September 10, 2014 Preface & Apology
Upon graduation from high school in 1966 I went on an 8-week journey around the United States of America with my friend Carl Colby. I maintained a journal which I called “Travels with Carly”, a tribute to a popular book by John Steinbeck, Travels with Charlie and a way to indulge my penchant for bad puns (are there any other kinds). At UNC in 1968 I kept a journal for Dr. Ruel Tyson’s religion class about self-revelation considering the works of St. Augustine, Montaigne, Kierkegaard, Sartre and others I’ve forgotten. About a decade later I found that journal as my wife and I moved from one abode to another and I reread parts of it with some curiosity. The stream-of-consciousness style and the poor handwriting prompted me at that time to reflect how patient Dr. Tyson was and how kind his comments were for the writing that seemed to me 10 years later to be rather random drivel.
It’s with mixed feelings that I begin another journal. The bad handwriting issue is now overcome with digital typing capability (Thank you Lord). The random nature of my thoughts continues with some mitigation resulting from years of discipline required to earn a living by focusing on a variety of problems and actually being required to suggest and to implement solutions.
That said a daily journal will be a challenge for me. I will attempt to harken to a couple of Dr. Tyson’s gently inscribed suggestions to “Take a stand” and to “Go a little deeper”. Some 46 years later that advice seems to hold up well and appears still to be sound. I will endeavor belatedly to follow my favorite professor’s directions.
In consideration of my chronologically gifted status among Columbia Seminary’s class of entering students and as a reminder that good writing need not be verbose, I will call this journal “The Old Man and the Seminary”.
Upon graduation from high school in 1966 I went on an 8-week journey around the United States of America with my friend Carl Colby. I maintained a journal which I called “Travels with Carly”, a tribute to a popular book by John Steinbeck, Travels with Charlie and a way to indulge my penchant for bad puns (are there any other kinds). At UNC in 1968 I kept a journal for Dr. Ruel Tyson’s religion class about self-revelation considering the works of St. Augustine, Montaigne, Kierkegaard, Sartre and others I’ve forgotten. About a decade later I found that journal as my wife and I moved from one abode to another and I reread parts of it with some curiosity. The stream-of-consciousness style and the poor handwriting prompted me at that time to reflect how patient Dr. Tyson was and how kind his comments were for the writing that seemed to me 10 years later to be rather random drivel.
It’s with mixed feelings that I begin another journal. The bad handwriting issue is now overcome with digital typing capability (Thank you Lord). The random nature of my thoughts continues with some mitigation resulting from years of discipline required to earn a living by focusing on a variety of problems and actually being required to suggest and to implement solutions.
That said a daily journal will be a challenge for me. I will attempt to harken to a couple of Dr. Tyson’s gently inscribed suggestions to “Take a stand” and to “Go a little deeper”. Some 46 years later that advice seems to hold up well and appears still to be sound. I will endeavor belatedly to follow my favorite professor’s directions.
In consideration of my chronologically gifted status among Columbia Seminary’s class of entering students and as a reminder that good writing need not be verbose, I will call this journal “The Old Man and the Seminary”.