A Golden Parachute

Rose Gardens, Ginter Botanical Gardens, Richmond, VA  Copyright: singeronthesand

A gift opens the way for the giver and

ushers him into the presence of the great.

Proverbs 18:16

I read a news article this week about a gentleman named Eugene Isenberg who is finally retiring at age 81 from the oil and gas industry.  I gathered that his retirement was not exactly his idea, but he is certainly of an age where it is a reasonable thought, and will guarantee that he receives his full Social Security benefits.

The big news, however, of Mr. Isenberg’s retirement was not so much that he was leaving, but what he was leaving with: a $100 million severance check.  I’m sure this man was paid very well during his tenure in the oil and gas industry, so this generous retirement gift is pure gravy.  I though he might be interested in some ways he could use some of this money to pay it forward, so some of my friends and I put our heads together and formed a list of what we might buy with $100 million:  

• 56,632 Emergency Room visits for the uninsured
• 20,000,000 mosquito nets for the children of Africa [projectmosquitonet.org]
• 125,000,000 meals for the elderly and disabled [Meals on Wheels]
• 250,000 sets of high school textbooks
• 167 heart transplants
• 40,000,000 twenty-six ounce bottles of infant formula [WIC]
• 1,818,182 backpacks with a full year’s school supplies for elementary students
• 400,000 cleft palate surgeries for children [smiletrain.org]
• One 80-bed hospital in the United States
• 10,870 full tuition scholarships at Texas State University
• 12,500 prosthetic legs
• 162 people receiving lifetime HIV treatment
• 833,334 sheep, goats or pigs to provide a living for Third World families  [heifer.org]

I’m sure that Mr. Isenberg is not about to give away all of his final paycheck, nor should he.  However, I would hope that this man is willing to entertain the notion of using a portion of this golden gift to better the world that his grandchildren will inherit.