I was a little edgy the last time I boarded a helicopter. It was a chopper in Kauai on our last cruise. But this time I was excited to hop into the 6-passenger aircraft. The most spectacular views of Hawaii, I have discovered, come from the air. Our pilot spun us around and headed for the lava fields. We were in Hilo on the east side of the Big Island of Hawaii, the site of the 2018 … [Read more...]

  February 1, 1967 was an exciting day. I had packed my Camaro convertible with a few pots and pans, some linens, my guitar and stereo and headed to Charlottesville, my new home. It was a beautiful day, in the low 80’s and I put the top down on my drive over. This Virginia is a special kind of place, I thought. Two weeks later it snowed 16-inches, but on that first day of February, all was … [Read more...]

  My happy place? It’s on a dock, any dock or pier with water nearby. I can spend hours and hours on a dock and it’s as if time stand still. I suppose it all goes back to my early experiences as a ten-year-old boy on Uncle’s Sidney’s pier on Bogue Sound, across from Atlantic Beach. Uncle Sidney had built the pier by himself, no easy task for a man with a wooden leg. He had lost his … [Read more...]

This week, I had a chance to correspond with an old friend from Lewisburg, Bill Shaver. Bill and I go back a long way. Bill was the athlete, an excellent pitcher who could bring the heat while I had to give it all I had to make a throw from third to first. Bill hit homers, I hit singles. Bill and I played basketball together and took various trips to Myrtle Beach, but one thing that stands out … [Read more...]

On October 8, 1956, I was in 7th grade. At the 2 PM bell, they let students out of their classrooms and those who were interested assembled on chairs in the auditorium. A television set was on. The picture was a little fuzzy, but it was Game 5 of the World Series at Yankee Stadium.  The Dodgers and Yankees. Vin Scully and Mel Allen were the announcers. Babe Pinelli was the ump behind home plate … [Read more...]

In 1983, my Dad gave me an English Setter puppy out of Walter, a great setter and family pet. We named him Hunter. But this was the skitziest dog I had ever seen. He was super-hyper and deathly afraid of the trash men who used to pick up our trash cans from the back deck. I thought he would be gun shy for sure and he was so wild when you let him go, I wondered if I would ever see him again if I … [Read more...]

Not many Boomers were able to avoid the scourge of hand-me-down’s – clothes and shoes passed down from older brothers or sisters, or from one family to another. Most Boomer parents were children of the depression, and recycling was a way of life, not a fashion statement. Moms were even known to cut off buttons from old shirts and coats, so you know they were eager for gently used clothing in good … [Read more...]

  It was a typical morning on the farm. The four farmhands, Glen Allen and Richard McClung, Ben Benjamin and I walked through the hen houses to feed, water and remove the young pullets that didn’t make it through the night. Next, we were off to the lower pastures to sink a few post holes. There was always something to do on  Houston Moore’s cattle farm in Lewisburg and this day would bring … [Read more...]

The modern generation is accustomed to innovation. In recent years, they have seen voice-activated television sets, we have cars that run on batteries, transplant surgeries that take less than an hour, drone delivered packages and a phone - small enough for a shirt pocket - that will take videos, guide travelers, spit out data like a water fountain and – yes – it’s a phone. For our generation, … [Read more...]

Boomers recall lots of childhood memories. Some good and some not so good. One of those not-so-good memories for me was when I got “chiggered.” I was spending a week at Grandma Brewer’s, in Clemmons, NC, an annual event soon after school let out. My father, who was killed in World War II, had 8 living brothers and sisters and I was often passed around from Brewer to Brewer as I visited. On … [Read more...]