May 23, 2019: Lawrence friends, now and then

Forty-one years ago I purchased my first home in Lawrence, Kansas. Paige and Ed provided the down payment. I furnished the living room with a nine-piece set of furniture made of 2x4's and padding. The interest rate on the 30-year loan was 10 7/8 percent.

How times have changed. The lot alone for our new home costs 30% more than the home I purchased in Lawrence. The new home has roughly double the square footage of the Lawrence home. Both have three bedrooms; the Lawrence home had a single bath, the new home has 2.5 bathrooms. While having twice the space, the new home costs ten times what I paid for the Lawrence home.

I am not complaining. Instead, I am primarily reminiscing about the distant past and thinking about the distant future. What will the world -- not just the cost of my home -- look like in another forty years, when Jane is about the age I am now? How much will college cost, if today's version of 'college' will even exist for most part in forty years? Will all Americans be speaking Spanish, or maybe Chinese? Will all of our personal transportation be driverless?

Lawrence friends: Peter, Jack, Mary, Bobby, Sueanna, Sid