Moving Reflections from a Business Writer

 

This article was originally published on LinkedIn on December 27, 2021. It has since been updated to include a tribute to my Creative Writing professor from University of Redlands.

Mother's Nontraditional Career

 

The above squiggles spell out "International Women's Day 2022"​ in Gregg shorthand.

This article was published on LinkedIn on International Women's Day, March 8, 2022. 

Black Jeep in the Family

Personally, black is my least favorite color for a vehicle. It shows dirt easily and it ages especially poorly.

In 2000, I was shopping for a new Jeep. I was upgrading from a green 1995 with a manual shift and four cylinder engine, and had decided on an automatic transmission with the legendary (to Jeep people) 4.0 liter straight six.

Winter is Leaving: It's Time to Come Out

I have a routine with my 22 year old Jeep. It sits in the garage as soon as the weather is too cold for top-down driving — October, maybe early November. Since I refuse to put the top up anymore, it then goes in the garage and stays there until the spring. That’s about four to five months.

Reflections on a '92 C1500 Suburban

 This is a 1992 C1500 Chevrolet Suburban. I bought it in 1995 and finally sold it to a private party in 2006 or 2007.

The Ordainment of Cecil Baker Egerton

Dr. Fred Fernando Brown

First Baptist Church

Knoxville, Tennessee

Sunday, December 30, 1951

 

DR. STOKES:

                  At the direction of the church, a Council of Baptist Preachers met with Cecil Egerton this afternoon. I am going to ask the Clerk of our church, Mr. Russell Parrish, to read the report of that Council. Mr. Parrish:

Churches I have Loved (Most of the Time): Cloudy

Editor's Note: The following is an essay and recollection written by my father, Dr. Cecil Baker Egerton, of his first pastorate in Cloudy, Oklahoma, circa 1950.

I will never forget Cloudy. I learned so much there. I don’t know what the place is like now, but over a half century ago, it was a journey back in time to an America that existed long before I was born. Located on a ridge in the Kiamichi Mountains of Oklahoma, it was twenty-five miles from the nearest paved road. As a young man from the city of Knoxville [Tennessee] who was studying in a theological school in Fort Worth, Texas, going there was like using a time machine to visit a vanished world. The women still boiled their laundry in iron kettles on Monday. People drew water from their own wells. The younger kids attended a one-room schoolhouse, while the older kids rode a bus down to Rattan.