Month: December 2015

I AM NOT A RUNNER

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I am not a runner. My legs are too short, and my feet are too big. I am not built for speed. I have calves the sizes of cannon balls. I try to remember the joy of running as a child, but I can’t. Instead, there are memories of being picked last for school yard games and of saving my pennies and dimes until I could buy a pair of PF Flyers. Their advertisement assured me I would be able to “run faster and jump higher.” They lied but I run.

I am not a runner. I am too old and have arthritic knees. I am too heavy because I have spent the past year attempting to get over a clumsy misstep and can’t seem to outrun my diet. When I get out of bed, I make the sounds my father made when he was my age. I have a “Rice Krispy” back. I move and it makes a “snap, crackle, popping” sound but I run.

I am not a runner. I didn’t start until I was fifty-six and at age fifty-seven, I ran my first 5K. Twenty-four minutes and some change. Good for a middle of the field finish…in my age group. This morning I ran-walked hard enough to finish four miles in forty-six minutes. Not fast but sometime next week I’ll try for five…maybe. I shouldn’t be happy, but I am, and I will run.

I am not a runner. I am not depressed when I run, I am depressed when I don’t run. I am my most creative when I run because I create stories to avoid thinking about the pain of running. The pain of running is not as bad as the pain of not running. I am not a runner, but I run.

“SNAPSHOTS” from PATHWAYS

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SNAPSHOTS an Excerpt from Pathways.

As I stare across my computer screen I can see my backyard framed like a photograph through the French doors leading out to our, for lack of a better word, patio. My wife has turned our backyard into a cluttered and jammed wildlife preserve–accent on WILD—and it is inevitable that I would think of my grandmother. Her “rock garden” was just as jammed with flowers of all types and sometimes with wildlife, too. All were thrown together in a helter-skelter manner. My favorite flowers were her tall and colorful hollyhocks. I have tried to grow them all but with not nearly the same success. Her backyard was just as tangled with privet hedge that had grown so high it had formed a canopy which seemed to form secret rooms. I think if I were to try, I probably could write a book about my grandmother and never run out of material in the lifetime I have left. I consider myself very lucky to have had her for as long as I did – almost forty-nine years as she died just a few weeks short of my forty-ninth birthday. I’m also greedy because I would have liked to have had her even longer.

As jammed as her rock garden was, her vegetable garden was not. Every morning she went out to the garden to chop down any weed before it could get a foothold or to hand-pick any critter that might chew on a leaf. This devotion is something I have a high regard for as I have moved toward organic gardening. Everything was quite orderly but her flowers were not. This difference was just one of several contradictions. One of the wisest and most well-read people I have ever known, she attended public school only until the eighth grade. She seemed to crave information but only if it didn’t interfere with time better spent in her garden. Even then, on rainy days, I would catch her gazing wishfully out the window. Most of her reading material revolved around her “Classics” – plant catalogs, crossword puzzles and religious materials including, but not limited to, the Bible. Despite being one of the most religious people I have ever known, she rarely set foot inside of a church and I wish I had taken the time to ask why. For some reason a belief the church might be filled with hypocrisy comes to my mind but that is my own cynicism showing. It might have just been she just didn’t like being cooped up. When we “stayed the night” due to our parent’s work schedule, she did not tell stories to put my brother and me to sleep. Instead, we played “finish the Bible verse.” To this day when I hear a parent tell a child to “Be Still”, I have to add, “…and know that I am God.”

Pathways can be downloaded on Kindle or purchased on Amazon using http://goo.gl/v7SdkH

A LAST GAME—A TRIBUTE TO A COACH

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This past Friday it ended. At least I think it did. My best friend coached the last game of his forty plus year career. That equates to over fifty years involved with the religion known as Southern football. Everyone who knows Mike Hawkins, Hawk as he is known wide and far, would have bet he would continue to coach until he drew his last breath. Then, having been carried off of a football field straight into the mortuary for cremation, would have his ashes scattered to the “football gods” over some yet undetermined football field “heaven.” I thought the same thing until I talked to him during the week prior to his “last game.” Mike has mellowed…A LOT…and seems to be at peace with his decision. Saying such, would I be surprised if he didn’t retire? Not at all.

As I begin this writing, I haven’t contacted him yet. I’m afraid to. I’m sure he has met this Saturday morning with a jumble of feelings although I am also sure he would never admit it. If I were writing a book, Mike’s season and career would not have ended on a late field goal during the upper-state championship. If I were writing the ending the Spartans would have blocked the field goal, returned it for the winning touchdown and gone on to win next week’s state championship game. It just goes to prove something I already knew. God could care less about who wins a football game because a win was sure something I prayed for… along with world peace. I still hope to be one for two.

Mike and I were introduced to each other some forty years ago on an athletic field that has dissolved into the fog of time…along with the introduction itself. We would spend the next dozen or so years looking at each other across athletic fields as we attempted to beat each other’s brains out at various sporting endeavors. During those years we probably broke even but who is counting…and it doesn’t matter anyway. Playing a game against each other doesn’t insure you will get to know someone either and Mike is as open as a giant clam. “Quare” is the Southern term I would have used to describe Mike. In the late Eighties I would find myself interviewing at a local swimming pool for the opportunity to coach football and baseball at Riverside and over the next twelve years would learn “Quare” really didn’t describe him at all. As I attempted to write a book on my teaching and coaching career I admitted to a former player that I was trying to write a story about Mike and was struggling. The player commented, “I don’t know why, you should have enough material to write a book.” The player was correct and the amount of material WAS the problem.

Being a bit odd is just a small part of his personality. Mike, despite his hard, old school exterior, has a heart like a marshmallow. Especially for kids…or animals. If you are in dire need Mike will move heaven and earth to help you. That includes friends or enemies alike. He is going to do what is right…well what he thinks is right. Generous and giving is a much larger portion of his personality than his “quareness.” I will always remember catching him sneaking food to the “stadium cat” and “roping off,” with crime scene tape, a killdeer’s nest so we would not run over it while cutting the field. There was even an impromptu celebration when we saw momma killdeer being followed by three minuscule chicks. After my heart attack in 2006 I had a stint surfed into an artery that saved my life. As I came back to the world of the living in CCU I knew I had not died and gone to heaven because the second face I saw was Mike’s. I knew I wasn’t in hell either because Linda, my wife, was the first face I saw. I just appreciated the fact they were both there.

For nearly thirty years Mike and I have coached and taught together, laughed together, cried together, watched each other’s children grow up and had grand-daughters within months of each other. Mike gave me the opportunity to get over a bad time in my life and I would not trade it for gold. I have tried to help him through his own bumpy roads and pray I have helped with his healing…it’s what friends do I guess. We both lost coaching jobs we believed we would never get over and ended up winning state championships with other programs, something that never would have happened had we remained where we had been. Sometimes lemons do make lemonade and I am just as proud for him as I am for me. Mike has been a winner in every definition of the word at every place he has ever been, on or off of the field. A winner with kids, his peers and his friends. I can give him no higher tribute than to call him Coach Hawkins, my friend.

I don’t know what chapters are left in our “book,” I just hope we write some of them together and that they are as memorable as his career. Enjoy a well-deserved rest Mike. It will take a while but you will get used to it. Love you Man!

IF YOUR SNUFF’S TOO STRONG, IT’S WRONG…

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The following is an excerpt from PATHWAYS, a book about growing up Southern in the Fifties and Sixties.

A strange pathway I follow. Despite having imbibed no distilled spirits of any type, I find myself following a mental path involving snuff, Arthur Smith, my Great-Grandmother Griffin and trying not to lose my cookies on a sideline in Spartanburg. Where do memories like this come from?

I grew up with Arthur Smith. Anyone remember Arthur Smith and the Crackerjacks? I would understand if you had never heard of him, but you need to do a little research…look up Arthur Smith. I always thought he was just some old guy with a country group who sang through their noses. He hosted a radio program on WBT in Charlotte Carolina Calling and later the first country-western television program to be syndicated nationwide for thirty-two years.

Smith hosted a morning show first on WBT Radio and then on WBTV. Through this medium I was forced fed “old time” country music by my grandmother and parents. They listened as if it were a religious experience. Country music of the Fifties included the likes of Red Foley, Ernest Tubbs, Bill Monroe, Hank Williams along with Arthur Smith and the Crackerjacks. It is as far from what we call country music today as liberals are politically from conservatives. What I believed to be a “regional” country music “wannabe” celebrity was quite successful on a national stage and even helped to pen “Dueling Banjos” from the movie Deliverance.

What do I remember about him? A commercial tune for Tube Rose Snuff. “If your snuff’s too strong it’s wrong, Try Tube Rose, Try Tube Rose.” For some reason all I hear in my mind’s ear is Arthur, Brother Ralph and sidekick Tommy Faile singing the commercial. Later in the early Seventies, I sat on a quilt at an open air “hippy fest” listening to Sweet Baby James Taylor humorously singing the same tune. Weird what you remember…

Should you desire to read the end of this, and other stories PATHWAYS may be purchased in book form or downloaded using the following link http://goo.gl/6yB5Ei

THE TRAP THAT IS RELIGION

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“As Christians, we do a better job of promoting what we are against than what we are for.” This was a quote from my minister this past Sunday as he presented his sermon and for once I was paying attention. The title of his message could have been, but wasn’t, “THE TRAP THAT IS RELIGION.” He referred to this “trap” a couple of times and both of these quotes provided a feast as in “food for thought.”

All week long I thought about the “trappings” of religion. Not the trappings my minister was talking about. I was thinking about rituals; my church is bigger than your church kind of things. Fancy eye-catching robes, repeated liturgy in unison, long, long, long alter calls, public displays, you get the idea. My grandmother turned her back on the “trappings” and lived a “religiously” pious God-loving life without going to church. Ninety-eight years’ worth.

I really have problems with public displays of faith. I don’t mean modeling it, I mean chest thumping. I would guess you are thinking, “Isn’t this public.” The answer is not really. Except for people who know me, I am hiding behind the anonymity of my computer. It is still hard for me to “bare” my feelings and put myself out there. My religious beliefs are private to me and hard for me to talk about. I know some Christians believe that public displays are part of the trappings. I ask God and Christ to make me more “public” but as yet they haven’t eased my struggle. They are probably busy elsewhere. I don’t blame them and yet still believe in their teachings.

When I thought about the “trap that is religion” I could not help but remember the lines from the Buffett song “Fruitcakes.” The lyrics went like this, “Where’s the church, who took the steeple? Religion is in the hands of some crazy-ass people. Television preachers with bad hair and dimples. The god’s honest truth is it’s not that simple. It’s the Buddhist in you, it’s the Pagan in me. It’s the Muslim in him, she’s Catholic ain’t she? It’s the born again look, it’s the WASP and the Jew. Tell me what’s goin on, I ain’t gotta clue.”

The line about religion being in the hands of some crazy ass people is what gives me the most pause. I think ISIS along with any other Jihadist group or individual would qualify as would a Christian reactionary killing (fill in the blank) for Christ. But I am concerned most about followers of non-reactionary American Christian Religions who their piety allows for racism and bigotry. John Pavlovitz, a pastor, and writer published these assertions in his blog, STUFF THAT NEEDS TO BE SAID. I am reproducing them verbatim from his post MY EMANCIPATION FROM AMERICAN CHRISTIANITY. These are his words, not mine, but I found them to be quite profound along with the rest of his post. I invite you to read it in its entirety.

http://johnpavlovitz.com/2015/12/01/my-emancipation-from-american-christianity/

“I am not losing my mind.
I’m not losing my faith.
I’m not failing or falling or backsliding.
I have simply outgrown American Christianity.
I’ve outgrown the furrowed-browed warnings of a sky that is perpetually falling.
I’ve outgrown the snarling brimstone preaching that brokers in damnation.
I’ve outgrown the vile war rhetoric that continually demands an encroaching enemy.
I’ve outgrown the expectation that my faith is the sole property of a political party.
I’ve outgrown violent bigotry and xenophobia disguised as Biblical obedience.
I’ve outgrown God wrapped in a flag and soaked in rabid nationalism.
I’ve outgrown the incessant attacks on the Gay, Muslim and Atheist communities.
I’ve outgrown theology as a hammer always looking for a nail.
I’ve outgrown the cramped, creaky, rusting box that God never belonged in any way.
Most of all though, I’ve outgrown something that simply no longer feels like love, something I no longer see much of Jesus in.”

This past Friday morning I felt alone as my blog post “Silence” should have reflected. Later, my Baha’i cousin, quoting scripture, and a friend quoting…well herself, lifted me up, something my musings had not done. This morning I opened my computer blog and found John Pavolovitz and realized I’m not the only “wrong” thinking person in my country…or at least my social media account. If enough of us become “wrong” thinkers maybe, we can actually make a difference in our world. I invite you to join the Evolutionary New Testament Church of Jesus Christ’s Love and Grace. We are not on TV and I don’t have any hair or dimples. I’m not going to give up my Church membership because they seem to be “wrong” thinkers too. My Christ is loving…toward all our neighbors.

MAW-REESE an excerpt from Pathways

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This EXCERPT is from the short story MAW-REESE and is a story that takes place in the Fifties. It is about how the issue of race raised its ugly head and got into the way of a friendship.

We had played together every Monday for the previous two years… every Monday when the sun was shining…regardless of temperature, since we had turned four. A lot of my memories have become muddled with the passage of time or the fact I was just four or five, but there are bits and pieces that I grab on to and, if I hold on tightly enough, they will turn into memories. My recollections of Maw are quite clear. Mondays were Nannie’s wash days and she still held on enough to the old ways that she did her wash outside even though a wringer washing machine had replaced her washboard and tin wash tub. There wasn’t enough room inside the house for the washer, especially after an indoor bathroom had been added to what was once a back porch. Water was boiled on the old gas range and carried outside to the washer. After the clothes were washed or sometimes “blued” in the old, claw foot style bathtub, they were hand cranked through two rolls called a wringer, an act that scared me to death. I was always fearful a body part might get caught up in it. The clothes were then hung out to air-dry or freeze if the temperature was too low. On days it was not in use, the washer became my personal spacecraft or tank and, despite my fear, they possessed a hand-cranked machine gun or pulsar cannon.

Miss Maggie Cureton was Nannie’s wash woman and friend even though during those days saying your friend was a “colored” wash woman was not something a white woman could admit. After Paw Paw died and Nannie moved in next door with us and our new-fangled washing machine and dryer, Miss Maggie became obsolete but was not replaced. Miss Maggie just became Nannie’s fishing buddy. I’m not sure a woman would like to be described as “thin and wiry” but it is the description I must use. Miss Maggie looked to be as tough as harness leather with strong muscles roping her thin arms. She was also as black as the end of a burned stick and always wore a kerchief around her head, unless she donned a huge straw hat given to her by my grandmother. While small, she could pull her weight and then some when lugging around baskets of water-soaked sheets or stringers loaded with fish. My fondest remembrance of her was the way she addressed me as “Honey Chile.” Her endearment was a little more loving than being referred to as one of the “you chaps” which was as close to an affectionate utterance every received from my grandmother.

One Monday morning Miss Maggie did not come alone but brought Maw and his two-year-old sister Bessy along with her. Maw’s mother, Maggie’s daughter, had found work at a church in Lancaster and would later marry a minister. Maw and Bessy were Miss Maggie’s grandchildren. While Maggie was ebony, Maw and Bessy were not. They were more the shade of the rich Luzianne coffee and cream that my grandmother drank. Their skin was shiny and seemed to glow in the morning light which accented their reddish hue. I heard them later referred to as “redbone” and was too young to understand the dynamics of someone who was bi-racial. The shine of their skin was due to the perspiration caused by their already hot and humid walk across the wide, sometimes cotton and sometimes hay field that separated their home from ours. Maw was my age, a few months older, and stood with his right foot planted firmly on the ground with his left nervously tucked, toes curled, under his instep. Both he and his sister were barefooted and dressed in hand-me-downs as was I, but I had not had to navigate the stubble and briars left behind from the last hay cutting. While only slightly older, Maw was already a half-head taller and several pounds heavier. Not intending to be stereotypical, Maw was the athlete I wished I could have been.

You may read the end of this story and others by downloading my book PATHWAYS on Kindle or purchase through Amazon at the following link: http://goo.gl/v7SdkH

“RIGHT MEN”

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I sat in a large lecture room during the summer of 1993 listening to the guest speaker during our annual state association athletic clinic in Columbia, S.C. Fresh off of a perfect season and national championship, Alabama head coach Gene Stallings was the speaker. I was impressed at the somewhat quiet, yet solid, demeanor of the Crimson Tide coach. His speech was a low Texas drawl I was sure could turn into a loud growl if necessary. Something in me believes it was rarely necessary. I was amused at a story he told about being embarrassed. In front of millions of viewers, a camera perfectly framed a reaction to a play that included an “F-bomb” expletive perfectly formed on his lips. One of those viewers was his youngest daughter, Martha Kate, who took him to task over the language he used.

You just knew Gene Stallings was a good man and there is nothing in his Bio today suggesting otherwise. One could not be hard-hearted enough not to tear up when Coach Stallings spoke about his son, John Mark. Coach Stallings teared up, I teared up and about a thousand others did to. John Mark was born with Down syndrome and was the light of his father’s life…along with his wife and four daughters. As you can tell, Coach Stallings spoke more about life than he did about football.

I never had the opportunity to sit down and hear Mark Richt speak in person. From clips, comments and sport’s stories I have read and viewed, I would say there is a lot of Gene Stallings in Mark Richt…except for the National Championship thing…but then again I am speaking about life. Richt, the former Georgia coach, now Miami coach, could have been bitter about his firing at Georgia despite two SEC championships, six SEC East championships to go with one hundred and forty-five victories to just fifty-one losses over a fourteen year career. Unfortunately college football is a “what have you done for me lately” profession. It’s about championships I guess.

Richt could have been bitter but made a profound “life” statement instead, “Life is about people, not rings. Rings collect dust.” While not the coach Georgia needs now, they think they need the rings, he is a man the world needs. Richt walks the “Christian Walk,” and has been a positive role model both on and off of the field. Along with his wife, the Richt’s have adopted two Ukrainian orphans, one with proteus syndrome, to go with their own two kids. This is something most people are very unlikely to know, Mark Richt plays everything close to the vest. One thing that he can’t keep close to his vest is the fact that he is a good man.

I wrote a book entitled “Winning Was Never the Only Thing…” It was about kids, peers, family and fans, along with memories of teaching and sports, all more important than victories, championships or passing test. I wish I had come to their lesson sooner. Is it more important to win championships or to produce up-standing, disciplined players? I know you can do both but which is more important? Good luck Mark Richt, I will be pulling for Miami to win championships when Clemson doesn’t. Interestingly, Clemson head coach Dabo Swinney played football at Alabama. His mentor and head coach…Gene Stallings. He too is one of the “Right Men.” Theirs’s are legacies that are far more important than sports.

If you are interested in reading more by Don Miller his books may be purchased on Amazon or downloaded on Kindle at the following links
“Winning Was Never the Only Thing…” goo.gl/dO1hcX
“Floppy Parts” http://goo.gl/0Lt0O8
“Pathways” http://goo.gl/6yB5Ei

SILENCE

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I worry. Worry for family, country, and friends. Friends of all races, creeds, and colors. I pray. There is no answer, nothing but silence.

I wonder. Wonder at how the world has come to this. I pray. There is no answer, nothing but silence.

I rage. Rage at Christians, Muslims, Atheist, Liberals, and Republicans. I pray. Again, there is no succor, only silence.

I hate. Mostly I hate myself for hating. I pray for the hatred to be taken away. It does not relent. The silence swells in my mind.

I ask for enlightenment. Understanding, Wisdom, Awareness, and Insight. Why do we do nothing but debate? I pray. There is nothing but deep, dark silence.

My grandmother instructed me to “lift up mine eyes unto the hills, from whence cometh my help.” I pray but the silence has become a deafening roar in my ears.

I must keep looking unto the hills. I must keep praying…hoping God will take the silence away.

TEACHING ISLAM?

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Former students, help me out here. Not just my former students, any former student. Do you remember being taught anything about Islam during “World History before the Renaissance” or Comparative Religion courses? I keep seeing such an outcry against teaching anything about Islam. Do we not need to know our enemy? Wait, I do not want to be misunderstood…I don’t think Islam is our enemy any more than I believe Christianity, Hinduism, Buddhism, Confucianism, Taoism or Judaism are our enemies. I probably should have mentioned Animism and Jainism to because I mentioned them when I taught comparative religion. Okay Confucius taught a way of life based upon mutual respect and technically is not a religion, I guess, but I taught it just like I did the others. It would appear I might have failed with the concept of respect. I also did a unit on modern terrorism. Daesh or ISIS weren’t our enemies then but Al Qaida was, along with several dozen (or more) other terrorist groups running the gambit of all religions along with people who claim to be atheist.

All terrorist are not Muslim nor are all Muslims terrorist. According to multiple sources, all biased I am sure, Muslim terrorism caused less than ten percent of the deaths due to terrorism recorded on US soil since 9/11. One source, http://www.washingtonsblog.com, siting the START Global Terrorism Database, states that since 1970, only 2.5 percent of terrorist acts carried out on US soil were Muslim. But, I digress.

Why would we not teach comparative religions or for that matter comparative cultures? Do we just ignore what we don’t want to understand and refuse to recognize the contributions made by Africans, Asians, Muslims, Catholics, and Mormons…etc.? During the Middle Ages “Western Civilization” was somewhat stagnate and backward…until Christian knights went off to fight the barbarians who called them infidels. Despite losing the “Holy Land” and actually killing more Jews and Christians than Muslims, Crusading knights brought back more than they left with. In addition to unknown foods and spices, they brought back a real concept of medicine based upon science rather than superstition, algebra, clocks, water wheels, and the modern acoustic guitar. Okay I have digressed again but am sure thankful they brought home the guitar and got one into BB King’s hands. They could have left algebra behind.

I’m not a fan of the Common Core and certainly am against lesson plans trying to convert our children to Islam…or any religion which I doubt Common Core does. As a teacher of social studies, conversion was not my function and in my part of the world is not allowed in public schools. However, teaching all religions from a cultural or historical standpoint is…and should remain so. Not teaching Islam would be akin to Nazi’s burning Jewish books, ignoring Protestantism if one were a Catholic or maybe ignoring the contributions of Mormons in our own West. As I have been told repeatedly from certain flag wavers, its history and we can’t ignore it…nor should we. We should also practice what we preach.