This weekend, I didn’t have to wonder what it would be like to go from Kansas to Oz in real life!

As we were descending for arrival on a Southwest airline to San Diego Airport the flight attendant announced “before deplaning please allow Marines returning after deployment from Afghanistan to exit the plane first.” We all burst into spontaneous applause as the returning soldiers, some still in fatigues, walked down the airline’s aisle. At the baggage claim my unintentionally voyeuristic eyes welled up witnessing the sacred moment that loved ones were embracing with their eyes, arms and lips.

Destination Peace participated in The Global ChangeMakers Summit at the University of California. It was held in the mythically recognized year round tropical weather of the “Emerald City“ in San Diego. The assembled “citizens” of Oz included theologians, conflict resolutionists, Native American advocates, the community’s mayor, the District Attorney, the Assistant District Attorney, Prison reform advocates, authors, professors, the actual Bionic Woman, global leaders, a former director of the Peace Corps, a university chancellor, a current and former executive vice chancellor, deans, survivors of sex Trafficking, psychologists, humanists, financial experts, the local newspaper’s editor, an imam, a medical director, the inventor of the cell phone, an inventor of artificial intelligence, a life strategist, an “Awarded Speaker”-inducted member of the National Speakers Association, inventor of the Jitterbug phone, a transition leader, clinicians from numerous modalities, a permanent representative of the United Nations, an Astrophysicist, student futurists, and a nonagenarian futurist. The Dorothy of Kansas was Naila Chowdhury, UCSD Director Social Impact of Social Impact and Innovation, and a Bangladesh native.

The Mission of UC San Diego’s Social Impact and Innovation is to “address critical social issues” which includes in its mission statement of “promoting peace.” Destination Peace has been honored to serve as a “peace ambassador“ on its distinguished team of global change makers at three of its four global summits.

Upon returning to the Thurgood Marshall International Airport in Baltimore I realized once again that Oz was wherever you are at any given moment.

There was a man “standing as tall and proud as humanly possible” resembling Benjamin Franklin wearing a suit that included a coat, waistcoat and breeches, enthusiastically ringing a bell. A throng of onlookers were cheering and applause broke out to fete the more than 30 veterans from Arizona as they arrived from Phoenix to our area to visit the Washington DC veteran memorials. Wheelchair after wheelchair, the occupants sitting were perceived to be standing tall as I kept hearing the Army Song:

“Men in rags, men who froze,
Still that Army met its foes,
And the Army went rolling along.
Faith in God, then we’re right,
And we’ll fight with all our might,
As the Army keeps rolling along.”

Tuesday’s trip included five women. Among them was Marine Corps veteran June Dempsey, who served in the 1950s, which reminded me of my late father was a Marine in World War II who fought valiantly on Iwo Jima.

This Oz-some trip started with me thinking about the current serving young soldiers risking their lives from our arriving plane and then finished with feeling the presence of my father (who would have been the ages of some of the few remaining WWII veterans). The self-sacrifice of these men and women inspires us all. Thank you!

There’s truly no place like home.