Nov. 20, 2022, column from the Amarillo Globe-News:

Reflections on loyalty to hometowns, churches, God

By Mike Haynes

                Loyalty was the topic of a column in this newspaper last Sunday by Dr. Walter Wendler, president of West Texas A&M University.

                It got me to thinking.

                I have plenty of faults, but after living for quite a few decades, it’s obvious that I’m loyal, mostly to people and place, as Dr. Wendler expertly described. So is Kathy, my wife.

                People all over the Panhandle can say the same thing, but here are my examples. I’ll bet most who read this will find them familiar.

                I worked for 25 years at Amarillo College, and after I retiring, I attend luncheons of the AC retirees’ group. I visit my old department often. AC is a great place and has great people, which still motivates me.

                Kathy worked more than 30 years at the first Amarillo cancer treatment center. She left only to join the team of an oncologist for whom she had worked for several years and who was helping start a new center.

                 Kathy and I met at Paramount Terrace Christian Church. We got married there soon after and kept attending PTCC, switching only from a singles class to a couples class. The church moved and became Hillside Christian Church; we moved with it and still are there after 31 years

                I grew up at First Methodist Church in McLean, 70 miles east of Amarillo. After moving away for college and various jobs, I still have a strong fondness for that church, and Kathy and I give part of our contributions to it. My cousin being the pastor for most of the past three decades might have something to do with it, but my loyalty is deeper than that. I still have a little wooden children’s chair that I’m sure he and I sat on during Sunday school when we were preschoolers. It’s where I started learning about God.

                Lots of people have lasting loyalty to their hometowns, but I doubt that theirs surpasses mine. I love living in Amarillo and love friends and family here. But it isn’t my hometown. My hometown is McLean, at about 725 residents, half the size it was when I graduated from school there. And most of my family still lives in or outside of McLean, attending that same Methodist Church.

                Family is an obvious one, and I won’t spend much space going into details today. But the fact that Kathy and I will be traveling down I-40 for Thanksgiving at the ranch, then rushing back to Amarillo for “Thankmas” – our combination of Thanksgiving and Christmas – with my mother-in-law and Kathy’s brother and family from Oklahoma is testament to the priority both of us place on our kinfolks.

                Also in my hometown is my No. 1 school. I’m the worst athlete in my family, but I’m still proud of having been on McLean football, basketball and track teams. I love that our football coach still returns from the Dallas area to our reunions. To paraphrase the Amarillo High saying, “Once a Tiger, always a Tiger.” But it isn’t just sports. My classmates, the excellent teachers we had and the old high school building all make it my school.

                Kathy may not have quite the level of loyalty to AHS that I have to MHS, but she does to her best friends from school and her church youth group. She kept in touch with one who moved to Kansas and then to Florida until that close friend passed away. Several women from her teenage years reconnected some time back and now get together often. One will be staying a weekend at our house in a couple of weeks.

                Then there’s the Texas Panhandle as a whole. I love that when a sports team from the region makes it to state, fans from Higgins to Happy and everywhere in between root for “our” representatives – even if our town lost to their town that season.

                 And the state of Texas. The Alamo, the ranching heritage, the fact that we were a nation and much more. Yes, I like to brag on Texas. And the United States, its history and its flag.

                If you look at the T-shirts in my closet, you’ll know I have sports loyalties. Radio announcer Jack Dale and Southwest Conference football star Donny Anderson from Stinnett made me a Texas Tech fan long before I attended school there. Later, working at Tech for seven years cemented the fact that it’s a great place with great people.

                I often say that my second favorite school is the University of Oklahoma. Family loyalty to OU started with relatives in leadership there and my grandmother and uncle going to school there. Ever since seeing Don Meredith and Bob Hays lead the Cowboys in the 1960s, I’ve stuck with Dallas as my NFL team. Of course, Tech’s Patrick Mahomes has compelled me to add Kansas City as another must-watch team.

                I have some loyalty to West Texas A&M, although I look for T-shirts that say “WT” without the “A&M.” Pistol Pete Pedro, Jerry Logan and Mercury Morris were some of my football heroes, and it is the Panhandle’s university. My mom and dad attended WT, which adds fondness for me. But luckily, they quit school to get married, moved back to McLean and had me.

                I’m sure that blind loyalty can be a bad thing. Sometimes it’s best for people to change jobs or churches or careers or even political parties. But I think there are plenty of good reasons for the loyalties that Kathy and I have. And one of them is a big factor in why we got married.

                Besides both liking the Beatles and salt on our chips, we knew we both had commitments to Jesus Christ. And that’s the most important loyalty of all.