Rev. Dr. Jeff Garrison
Gary D. Schmidt, Orbiting Jupiter (Boston, Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, 2015), 183 pages. The family has one other boy, Jack. After getting off to a shaky start, the two become like brothers, watching out for the other. The story centers around what happened to Joseph in his past. When he was 13, he fell in love with … Read more Notes on my reading during the past month
I have told this story several times including in an article published in Nevada Magazine’s online edition. 1988 was the first time I was without family on Christmas. It was also my first white Christmas. And it was a holy Christmas. I had taken a year off from seminary to serve as a student pastor in … Read more A Christmas Eve Story
Last week I spent a few days with my father and uncle (and my uncle’s brother-in-law) fishing off Cape Lookout. The end of a day We leave the jetty off the southwest side of Lookout a little after four. To the west, the sun is dropping close to the horizon. I’m at the helm of … Read more A Good Day Fishing
The sun burns brightly in the blue sky. What warmth it provides is swept away by a strong breeze. The move, the death of my mother, settling into a new church, and dealing with the new house has taken a lot out of me. I need a break. I take Tuesday off and spend the afternoon … Read more A Windy Walk to Clear My Mind
Esau McCaulley, Reading While Black: African American Biblical Interpretation as an Exercise in Hope (Downer’s Grove, IL: Intervarsity Press, 2020), 198 pages including a discussion guide, bibliography, scriptural index and index. McCaulley provides an interesting insight into the struggles facing African American theologians today. Coming from an evangelical tradition, he quickly notes the failure of … Read more Reading as Black: African American Biblical Interpretation as an Exercise in Hope
On Wednesday, drove from Mayberry to Bluemont along the parkway, in the fog. It looked a lot like Halloween. With the bare trees and fog, who knows what evil might be lurking… In thinking about this day, I recalled my first time going out trick-or-treating and pulled out an old manuscript and reworked it. Remember, … Read more Halloween 1962
Today, we buried my mother. This is an obituary my father had me to write a few years ago. It appeared in an edited version, but I am posting it at its full length. On July 26, 1937, Barbara was born on a farm outside of Pinehurst, North Carolina to Pete and Gladys Faircloth. She … Read more My Mom
John M. Barry, The Great Influenza: The Story of the Deadliest Pandemic in History (2004, Penguin Books, New York, 2018), 548 pages, some photos, index and notes. This is an impressive book that does more than just provide a history of the 1918 influenza pandemic. Barry provides a history of medicine especially in … Read more The Great Influenza
The finish was exciting. An offshore breeze was blowing steadily toward the land and many of the boats still in the race were all convening on the R2W buoy two miles off Wassaw Island at the same time. There was only one boat left in our class, Todd’s Grand Cru. While we had opted to … Read more Sailing: The Low Country Hook Ocean Race
Jesse Cole, Find Your Yellow Tux: How to be Successful by Standing Out (Lioncrest Publishing, 2018), 303 pages, some photos. The Back Story: One of the most amazing things I’ve seen while living in the Savannah area is the development of a summer league baseball team for college players, the Savannah Bananas. Before the Bananas … Read more Would You Wear a Yellow Tux?