While affirming the separation of church and state, I thank God for giving us governments by which we may live together for the common good. From the federal to the local levels, governments made me into the person writing these words that public schools taught me to use. Government protected me from diseases and disasters and enemies, foreign and domestic. From Medicare to Social Security, it has been the helping hand for us older folk. All the roads I have travelled in my lifetime were built by the governments of the people and by the people and for the people. […]
Good Ancestors Are Hard to Find
As an amateur dabbler in matters of my family tree, I try to keep it fertilized and trim it occasionally when it promises bad fruit or withered limbs. I do hit a snag as to whether certain ancestors might not be kith and kin and would wish I had some choice in picking a more nobler pedigree. Cassius reminded us and his friend that “The fault, dear Brutus, is not in our stars / But in ourselves, that we are underlings”. Stumbling around in our own stash of stardust, we don’t get to choose our ancestors who, over generations, created […]
The Unseemly Demise of My Sister’s Cat
While there’s very little glory in the gory details of this sordid tale that ends in catastrophe, my conscience continues to plague me until I have let most of the known world know what happened on that bloody day. I’m not big on confession [even during Lent], but I’m scared that purgatory and/or hell itself will literally have kitty litter all over the place. And no more catnaps! On good days, I am indifferent towards most cats because a childhood experience when I was traumatized by several domestic feline terrorist on the overloaded dining room table of an elderly relative’s […]
Rebels With a Cause
In the autumn of 1962, the Ole Miss “Rebels” [former politically incorrect nickname] football team was on its way to an undefeated season and capturing the national championship without the benefit of their own campus stadium. It was being occupied by federal troops who were there to make sure that James Meredith, the first African American student, could attend classes. All kinds of chaos surrounded his admission, beginning earlier in the state Capitol. As a member of the Fourth Estate for my college newspaper, I had a press pass that got me admitted to the notable incident that took place […]
When One Cheer Is Enough
The University of Mississippi in Oxford has many claims to fame, but it’s graduates will tell you that the best one is the famous cheer that is exclaimed with pride, joy and a twist of irony: Hotty toddy/ Gosh almighty/ who in the hell are we? Hey!/ Flim Flam, Bim Bam,/ Ole Miss, by damn! While no one can tell you the deeper meanings of this yell, the cheer was a caustic affront to athletic foes and to the Southern Baptist Convention where curse words like “hell” and “damn” were considered an abomination unto the Lord. No one can explain […]
Sabbath as a Sanctuary in Time
Coming on the last day or the first day of the week [depending on your religious upbringing], the Sabbath is a hinge that binds our days into a profane and holy history of many chapters. When I used to work for a living as a minister, I often referred to the “tyranny of the Sabbath” and meant by that the relentless march of time that demanded I be ready to lead worship and preach a sermon worthy of my hearers [often referred to as the preacher’s one hour a week job]. In these more laidback wonder years of retirement, I’ve […]
Cold Wars and Warm Welcomes
While we never had to worry about insurrections instigated by the president who clearly lost the election to take over Washington and stop the democratic election process on which the nation was founded, we had other important fish to fry to protect our country in the days of my youth. Growing up southern was not a piece of cake, and civic duty was always calling us to save our town from enemies — both foreign and domestic. In the 1950’s, for example, in the prime of my teenage years, I would serve as a capricious cadet on the local Civil […]
A Confederacy of Complicated Complicity
How in the world did my little hometown pull a reverse ratio in order to maintain what the citizens of white persuasion called keeping “a way of life” alive for several centuries? In the last half of the 20th Century, the “minority” of non-voting citizens was approximately 70%, who happened to be of the ineligible black persuasion. You did not need a wall in those days to keep the lines of demarcation since the color of your skin – rather than the content of your character – was fairly indelible. Railroad tracks served as a mild steel barrier for housing […]
Hoodwinked and Bamboozled
In an attempt to save face and cover his dismal inaugural exposure four years ago, the then newly-elected President had to resort to a strategy that would beguile his next four years in office. The water hit the proverbial wheel on the first day in office when a dispute arose in the land as to just how many folks showed up for the inauguration. Looking at information provided by the National Park Service, the press approximated that there were about 160,000 odd people lining the mall. Rather than confuse the issue with such reliable data here, let’s just say someone […]
The Courage of Our Convictions
Call it what you will, but that violent insurrection against our country last week was nothing more than a mob scene gone berserk. They had been invited and incited by President Trump who tweeted to his base on December 19: “Big protest in D.C. on January 6th. Be there, will be wild!” “Wild” was an understatement. As I watched the madness, I was reminded of another mob that turned the tide in my life nearly sixty years earlier when one person’s profile in courage made all the difference in the world. In the long hot summer of 1964, my hometown […]