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Saving the Country
Excalibur was on a movie channel the other night. I watched; couldn’t help it. The 1981 John Boorman classic is a rousing retelling of the King Arthur legend and as visually stunning as any current,...
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Remembering Bob White
Walking the dogs early one recent morning I heard a quail’s call, something absent from my ears for decades. These birds were once plentiful throughout the South until fire ants, coyotes, developers;...
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A Sincere Christmas Suggestion
Here’s a sincere and hopeful Christmas suggestion designed to reduce stress and improve holiday festivities for all of us this year. To: All of you who feel the need to shop for everyone you know, used...
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Listening to the Rain
From downstairs arose such a clatter I knew the roofers had arrived. We cohabitate with five dogs and a cat under normal circumstances; when we are fostering others, the numbers swell. Currently there...
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Remembering Greatness
I gravitated toward the giggling coming from a small group of female co-workers, all north of the middle age demographic. They were passing around 8X10 glossies and smiling as if back in high school....
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Here’s To Love
Each year I get giddy just thinking about February Fourteenth, my favorite perverse holiday: A celebration of love invented by card companies to increase revenue between Christmas and Mother’s Day....
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We’re the Intelligent Ones
There are few things in life as fine as sitting in a southern place, drinking something cold, and watching a spring breeze tousle the tree limbs in a location where no other sights are visible and no...
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Yank Redux
If you’ve been watching the local news in the last month, you have seen footage of soldiers leaving for the Middle East. There are several military bases in South Carolina and the flow of soldiers...
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Rising From the Ashes
In this day of anonymous email trashings, un-informed blog posts, and you tube mistakes that last forever, we rarely see political second chances. But last week a disgraced public servant rose like a...
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Going Where We’re Going
Mark Cohn’s words hit home, ringing out above the hum of four tires on two lane back road pavement. You go where you’re going, ‘till you get where you are. Lucky for me I didn’t go too far. The song is...
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Happy Birthday America
The running lights from the boats scattered across the lake looked like a lightning bug invasion. There were dueling fireworks shows; the official Lake Murray display from Bomb Island and the Dreher...
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The Old Red Radio
By today’s standards of electronic innovation, the old radio would be an embarrassment; an eight track player sitting in a shiny new Lexus. There was no screen, no camera, no MP3 player; the device...
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Religious Experiences
The Baptist church in Demopolis, Alabama, was hot. I was thinking about Sunday dinner when my brother Rick stirred in his seat. I thought his leg was asleep but he slid into the aisle and walked down...
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Joe Walsh; Philosopher
During the Mid-sixties, a regional band called the James Gang had one local hit that everyone I knew loved beyond reason. The song was called “Georgia Pines.” It was a ballad about regret and the...
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After the War
We were enjoying bar food and cold drinks at an East Columbia establishment. College football was on every hi-def TV and the place was buzzing with good vibes. The lady sitting across from me, one of...
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Freeing Free Speech
I sincerely hope Tommy Jefferson and John Adams and Jim Madison didn’t mean for this to be the end result. A second rate character in a two-bit television show has temporarily become the nation’s moral...
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Christmas in Dixie
With his Christmas email to me, my friend Richard attached a Cox family Christmas morning picture from the mid Fifties. I have an electronic copy somewhere, as does my brother Rick, who posted it on...
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Southern Snowpocalyse
A dozen years ago, during the early spring, I was visiting my son in Pennsylvania. Among the scheduled activities was an opportunity to see my ten year old grandson play basketball that Saturday at the...
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Daryl’s House
The text message was simple and in code; I was visiting Daryl’s house the other day and Billy Gibbons dropped by. We had fun. Billy has a killer guacamole recipe. My son’s one word reply: Nice. Shane...
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World Cup Fever
As the US futbol team moved from regulation into that mysterious realm known as extra time during the elimination World Cup match against Belgium, I was attending the Richland (SC) County Council...
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