It is twilight, not really, as the sun has sunk behind our slope, but not down on the Pacific horizon, no, not down on the western horizon. If i wished to climb up to our flag, i could watch it set, possibly catch a “green flash.”

But i am grilling filets tonight. i sit on the small patio outside our kitchen. i earlier marinated the steaks. The grill is heating up. Charcoal is my only choice for grilling. i link my bluetooth speaker to my “library” and play my “oldies” from most genres before “rap” and “hip hop.” Maureen is in the kitchen cooking the sides and preparing the salad.

It was cool today for the Southwest corner. As the sun fades behind our slope, it gets cooler fast. i add a Navy watch cap and a thick green hoodie for warmth. Still, i sip from my martini while waiting for the charcoal to heat up. It does get cooler as i listen to my music, “shuffled” to guarantee all genres will play. As i write, Nina Simone is singing one of my favorite songs of hers, “You Can Have Him.”

It is a time for thought, peaceful thought. 

i think life ain’t all that bad. If the next round of rain holds off, i should get in a round of golf on New Year’s Day. Approaching 82, a duffer’s golf game doesn’t get better, just shorter and shakier. The game is now about being with long-time friends, military men with unlimited stories to tell over a beer or two after a round. We call ourselves, appropriately “curmudgeons,” frequently using the term “asshole” as a compliment.

The sun has set, head down over the pacific about seven miles away, a figure that was important when i was officer of the deck: “hull down” meant a ship was more than seven miles away with only her superstructure or, at night, her running lights visible.

i look back toward the kitchen. Maureen is rinsing vegetables at the kitchen sink before drying them by spinning them in the collander. She is a great cook, a kitchen engineer with preciseness, just like her dad was as a mechanical engineer. Her salads are the best i’ve ever had anywhere.

She remains beautiful. Her movements there in the kitchen make me feel glad, lucky i must admit. Our two daughters are happily married. One is a successful manager. The other is on her rise to success. We don’t see them or our grandson enough. Knowing they are secure and living good lives is enough.

That New Year’s golf game is only a few days away. Then comes 2026. Our travels won’t be as long or often as they used to be. Our driving will be slower and, for me, more careful. i already avoid freeways when possible. My aches will increase. i will start to shuffle more than walk. My balance requires me to be careful of how and where i walk.

It’s all okay. i am alive with a wonderful mate (the seaman connotation, “mate” is a nice word but much better when it concerns us).

i hope all of you have a successful and healthy 2026 and find happiness and peace beyond the next horizon.

Sunday morning, the last Sunday before Christmas, the last Sunday of Christian Advent, i became a better person, experiencing an emotional morning due to my sister Martha and my brother Joe.

Maureen and i are on top of my favorite mountain (especially after retiring my skis several year ago).

Just before 11:00, my brother-in-law and i went to the Signal Crest Methodist Church. We parked and walked up to the balcony and sat in the back row.

For an hour, i was mesmerized. My sister Martha plays in the bell choir, which performed to excellent pieces, especially their version of “Noel.” The pastor, Dave Graybeal, gave a sermon centered around Mr. Rogers and his neighborhood. Ordinarily, i politely act like i listen to sermons while thinking about other things. Dave’s resonated with me. Even Tracy Gartman’s presentation to the children moved me.

There was a goodness in the air. It moved me.

i am a lucky man to have my sister and brother-in-law in my life.

◆◆◆

Martha’s and my brother Joe is a retired Methodist minister. He is also brilliant and holds master degrees in theology and philosophy from Boston University. He wrote a book, The Elements of Prayer, modeled from Strunk and White’s Elements of Style. It is a moving book that is for everyone to contemplate on their relationship with their higher power. i gave a copy to Marty Linville, one of my best friends in San Diego and his wife Linda. They were very religious Catholics. Marty was awarded the Army’s Silver Star due to his valiant action when in charge of a 105 howitzer artillery unit that was overrun by a North Vietnamese company. Marty told me several years later that he and Linda would read Joe’s book on prayer every month or so because of the grace they received from it. i will pick my copy up and read it again when i am feeling a bit low.

Joe is a wonderful man. He is super smart and reads deep and thoughtful books. He is a terrific family man, and loves his adopted New England. His wife Carla Neggers is a talented and successful novelist.

i am a lucky man to have such a brother and sister-in-law

Previously on Saturday evening, i opened up my brother Joe’s Facebook post:

Some fifty-odd years ago, I was walking back to my fraternity house late one evening. I had been studying for my last final exam, in Phenomenology. I had found a quiet place on the Scarritt College campus that I used when I really had to concentrate on a subject as I always did when reading Husserl. While I had been inside, it had started to snow; the ground was lightly covered and flakes were still drifting down. As I walked past Wightman Chapel, I noticed it was partially lit, the only light around, and inside someone was playing Bach’s Toccata and Fugue in D minor. I was transfixed, even though the piece was not one I associated with Christmas. It was a moving moment, but then, the player stumbled on a difficult passage, stopped, and started the section over, getting it right. I stood there, listening, and then the player stumbled again, restarted, finished. I stayed until it was over and then made my way back.

I knew I would remember those moments, but it wasn’t until some years later that I began to grasp why it had been so meaningful to me. It was the stumbling blocks, the “scandalon” in New Testament Greek, that made it special, that made it become…human.

Not otherworldly, not spiritual in a shallow sense, but human, something with which another human could connect.

We are anticipating and about to celebrate The Incarnation, God made flesh, God become human, God possibly stumbling, possible of and for connection with us. Sometimes, as this year, the Christmas “Spirit” seems sparse, so I think on those moments, that connection. And that is my Christmas wish for all who read this: that you connect to others in our humanity which promises the divine to us all.

MERRY CHRISTMAS!!!

i was deeply moved when i read that post. Grace took me by the hand once again. i felt peace washing over me. Peace for all along with a wonderful Christmas with your loved ones.

Thank you, Joe, Carla, Martha and Todd.

There are some things that never change, For me, one of those “things” is the relationship i have with George Henry Harding, IV. We have been friends since we first met at our christening in May 1945 at the Lebanon First Methodist Church in Lebanon. i was a year and four months old. Henry was a year and one month old.

We are not alike. Henry is tall, dark, handsome, and still has hair. Me…well, let’s not go there.

i probably spent as much, if not more time at Henry’s home as i did at mine after the age of seven or so, until i left for parts known and unknown when we turned 24.

Henry went to Lebanon High School. i went to Castle Heights Military Academy. We remained close and spent our weekends when not playing football, basketball, baseball together, as well as nights listening to his father’s “party” records of Moms Mabely and Redd Foxx in the front room of his home.

Henry went to the University of Tennessee. I went to Vanderbilt and graduated from Middle Tennessee.

Henry was enlisted Army and an ordance instructor in Maryland. i went to Navy OCS and eventually made the Navy my career.

Henry stilll lives in that house where we played. i have lived in a dozen places, most while being aboard 10 ships that traveled to many places, except Northern Europe and around South America.

We still talk to each other, but now, it is nearly allways by long distance phone calls. Each time, no matter how long in between, it’s like we pick up the conversation where we left off the previous time. 

Henry remains a die-hard Tennessee football fan. i continue to be a dyed–in-the-wool Vanderbilt fan. We cheer for our respective teams and enjoy the successes of the other.

Remarkably, we seem to think alike on most subjects, especially politics.

We rag at each other in the most jovial manner.

He is like another brother.

This weekend i initiated a string of emails about the Vanderbilt-Tennessee football game. i expressed my thrill at Vandy’s win but also expressed some sadness that the Vols had to lose.

This exchange went on for several emails. When i closed out, i made the comment that like Waylon Jennings sang, “I’ve always been crazy but it’s kept me from going insane.”

Henry’s reply:

“Too late.”

Not only is he like a brother, he knows me well.