Columbia (President's Day)

 

We all know the iconic image of “Columbia”—long before she became associated with Columbia Pictures (founded in 1919 under the less-than-catchy name Cohn-Brandt-Cohn Film Sales).

But Columbia’s story predates Hollywood—and even predates Lady Liberty.

As we approach Presidents’ Day, I’ve been reflecting on the remarkable poet Phillis Wheatley (1753–1784) and her tribute to General George Washington at a defining moment in American history.

Wheatley was kidnapped from West Africa as a child and enslaved in Boston. Yet through extraordinary intellect and determination, she became the first African American woman to publish a book of poetry (1773). At a time when both her humanity and her intellect were questioned, her published volume stood as a quiet but powerful rebuke to the injustice of slavery.

In 1775, during the Revolutionary War, Wheatley wrote a poem titled “To His Excellency, General Washington.” Washington was then Commander-in-Chief of the Continental Army—leading a fragile, under-resourced force against the most powerful empire in the world. The American experiment was uncertain. Independence was not yet secured. The future hung in the balance.

In that moment, Wheatley cast Washington not merely as a military leader, but as the defender of an ideal.

She imagined America personified as Columbia—radiant, noble, and divinely guided—moving through the turmoil of revolution with both beauty and strength. And she placed Washington within that vision as the champion of liberty under Providence.

Here’s a taste of her powerful poem:

Celestial choir! enthron'd in realms of light,
Columbia's scenes of glorious toils I write.
While freedom's cause her anxious breast alarms,
She flashes dreadful in refulgent arms.
See mother earth her offspring's fate bemoan,
And nations gaze at scenes before unknown!
See the bright beams of heaven's revolving light
Involved in sorrows and the veil of night!
The Goddess comes, she moves divinely fair,
Olive and laurel binds Her golden hair:
Wherever shines this native of the skies,
Unnumber'd charms and recent graces rise.

In Wheatley’s time, Columbia became a beloved symbol of the young nation—representing its ideals, aspirations, and resilience. Named for Columbus, she embodied the spirit of the “new world,” but more importantly, she embodied liberty itself. Artists and writers of the 18th and 19th centuries depicted her in classical form—draped in flowing garments, crowned with laurel, standing beside eagles or ships, holding symbols of freedom.

But Wheatley’s portrayal may be one of the earliest and most striking literary depictions. Her Columbia is “divinely fair,” yet not passive. She is radiant—but armed. Beautiful—but resolute. She feels the anxiety of a fragile cause, yet stands ready to defend it.

And at the center of that moment stood George Washington.

What is especially moving is that Washington received Wheatley’s poem with gratitude and dignity. He responded with a personal letter thanking her and later invited her to visit his headquarters in Cambridge. In a time of deep contradiction—when a nation proclaiming liberty still permitted slavery—this exchange stands as a small but meaningful moment of mutual respect.

Wheatley saw something in Washington that symbolized hope: a leader striving to secure freedom for a new nation. And Washington, for his part, recognized the brilliance of a young Black poet whose words gave moral weight to the cause.

Throughout the 19th century, Columbia remained a familiar patriotic figure, though by the early 20th century her symbolic role gradually shifted to Lady Liberty. Still, Columbia evokes the founding vision of America—its courage, its aspiration, and its solemn responsibility.

Presidents’ Day gives us an opportunity not merely to remember leaders, but to reflect on leadership itself.

Washington was not perfect—but he understood the gravity of stewardship. He relinquished power when he could have held it. He set precedents of restraint and constitutional order. In doing so, he helped shape not just a revolution, but a republic.

Wheatley’s Columbia captures that same tension—hope mingled with burden. Radiance intertwined with responsibility.

Her poem reminds us that America was born not only through battle, but through vision. Through prayer. Through moral imagination.

And perhaps that is why her words still resonate.

Columbia moves “divinely fair,” but she feels the weight of her mission. Washington leads, but under the gaze of Providence. Freedom shines—but it must be defended and stewarded.

Did you know the very first post on this blog, written 20 years ago, was a prayer for America?

November, 2004- the very first blog post I ever wrote:

Dear God Our Father,
In this time of great division and danger, we ask that you help us. Not that we deserve it, but we want to continue to be a beacon of hope and a model of success. This life is a mixed bag and a temporary host. May you allow us to continue being a preservative of the natural entropy of order.
Lord, the churches are dark in the old land and selfishness reigns. Intellectual imperialism tickles the ears but salve no wounds. Our churches are flickering. Please revive us- give us soft hearts of love and united hearts of courage. We wimper in our prosperity and hoard our greed.
Be gracious to our leaders and heal our land.
In the name and example of Christ,
AMEN

As we observe Presidents’ Day, may we remember both the leader and the poet. May we remember the courage required to found a nation—and the faith required to sustain one.

Wheatley gave us a vision of America that was noble, beautiful, and accountable to heaven.

May we continue striving to live up to it.

Here is the song link:

Columbia

(Verse 1)

In the heart of this land, where freedom grows,

There’s a lady of beauty, in soft repose,

She moves through the ages, a vision so fair,

With laurel and olive bound in her hair.

She’s America’s grace, her strength, her pride,

But today she kneels with us, by our side.

(Chorus)

We’re praying with Columbia, for the heart of the land,

With hope for tomorrow and faith in our hands.

She’s radiant with beauty, yet heavy with care,

For the promise of freedom, we all breathe a prayer.

(Verse 2)

Phyllis saw her standing, strong in the fight,

With “fair freedom” shining, a “heavenly light.”

Though danger and darkness might come her way,

She lifts her gaze to a brighter day.

Now we stand with her, her hopes and her fears,

Her voice through the ages calls out in our ears.

(Chorus)

We’re praying with Columbia, for the heart of the land,

With hope for tomorrow and faith in our hands.

She’s radiant with beauty, yet heavy with care,

For the promise of freedom, we all breathe a prayer.

(Bridge)

The weight of a nation rests on her soul,

She fights for our future, to keep us whole.

In fields of freedom, in skies so blue,

She stands in our shadows, she stands with you.

(Chorus)

We’re praying with Columbia, for the heart of the land,

With hope for tomorrow and faith in our hands.

She’s radiant with beauty, yet heavy with care,

For the promise of freedom, we all breathe a prayer.

(Outro)

So we lend her our voices, we lend her our song,

In the hope of a future where freedom is strong.

She’s America’s dream, her sorrow, her grace—

Together, we pray in this hallowed place.

Barefoot Where I Belong

A story and song for spring........ Always a good time to return from where you have been.

The rideshare driver didn’t say much when the pavement gave way to gravel. The GPS had gone silent five miles back, replaced by fence lines and fields that rolled on without apology.

“Out here?” the driver asked.

“Yep,” he answered.

The car slowed beside a weathered mailbox that still leaned slightly to the left, just like it had when he was twelve. The old farmhouse sat beyond it—white paint worn thin, porch wide and waiting, fields stretching in every direction like open arms that had never quite closed.

He stepped out and back in time.

The door shut with a hollow thud, and for a moment he just stood there, breathing. The air smelled like sun-warmed hay, red dirt, and something sweet drifting from the far pasture. It didn’t smell like city rain on concrete. It didn’t smell like cologne and polished floors and late nights pretending.

He had that inner voice that had changes so much in the last few years. "You thought this place was prison and you hated the decay, now you know it  smelled like truth".

He looked down at the boots he was wearing—expensive, sharp, chosen carefully once upon a time. Tony Lamas. Polished shine. They had looked good in mirrors, under office lights, across bar counters. They had added height. They had added confidence. They had added a version of him that never quite fit.

He was happy to take them off for good- he knew there were some cow patty crusted Brogans in the barn that likely had not moved in years.

He tossed them on the bags that were the only reminders of that far away wasteland of regret.

When was the last time he walked barefoot and free? 

The gravel was rough at first. Then the grass met him—cool and forgiving. He stepped forward, and the earth gave just enough beneath his weight. No echo. No cement. No hard return of footsteps trying to prove something.

Just ground. Every step felt like it was peeling something away.

He had walked far from here. Walked into rooms where he learned how to smile without meaning it. Walked streets that never slept, under lights that never let you see the stars. He had worn boots too tight for too long, marching to a rhythm that promised success but never rest.

He had looked good but it had never felt right. It never was him.

The sun pressed warm against his face now, and he closed his eyes, letting it settle into his skin like it used to when he’d lie in the pasture and watch clouds turn into cattle and ships and dragons. The wind moved through the tall grass, brushing his legs. It carried the faint sound of wind chimes from the porch.

He started walking. Not toward anything specific. Just kept moving forward.

The field opened up around him, wide sky stretching overhead with nothing to prove and nowhere else to be. His Sunday best would have grass stains soon. He almost laughed at the thought. His mother used to fuss over that. His father used to shrug and say, “It’ll wash.”

The dirt clung to his feet. Honest ground. Not polished floors. Not city sidewalks that burned in summer and froze in winter. This soil knew him. It remembered the boy who ran through it barefoot, who climbed fences and fell and got back up without checking who was watching.

Out here, there was nothing left he had to be.

The house grew smaller behind him as he walked deeper into the field. He hadn’t meant to go far, but his feet kept moving as if they were reacquainting themselves with the land. The wind ran through his hair. He tipped his head back and let it.

He had left chasing something—status, approval, a version of manhood stitched together from magazine covers and boardrooms. Nights that made him stronger, yes. Harder, too. But stronger in ways that felt earned, not borrowed.

He sat down and looked back to the sun.

The farmhouse looked smaller now, resting against the horizon. The porch swing swayed slightly. He could almost picture his mother’s hands gripping the railing, shading her eyes.

Then he heard it—

A car door slamming in the distance.

The sharp sound carried across the open field. He had walked farther than he realized.

He squinted toward the house. At first, they were just shapes against the white porch and pale sky. Small. Almost fragile at that distance. Then the shapes began to move.- They were running.

One figure first. Then another. Arms lifting. Waving. Running as if they had been waiting at the door for years and finally saw him not just passing through—but coming home.

He felt something rise in his chest, not loud or dramatic. Just steady and certain - They looked small from here, but he could see the joy in the way they ran.

He looked down at his feet, dusted in dirt and grass, planted in the only soil that had ever known his name before he tried to rename himself.

The sun was sinking low now, but his heart felt strong. He smiled. It felt good to be back where he belonged.

Song: Barefoot Where I Belong

A Streetcar Named Success: How Tennessee Williams Lived the American Nightmare

If Southern Gothic asks, “What happens when the past won’t stay buried?”

Tennessee Williams answers, “People break—but beautifully.”

I went to dinner the other night with a group of friends where the meal was authentic New Orleans–style gumbo—and it was the best I’ve ever had.

 Everything about the night was intentional, almost thematic. The food, the conversation, the pace. We even had Kopi Luwak coffee—made from beans that pass through a civet’s digestive system—once prized for its rarity and smoothness, now better understood as a symbol of how appetite, prestige, and story can sometimes outpace substance.

The evening revolved loosely around the idea of the Vieux Carré, French for “Old Square,” the historic heart of New Orleans. The French Quarter. Old streets laid out centuries ago. A place where music, food, decay, beauty, and excess all coexist. Vieux Carré is also the name of a classic cocktail—and the title of a play by Tennessee Williams set in that very neighborhood. Without realizing it at the time, the setting had already chosen the author.

I hadn’t really read much Tennessee Williams before. So over the next few days I read "A Streetcar Named Desire" and "The Glass Menagerie". I wasn’t blown away by either. They’re interesting, important, and historically significant—but by today’s streaming standards, they feel restrained, even dated. I can see why Marlon Brando’s performance as Stanley Kowalski added a whole new gear to Streetcar—his infamous “STELLA!” practically lives outside the text now—but on the page, the plays felt a bit like the playwright’s name itself: great titles, evocative, suggestive… but not electrifying for me.

What did stop me cold was an essay.

Before Streetcar opened in New York in December 1947, Tennessee Williams published an essay in The New York Times Drama Section titled “A Streetcar Named Success.” And in that essay, Williams is not writing about theater so much as he is writing about the danger of arrival.

He begins by describing how abruptly success came to him after The Glass Menagerie—how one life ended and another began almost overnight:

I will quote a lot of this essay - It stayed with me for days.....

“I was snatched out of a virtual oblivion and thrust into sudden prominence… My experience was not unique.

Success has often come that abruptly into the lives of Americans.

The sort of life which I had had previous to this popular success was one that required endurance, a life of clawing and scratching along a sheer surface and holding on tight with raw fingers to every inch of rock higher than the one caught hold of before, but it was a good life because it was the sort of life for which the human organism is created. I was not aware of how much vital energy had gone into this struggle until the struggle was removed.

This was security at last. I sat down and looked about me and was suddenly very depressed. I thought to myself, this is just a period of adjustment.

In the suite things began to break accidentally. An arm came off the sofa. Cigarette burns appeared on the polished surfaces of the furniture. Windows were left open and a rainstorm flooded the suite.

I lived on room-service. But in this, too, there was disenchantment. Sometime between the moment when I ordered dinner over the 'phone and when it was rolled into my living room like a corpse on a rubber-wheeled table, I lost all interest in it.

Once I ordered a sirloin steak and a chocolate sundae, but everything was so cunningly disguised on the table that I mistook the chocolate sauce for gravy and poured it over the sirloin steak.

I soon found myself becoming indifferent to people. A well of cynicism rose in me.

Conversations all sounded like they had been recorded years ago and were being played back on a turntable. Sincerity and kindliness seemed to have gone out of my friends' voices. I suspected them of hypocrisy.

I stopped calling them, stopped seeing them.

I was impatient of what I took to be inane flattery. I got so sick of hearing people say, "I loved your play!" that I could not say thank you any more. I choked on the words and turned rudely away from the usually sincere person. I no longer felt any pride in the play itself but began to dislike it, probably because I felt too lifeless inside ever to create another. I was walking around dead in my shoes, and I knew it but there was no one I knew or trusted sufficiently, at that time, to take him aside and tell him what was the matter.

This curious condition persisted about three months, till late spring, when I decided to have another eye operation, mainly because of the excuse it gave me to withdraw from the world behind a gauze mask.

It was my fourth eye operation, and perhaps I should explain that I had been afflicted for about five years with a cataract on my left eye which required a series of needling operations and finally an operation on the muscle of the eye.

When the gauze mask was removed I found myself in a readjusted world. 

I checked out of the handsome suite at the first-class hotel, packed my papers and a few incidental belongings and left for Mexico, an elemental country where you can quickly forget the false dignities and conceits imposed by success, a country where vagrants innocent as children curl up to sleep on pavements and human voices especially when their language is not familiar to the ear, are soft as birds'. My public self, that artifice of mirrors, did not exist here and so my natural being was resumed.

Then, as a final act of restoration, I settled for a while at Chapala to work on a play called "The Poker Night," which later became "A Streetcar Named Desire." It is only in his work that an artist can find reality and satisfaction, for the actual world is less intense than the world of his invention and consequently his life, without recourse to violent disorder, does not seem very substantial. The right condition for him is that in which his work is not only convenient but unavoidable.

Success happened to me. But once you fully apprehend the vacuity of a life without struggle you are equipped with the basic means of salvation. 

Once you know this is true, that the heart of man, his body and his brain, are forged in a whitehot furnace for the purpose of conflict (the struggle of creation) and that with the conflict removed, the man is a sword cutting daisies, that not privation but luxury is the wolf at the door and that the fangs of this wolf are all the little vanities and conceits and laxities that Success is heir to-- why, then with this knowledge you are at least in a position of knowing where danger lies. You know, then, that the public Somebody you are when you "have a name" is a fiction created with mirrors and that the only somebody worth being is the solitary and unseen you that existed from your first breath and which is the sum of your actions and so is constantly in a state of becoming under your own volition--and knowing these things, you can even survive the catastrophe of Success! 

It is never altogether too late, unless you embrace the Bitch Goddess, as William James called her,

(note: William James uses the term in his 1907 book Pragmatism. There is a certain worship of success in American life, a devotion to what he calls the “bitch-goddess Success.”)

with both arms and find in her smothering caresses exactly what the homesick little boy in you always wanted, absolute protection and utter effortlessness. Security is a kind of death, I think, and it can come to you in a storm of royalty checks beside a kidneyshaped pool in Beverly Hills or anywhere at all that is removed from the conditions that made you an artist, if that's what you are or were intended to be.

Ask anyone who has experienced the kind of success I am talking about--What good is it? Perhaps to get an honest answer you will have to give him a shot of truth-serum but the word he will finally groan is unprintable in genteel publications.

(Note- I am reminded of the Guy de Maupassant quote that is understood to be a pithy summary of his outlook on life and desire: “I have coveted everything and taken pleasure in nothing.”)

Then what is good? The obsessive interest in human affairs, plus a certain amount of compassion and moral conviction, that first made the experience of living something that must be translated into pigment or music or bodily movement or poetry or prose or anything that's dynamic and expressive--that's what's good for you if you're at all serious in your aims. William Saroyan wrote a great play on this theme, that purity of heart is the one success worth having. "In the time of your life--live!"

(note: William Saroyan & The Time of Your Life (1939) Saroyan wrote the play in the late 1930s, on the eve of war, in a moment when America was anxious, disillusioned, and unsure what “winning” even meant anymore. The line comes from the play’s epigraph and recurring moral center: “In the time of your life—live!” And the idea —“that purity of heart is the one success worth having”—is Saroyan’s explicit thesis.)

That time is short and it doesn't return again. It is slipping away while I write this and while you read it, and the monosyllable of the clock is Loss, Loss, Loss unless you devote your heart to its opposition.

Reading this essay, it struck me that Williams wasn’t just describing a personal crisis. He was diagnosing a cultural one. What he feared in his own life—the confusion of success with safety, prosperity with meaning—is a trap that has always haunted the American Dream. And when opportunity is severed from virtue, the dream quietly becomes a nightmare.

Every February, I try to observe some kind of fast. I don’t want to go into the details now, but reading Williams—and thinking through where success, comfort, and attention quietly reshape us—has already begun to influence what that fast will look like this year. Rather than a withdrawal for its own sake, it feels more like an experiment in resistance: a way of paying closer attention to what I consume and what consumes me. I’ll be curious to see where it leads, and perhaps when the month is over, I’ll have something worth reporting—not as a conclusion, but as an experience.

Update: This is kind of bizarre, but in trying to capture the mood of this amazing essay from Williams- I felt I needed a more bleak symbol... so it landed at the tragedy of Howard Hughes- 

Song: The Last Days of Howard Hughes

Music video: Last Days of Howard Hughes Video

Here We Are Again in the Garden of Gray

Note: I normally avoid wading into the sharp and tangled debates that swirl around tragedies like the one in Minnesota. My deepest desire has always been to encourage unity, grace, and the faithful proclamation of the gospel rather than contribute to cultural division.

In the past, I’ve started posts, stopped, rewritten, and even retracted them because I did not want my words to inflame when they should invite reflection. I’ve struggled with this — not because I lack conviction, but because I understand how easily good intention can be misunderstood when poured into a landscape divided by bias, strong presuppositions, and fragmented realities.

Hard to believe it has been a decade regarding Baltimore/Ferguson. Here was the mood back then:

In Screens We Trust (Baltimore)

Yet here I am again — not because I think I have all the answers, but because we cannot simply turn away from these moments. When we refuse to speak honestly, we leave only the loudest voices to fill the void. When we retreat out of fear of offending, we surrender the space to those who thrive on division rather than dialogue.

My hope is not to score points or to settle partisan scores. I write because I believe we must seek truth together, even when it lives in the gray between outrage and resignation — and especially when that truth is uncomfortable.

Know this, my beloved brothers: let every person be quick to hear, slow to speak, slow to anger; [20] for the anger of man does not produce the righteousness of God. [21] Therefore put away all filthiness and rampant wickedness and receive with meekness the implanted word, which is able to save your souls. [22] But be doers of the word, and not hearers only, deceiving yourselves. (James 1:19–22 ESV)

We are all disturbed by the tragedy that has taken place in Minnesota. Lives have been lost, communities are hurting, and the tension surrounding it feels raw and unresolved. It is the kind of moment that demands careful thought, yet feels almost impossible to discuss honestly. Grief is close to the surface, emotions are high, and words are easily misheard or weaponized.

Perhaps that is why our conversations so quickly fracture. Many of us now live inside echo chambers—formed by algorithms, social media, and selective news consumption—that reinforce what we already believe rather than challenge us. Bias has always existed, but today it is paired with something more corrosive: disinformation and half-truths repeated until certainty replaces understanding. In that environment, deliberation gives way to reaction, and discourse gives way to division.

I do not pretend to know exactly where the balance lies right now—where the pendulum between order and liberty currently rests. What I do know is that societies rarely drift into authoritarianism from only one direction. Excessive force and unchecked power can push a nation there. But prolonged unrest, fear, and the breakdown of shared norms can also create the conditions in which people begin to demand a strong hand. History offers few examples where sustained disorder ends in freedom.

This is the paradox we struggle to name. What is decried as authoritarianism on one side can become the very outcome produced by chaos on the other. That reality does not excuse abuses of authority. Power must always be restrained, accountable, and legitimate. Brute force cannot substitute for trust. Yet protest without limits—harassment, intimidation, vandalism, doxing, or deliberate provocation—does not strengthen justice either. It accelerates escalation and makes restraint more difficult for everyone involved.

Perhaps the deeper issue is not only what we are arguing about now, but what we failed to build long before this moment.

In a relatively benign way- I came to understand this slowly during my years as a Dean of Students—after some good decisions and more than a few mistakes. Discipline was never something I mastered quickly, nor was it ever clean. Over time, I learned that rules could not be applied mechanically if they were going to be just. Authority had to be exercised with discernment, shaped by the individual in front of me, not merely the infraction on paper.

I could not let my love for law override my love for people. But I also learned that the opposite failure carried its own cost. Refusing to confront wrongdoing did not make me compassionate; it often meant that victims’ needs were ignored, that harm went unaddressed, and that boundaries quietly eroded. Justice required navigating between those extremes—a space that was almost entirely gray.

Often, what appeared to be a minor issue was no longer about the rule itself. A dress code violation, for example, ceased to be about clothing and became about whether authority would be acknowledged at all. That always raised the same difficult question: Is this worth it? Not enforcing boundaries invited disorder. Enforcing them too rigidly risked disproportionate harm. The goal was never punishment for its own sake, but formation—teaching self-discipline early, in a place where mistakes could still be corrected without permanently altering the course of a life.

I could not do that work alone. It required partnership with parents, colleagues, and a willingness to admit when I was wrong. Divided authority—especially when adults were not on the same page—made discipline nearly impossible. Inconsistent expectations taught students to exploit the gaps, not because they were malicious, but because systems always teach behavior. Restraint depended on legitimacy, consistency, and trust.

By the time authority is encountered only through law enforcement or the full weight of the state, the opportunity for that kind of formative correction has often already passed. The consequences are sharper, the margins for grace narrower, and the outcomes far more permanent. Schools and homes are meant to be the last places where correction is personal and survivable. When those foundations weaken, we ask police and governments to do work they were never meant to do: moral formation.

None of this fits neatly into partisan narratives. It requires holding two truths at once—that unchecked power is dangerous, and that unchecked disorder invites it. That restraint is essential, and that restraint itself must be learned. A society that abandons early formation should not be surprised when force becomes the only remaining tool.

I do not know where we are on the pendulum. I do know that shouting across divides will not steady it. What is needed now is not less conversation, but better conversation—one grounded in humility rather than certainty, in responsibility rather than outrage, and in a shared commitment to rebuild the foundations that make freedom sustainable.

If we cannot speak to one another honestly—if we cannot agree on legitimacy, boundaries, and restraint—then the question before us is no longer who is right.

The question is whether the foundation we need is still intact…

or whether we will only recognize its absence once everything built upon it begins to fall. 

I do know this for a fact (and probably true of me as well)- I can read almost every social media post from anyone on my feed and I can guess with a high view of accuracy where you get your news......

We need to simmer down and listen- we need to be compassionate and pray- we need to stop accusing in hyperbole- we need to find common ground.....

Never forget the lesson of the Templar's- I tried to capture it in a song:

Every Holy War Ends This Way

The Price of a Day

You can find all the Jan. 26 posts here: https://bearbryantmemories.wordpress.com/

Every January 26, I pause.

I pause to remember Coach Paul “Bear” Bryant—not only the championships, the records, or the houndstooth hat that became iconic, but the man who taught lessons that reached far beyond football.

One of those lessons came in 1982.

At a team meeting that year, Coach Bryant reached into his pocket and pulled out a small, folded piece of paper. It was worn, creased, and clearly carried often. He told us he kept it with him as a reminder of what truly mattered.

Then he read it to us.

It wasn’t a play.
It wasn’t a motivational speech.
It was a poem.

And when he finished reading, the room was silent.

Here is the poem Coach Bryant carried—and lived by:

The Beginning of a New Day

Heartsill Wilson

This is the beginning of a new day.
God has given me this day to use as I will.

I can waste it or use it for good.
What I do today is very important
because I am exchanging a day of my life for it.

When tomorrow comes, this day will be gone forever,
leaving something in its place I have traded for it.

I want it to be a gain, not a loss—good, not evil.

Success, not failure, in order that I shall not regret
the price I paid for it.

Coach Bryant understood that poem in a way few people do.

He knew that every morning, God hands us a day—twenty-four brand-new hours—and the price of that day is our very life. You can’t borrow time. You can’t save it for later. You either spend it well, or you lose it forever.

That lesson stayed with me.

Years later, it became a song I wrote called “The Price I Paid for Today.” It’s my own reflection on that moment in 1982, and on the truth Coach Bryant impressed upon us so simply and so powerfully: time is not free.

Every day asks a question of us.

Did we spend it on love or anger?
Did we build or did we tear down?
Did we honor God with the wage we asked for—or settle for something less?

Coach Bryant didn’t preach long sermons. He didn’t have to. He lived what he taught. He understood discipline, accountability, and faith—not just in football, but in life.

As we remember him today, I believe this is the question he would still want us to ask ourselves:

What did I spend my time on today?

Because when this day is over, it’s gone.
And the price we paid for it… is our life.

“See then that ye walk circumspectly, not as fools, but as wise,
Redeeming the time, because the days are evil.”
— Ephesians 5:15–16

Thank you, Coach.
For the lessons that never fade.

You can find the song here: The Price I Paid for Today

Living Water

 

"For my people have committed two evils: they have forsaken me, the fountain of living waters, and hewed out cisterns for themselves, broken cisterns that can hold no water." (Jeremiah 2:13 ESV)

Anyone who has trained for any sport or physical discipline knows how essential water is. If you're not staying hydrated, no amount of hard work will bring results. Has your weight loss plateaued? Are you struggling with sleep? In many cases, the answer is simple: drink more water.

In Jeremiah 2, God speaks of a tragic choice made by His people. They turned away from Him—the fountain of living water (sin #1)—and instead dug their own cisterns (wells or containers). But these cisterns are broken and leak water; they’re dry and useless (sin #2).

Are you thirsty? Deep down, we all are. We all have deep desires—for love, security, purpose, and peace. And there’s only one true source to quench this thirst. Yet we often reject the One who can truly satisfy and turn to anything and everything else, thinking these things will fill us up. But each one fails us in the end.

We chase fortune, fame, pleasure, the perfect job, the ideal vacation, or even the “next big thing”—thinking it will be enough. But as we’ve heard from countless voices: Mick Jagger sang, “I can’t get no satisfaction.” U2 still haven’t found what they’re looking for. And Frank Sinatra knew all too well about being “riding high in April, shot down in May.”

C.S. Lewis wrote about these deep desires and the ways people try to handle them in Mere Christianity. He described three common approaches:

1. The Fool’s Way: This is the person who thinks, “If I could just have this one more thing, then I’d be happy.” They run after a series of temporary thrills, always thinking satisfaction is just around the corner, but they’re left empty every time.

2. The Disillusioned ‘Sensible’ Way: This person realizes that nothing satisfies them for long, so they try to lower their expectations. They tell themselves it’s wiser not to dream, that the best they can do is to be “realistic” and give up the pursuit of true fulfillment. They become cynical, thinking happiness and fulfillment were just childish ideas.

3. The Christian Way: This approach acknowledges that our longings aren’t the problem; they’re signposts. They point us to something beyond this world. We weren’t wrong to want something more; we were just looking in the wrong place. As Lewis famously wrote, “If I find in myself desires which nothing in this world can satisfy, the only logical explanation is that I was made for another world.”

Are you thirsty, my friend? Just because this world has let you down, time and time again, doesn’t mean that God is absent. Jesus Himself offers “living water”—an endless, ever-fresh supply that truly satisfies.

Consider the story of the Samaritan woman in John 4. She came to a well for water, but Jesus spoke to her about a different kind of water. He told her, “Everyone who drinks of this water will be thirsty again, but whoever drinks of the water I will give will never thirst again. The water that I will give will become in him a spring of water welling up to eternal life” (John 4:13-14 ESV).

This woman had tried and failed repeatedly to find satisfaction and peace. Her life was marked by loneliness and rejection. Yet Jesus met her with love, hope, and forgiveness. And she was ready—she humbled herself, acknowledged her thirst, and received His offer of grace. By the end of their encounter, she ran to tell her whole village about the One who offered her living water.

If you’ve tried to quench your thirst in broken cisterns and found them dry, there’s good news: the fountain of living water is still available to you. Jesus promises that His living water won’t just refresh us; it will overflow through us, bringing life to others.

So, let’s remember: true training, true growth—even in our faith—requires not just discipline but also sustenance. Just as the body needs water to grow and heal, our souls need living water to thrive. Ask yourself—are you thirsty? Then come to the One who can truly satisfy, and let His water pour over you today for cleansing, life, and unending peace.

A few songs on this topic:

Living Water

Meant for Another

The Older I Get, The More Complicated It Feels, But the Loops Are the Same

I didn’t set out to think about any of this.

I actually stumbled into it by accident.

I don’t think the world has become more chaotic.

I think it has become more layered.

The older I get, the more everything feels complicated—college football, culture, music, even the shows that grab my attention. Things feel disjointed, anachronistic, strangely familiar and unfamiliar at the same time. Traditions still exist, but they feel thinner. Rituals still happen, but they don’t land the way they used to.

And yet, when I step back, I realize something unsettling and oddly calming: the loops are the same.

College football is where this first hit me. The pageantry is still there—the bands, the rivalries, the chants—but something underneath has shifted. Conference realignment, NIL deals, transfer portals. The game looks the same, but it no longer answers the same questions it once did.

It used to be about continuity: alma mater, region, identity passed down. Now it feels more transactional, more optimized, more like entertainment than inheritance. The ritual remains, but the obligation has faded.

That’s when I started noticing the same feeling elsewhere.

When people say this is nostalgia, I don’t think that’s quite right. Nostalgia is often dismissed as sentimental longing for the past, but what I feel is closer to recognition.

It’s the sense that something real has been lost—and that what replaced it hasn’t fully learned how to carry meaning yet.

That’s why the shows and music that resonate with me lately are often anachronistic.

A good example is Fallout. I came across the series on Prime almost by accident, knowing nothing about the video game history behind it. What struck me immediately was the tone—the 1950s optimism, the cheerful slogans, the anachronistic music layered over institutional decay. It felt strangely honest.

Then my son-in-law mentioned that he had played the Fallout games for years, and that the show was remarkably faithful to the source material. That surprised me. What I thought was a modern commentary turned out to be a long-standing cultural diagnosis that had finally caught up to the present. They mix eras. They feel disjointed. They use old aesthetics to say new things. Fallout does this perfectly—1950s optimism layered over institutional collapse. It isn’t about the apocalypse. It’s about what happens when systems keep running after belief is gone.

That feels familiar.

That realization sent my mind backward.

I started thinking about Saturday Night Fever—another piece of pop culture that felt like entertainment on the surface but was really about pressure underneath. The film traces back to a 1976 New York Magazine article, often remembered as Rituals of Saturday Night. Its reporting was later disputed, but like most powerful cultural artifacts, factual precision mattered less than emotional truth.

The article captured something real: the streets of New York were tough, work was constraining, status was limited, and Saturday night became ritualized escape. Disco wasn’t frivolous—it was endurance with a beat.

That idea even shows up subtly in the music. In Stayin’ Alive, there’s a lyric often misheard or overlooked: the reference to media pressure and the weight of the city—you see clearly in the opening verse:

Music loud and women warm, I've been kicked around
Since I was born
And now it's all right, it's okay
And you may look the other way
But we can try to understand
The New York Times' effect on man

 Whether literal or symbolic, the meaning lands the same: information, expectation, and environment pressing down on the individual.

What article or post is having that effect on man today?

History keeps showing us the same pattern.

After the Great Depression and World War II, people wanted order. The 1950s were about structure, routine, and faith in institutions—families, corporations, government. Even under the shadow of the atomic bomb, there was comfort in predictability.

Then came the cracks.

The 1960s brought civil rights, unrest, and rebellion—not because people wanted chaos, but because the old order no longer made moral sense. Music became protest. Rituals became marches. Authenticity replaced conformity.

The 1970s were different. Vietnam, Watergate, and economic stagnation drained belief. Idealism collapsed. Culture turned toward survival and escape—disco, nightlife, movement. Staying alive wasn’t a metaphor; it was a posture.

The 1980s layered performance on top of that survival. Image, consumption, and status filled the meaning vacuum.

The loop kept turning.

What makes the early 2020s feel different isn’t the presence of crisis. It’s the absence of resolution.

Institutions don’t collapse. They persist. Rituals don’t disappear. They perform. Traditions don’t die. But they seem more like old silly rewinds than anything meaningful. My experience even with young adults is that old is old and they want new.

The pressure today isn’t merely physical danger. It’s cognitive saturation. Endless information. Endless judgment. Endless reaction. The street isn’t hostile—the feed is.

That’s why we don’t have shared anthems anymore. We have playlists. Vibes. Moments that burn bright and disappear. The loop has sped up.

So when a show like Fallout resonates, it’s not because I want the past back. It’s because it admits something we’re all quietly noticing:

That we are living inside systems that still function but no longer fully explain themselves.

The anachronism isn’t confusion—it’s honesty. It reflects a world where old stories are still playing on the speakers, but no one quite believes the lyrics anymore.

Here’s the surprising part.

After a few weeks of turning this over—college football, Fallout, Saturday Night Fever, music, rituals—it started to feel less like isolated observations and more like a pattern.

Once you see the loops, the complexity becomes less frightening.

Order gives way to rebellion. Rebellion gives way to disillusionment. Disillusionment gives way to survival. Survival gives way to performance. Performance eventually collapses under its own emptiness. And then—quietly—people start rebuilding meaning again, usually smaller, more local, more embodied. Maybe even a hunger for God, the only One big enough to make sense of it all.

We’ve been here before.

What changes are the technologies, the aesthetics, the speed.

What doesn’t change is the human need for: Belonging over time (relationships) Ritual that costs something (worship) Traditions that ask us to carry them forward (discipleship).

The older I get, the more complicated it feels—not because the world is unprecedented, but because I can finally see the layers at once.

So where are we now?

We seem to be at the late stage of the loop: after belief has thinned, after performance has replaced meaning, and before anything solid has been rebuilt. Traditions still exist, but they feel negotiated. Rituals still happen, but they’re often detached from obligation. Pop culture reaches backward not out of laziness, but because older aesthetics still know how to tell the truth.

Where are we trending?

Historically, moments like this don’t resolve through bigger spectacles or louder anthems. They resolve quietly. Meaning rebuilds at smaller scales—local, embodied, intentional. New rituals emerge that ask more of us, not less. Traditions return, but stripped of illusion.

And once you see the loops, you realize this moment isn’t the end of meaning.

It’s the part of the cycle where meaning has to be rebuilt—again.

And he said, “Go out and stand on the mount before the LORD.” And behold, the LORD passed by, and a great and strong wind tore the mountains and broke in pieces the rocks before the LORD, but the LORD was not in the wind. And after the wind an earthquake, but the LORD was not in the earthquake. [12] And after the earthquake a fire, but the LORD was not in the fire. And after the fire the sound of a low whisper. (1 Kings 19:11–12 ESV)

Song Link: Low Whisper

To the 'Broken' Watchman (Ezekiel 2 and 3)

“A broken clock is right twice a day.” Mark Twain

“Who watches the watchmen?” Juvenal

“Time and tide wait for no man.” Chaucer

“Lost time is never found again.” Franklin

Hey—

look at me.

I know.
You didn’t fall because you were reckless.
You fell because you were tired.

You didn’t abandon the wall—
you just sat down for a minute
and the minute turned into months.

It wasn’t the shouting that got you.
It was the looks.

The eyes that narrowed.
The faces that stiffened.
The smile that never reached the eyes
and the silence that said more than words ever could.

And then the screens—
the endless scrolling screens.

The comments dressed like concern.
The sarcasm disguised as wisdom.
The “just asking questions” crowd
asking nothing at all.

You posted once.
Once.

And the room turned cold.
Not loud—
worse.

Cold.

No replies.
A few laughs—
not with you.
At you.

And you told yourself it was discernment.
Maturity.
Peace.

But really—
it was fear wearing a clerical collar.

Listen—
you are not weak for feeling it.

Words cut.
Looks crush.
And being misunderstood in public
is its own kind of crucifixion.

But hear me now.

You were never called to win the city.
You were called to warn it.

You were never tasked with changing hearts,
only with opening your mouth
when God put fire there.

You forgot that part.

You thought silence might save you.
You thought quiet might keep the peace.
You thought retreat was kindness.

But peace that demands disappearance
is not peace.
It’s surrender.

And love that never risks truth
is not love.
It’s fear with good intentions.

I know—
you replay the faces.
You hear the tone.
You still flinch when the notification buzzes.

That doesn’t disqualify you.

It means you cared.

But hear this—
their looks were never your verdict.
Their words were never your judge.

They were a rebellious house
before you ever climbed the wall.

So stand up.

Not angry.
Not loud.
Not cruel.

Stand up faithful.

Say the thing you were given—
not everything,
just the thing.

Warning, not winning.
Faithfulness, not applause.
Love that tells the truth
and leaves the outcome with God.

You don’t have to shout.
You don’t have to post every thought.
You don’t have to answer every voice.

But when the word comes—
don’t sit down again.

Get back on the wall.

The city still needs watchmen.
And you—
you were never finished.

“A broken clock still tells the truth sometimes.”

“The watch is broken, not time itself.”

“Silence does not stop the clock.”

“The price of freedom is eternal vigilance.” Thomas Jefferson

“Watchfulness is the price of safety.” Samuel Johnson

“It is easy to sleep at your post when the night is long.”

Note: About the quote at the top

Watchman Nee (1903–1972) is recognized by some as one of the most significant Christian figures of his era.
Nee became a Christian at age 17 in 1920. He soon began an impactful ministry focusing on personal faith, the experience of Christ, and the deeper Christian life, without attending a formal theological seminary.
He founded a movement in China known as the "Local Churches," which emphasized independence from Western missionary organizations and sought to follow New Testament church practices strictly. The movement grew rapidly to hundreds of congregations across China before the Communist Revolution.
A prolific writer, his books were often compiled from his spoken messages. His most well-known works include The Normal Christian Life, The Spiritual Man, and Sit, Walk, Stand. These writings continue to influence Christians globally, spanning various denominations.
Following the Communist takeover of China, Nee was arrested in March 1952 for his faith and leadership among the churches. He was falsely accused of various crimes and sentenced to fifteen years in prison in 1956.
He remained imprisoned until his death on May 30, 1972, spending the last 20 years of his life in confinement. In his final days, he left a note under his pillow that served as his testament: "Christ is the Son of God Who died for the redemption of sinners and was resurrected after three days. This is the greatest truth in the universe. I die because of my belief in Christ". He is considered a martyr of the Chinese church.