A Country Boy Can Surmise

 Note:   I'll be sharing some thoughts every Sunday through Advent to help myself plow through this time of stillness when I so often love to go to church for the ceremony surrounding the waiting time.    One of my prized possessions is a 45 single of "Please Come Home For Christmas" by The Eagles.  I like The Eagles a lot but I would never call myself a super-fan.  But this particular record belonged to my aunt, Sis, and she loved them.  In particular she loved "Please Come Home for Christmas".  In the gloomy evenings after Thanksgiving she and I would decorate her tree and pull out her Christmas music, which was a vast treasure.  We worked for hours on her artificial tree, which had to be perfect.  First it had to be shaped, then laden with thousands of lights and a hundred ornaments.  My favorite part was the finishing touch:  adding the icicles , which were some kind of shiny, silver, synthetic strands that you hung all ove...

Note:   I'll be sharing some thoughts every Sunday through Advent to help myself plow through this time of stillness when I so often love to go to church for the ceremony surrounding the waiting time.  On the Second Sunday of Advent it is traditional to light the second purple candle, which is a symbol of faith.  This makes me think about how so many people I know associate their belief with a building and struggle to keep their faith lit if they do not go to church every time the door is cracked.  During the pandemic I have certainly missed going to church but I have been thankful to be part of a congregation that values the health and safety of others more than its own desire to gather.  Too many churches  throughout the country have exhibited a deep selfishness in refusing to close their doors, refusing to mask up, and refusing to social distance.  If any organized bodies should be setting themselves forth as an example, churches should, yet so many...

The Great Mystery- First Sunday of Advent.    During this pandemic time when so many of us are unable to attend church because we want to protect others, Advent is more important than ever.  I'll be sharing some thoughts every Sunday through Advent to help myself plow through this time of stillness when I so often love to go to church for the ceremony surrounding the waiting time.  The word Advent comes from the Latin word  adventus and means  "coming".  Since the 4th Century Advent has been a season of preparation in various ways although the most widely held is the build-up to the celebration of the birth of Christ. Advent wasn't explicitly tied to Christmas until the Middle Ages. Today, Advent lasts for four Sundays leading up to Christmas.  Then there is the twelve day celebration of Christmastide that ends with the Day of Epiphany on January 6.   I am one of the few writers in contemporary literary fiction who write and talk about peopl...

Huge showers of red and yellow and green and blue and white exploded on the sky, blossoming like giant willow trees. The booms were huge and square-sounding, echoing several times down the hills lining the river. Between explosions, blue smoke hung on the sky. After a while, a sort of reverent silence fell upon us. All the children stopped running about and screaming, and everyone became still. Perhaps we were all understanding that we had been free for two hundred years, or as free as people can possibly be. I like to think that everyone was filled with a brief melancholy, a moment in which we took into account everything we had, and appreciated it all, and felt blessed and lucky to have been born in this country, in this time and space. Or maybe everyone was taking into account all of the wrongs done to others to gain this freedom, the freedom that had been taken from others for our gain. My sister Josie...looked up at to the sky. Then she whispered to me: ...

This was in 1992. In the foreground is CNN anchor Bernard Shaw, who at the time was one of the most famous journalists in the world after narrating most of the Gulf War to us.  That’s me right above his head. At the time I was editor of my college newspaper and our wonderful faculty advisor, Susie Bullock,  took us to see Shaw when he came to the University of Kentucky to give the Creason Lecture. That night when I spoke to Shaw he said “With a voice and accent like that you have a future in journalism.”  Only a couple months before a judge at a journalism conference had told me I’d never get anywhere with my accent despite my perfect grammar. “That hillbilly talk makes you sound like an idiot,” the judge said.  Less than ten years after this picture was taken I became a contributor to NPR’s “All Things Considered”. Since then I’ve published seven books and been on a lot of TV and radio, appeared in and narrated documentaries, done commercial narration, and ...

My quickly written but passionate thoughts about the Oscars. Rural Erasure, As Always As always, the films that portrayed rural people with dignity and complexity were overlooked almost completely. Hollywood, like the literary gatekeepers in New York, won’t allow rural complexity to get too much attention or acclaim or it might be admitting that the sensational stereotypes aren’t truer. This year there were three that painted rural people beautifully—not as perfect, but as real human beings. They were:   Leave No Trace , First Reformed , and Lean on Pete, and they are all films that were absolutely cheated out of Oscar nominations.  I think it’s partly because of the rural complexity on display in the films.  Although the characters live in small rural towns, they are intelligent, engaged, and complicated.  Last year, my favorite movie of the year,  The Florida Project  was similarly overlooked, and I think that’s mostly bec...

I read 36 books this year (not counting the books I read for blurbs, workshops, etc.). Someone told me yesterday that they don't read because they don't have time.  Only a nonreader would think that's a valid excuse.  That person certainly has more time on their hands than I do but I still managed to devour almost forty books (and I'm a pretty slow reader, I think). We readers know that one makes time to read.  It's not a choice.  We're not happy if we're not doing it. Here are twenty-one of my favorites from that pile (in alphabetical order by author's last name).. Books that were published this year have a * by them.  I'm always hesitant to make lists because they're so objective and really only reveal the taste of the reader.  Most of the big magazines and awards failed to recognize many of the books I found the best and lauded several other books that I struggled to finish. Often I see books that are incredibly hyped and realize that I ju...