yokel."

And believe me, you'll have to look long and hard to find anyone more parochial and provincially-minded than a foot-in-manure "Pioneer Valley" die-hard denizen.

And, what I said above about this area being a "Death Valley" for us folks of the conservative persuasion -- take it as gospel truth. The media is run by libs for libs who only want to read and hear about libs and lib ideas.  

While some liberals I know as friends are blessed to have a genuine sense of humor and don't mind a good-natured ribbing, most of the liberal pundits and pundit/expert wannabes have as much humor as Mike Dukakis on a bad day or Ned Lamont on a good one. (Yes, I've interviewed the Duke, and he does know how to crack a smile after all.)

But, it can be (a-hem) challenging to be a conservative, or even moderately conservative like I happen to be. Still, to many of my liberal "fans" here, I'm perhaps a knuckledragger no matter how much I nuance my views.  So be it.

I like this "post topic" already picked out by Townhall because it pretty much sums up what's really important in life, no matter who you are, how important you've become or think you've become and so forth.  

During my straining years two decades ago, I made the mistake of stressing the dire importance of building a career to my dad. Well, it was a profitable mistake indeed.
All it took was a quick verbal jab to KO my ambitious ego: "Listen buddy, you don't have a career, you have a vocation!"

How true indeed. I also had my wife and our first born son to think first and foremost about -- even ahead of my big plans.  Fortunately, I allowed myself to be persuaded by sounder logic and a higher moral calling than becoming a big-shot pundit.  And, to punctuate his point, my dad pulled out one of his most effective weapons, a verse from the Bible, "What would gain a man to gain the world at the price of his soul?"  Not the Vulgate or KJV, but the point was well taken.

My parents are in Heaven, but the impact remains with myself, my two brothers and all of our wives and children. No divorces; but those two words say a lot. Especially nowadays.

Not that I'm bragging. I'll gladly give due credit to God, his Son, the Holy Spirit, Mary and all the saints above.  Reformed Protestant readers might think I'm a little overboard here, mentioning Mary.  Yet, I think they'll give me the benefit of the doubt here. If you want to wind up in the non-smoking section when you have to depart, it never helps to have lots of  friends in high places.

As I mentioned above, we live in a very liberal geological rut, and many of the churches go out of their way to out-liberal other liberal churches.  You see this a lot between Episcopalians and Congregationalists, and of course, those so-called "American catholics" who've seemed to forget that they belong to a universal body, not just some nationalized version of the real thing.  (By nationalized, I mean culturally and theologically here in the US. -- but that's grist for another blog.)

Still, it's possible for socially conservative Christians of either Protestant or Catholic leanings to find a home.

What I have trouble figuring out is, why are the ranks of the socially conservative, albeit fiscally moderate or liberal, so thin and the ranks of the fiscally tight, albeit socially liberal conservatives so thick?  (No, I don't mean that kind of thick, not now in my "maiden posting.") 

Having listed Faith and Family as my two highest priorities in life, I suppose it's time for me to give up this fancy typewriter for someone else.

But, maybe, I could just squeeze in a hand of solitaire.

Before I leave, I have to share a question for any National Journalism Center grads? Whatever happened to that small little finger-eating, patience-devouring Olympia manual? If you could type on that, you can master anything. Even a PC.