Brothers. (August 2022 Chair’s Column)

Brothers.

I’ve recently realized that I seem to enjoy travelling more than I used to.  I don’t seek out travel – we all know that there’s plenty required in our jobs.  But, I’ve found that the trips I’ve made over the past year or two have left me with warm feelings of time well spent, and appreciation for the sights and sounds of it all. Any trip with my family, especially my kids, is a wonderful thing. Also, joining my GEDA family at Jekyll – priceless! My SEDC friends in Dallas – fun!  I’ve always been sentimental, but I’m sure that I’m getting worse.

Last weekend, I had the pleasure of another wonderful trip, made special because of the group of travelers.  I grew up in a small town. My father died when I was very young, and my Mom, sister and I were very close.  I didn’t have any brothers, and I was the only male in the house.  When I went off to Georgia Southern College as a 17-and-a-half-year-old freshman, my sister (the subject of a future column) suggested that I consider joining a fraternity.  I did, and I became part of a group that will forever be important to me.

This weekend, that group met up at Lake Rabun for a reunion – 38 years after we’d pledged together, nine of us from our pledge class of 13 initiates from around Georgia spent a weekend reliving memories and talking about how old we’ve become.  We laughed, we talked, we ate really well.  We cried and hugged.  Some of us jumped into the Lake from boathouse, some of us went tubing.  (Some of us still can’t lift our arms above our shoulders two days later.)  We looked around the porch and saw our Brothers, a band of young men that had aged but hadn’t lost our connections to each other.

Our fraternity’s ideals include the importance of different temperaments, talents, and convictions, and as the weekend unfolded, I saw significant differences among us – different ages, hometowns, and socioeconomic backgrounds. We spent most of the weekend talking as a group, and we debated and discussed politics, business, and other issues just as we did at Southern years before.  But when we finished the discourse, we all knew that welcome hands and warm hearts would always be offered to each other, providing comfort and hope any time we need them.

As we stood outside the lake house and bid each other Godspeed, we all knew that we were bound together through our shared experiences and commitment to each other, in friendship and love.  It’s an amazing thing to have Brothers, by birth or by choice and experiences.  I’m thankful for mine, and for the Sisters in my life, too (birth and otherwise), and for the friends and acquaintances I’ve made during my time in this profession.  I guess I am getting even more sentimental, and I hope it gets worse.

Godspeed to all of you, and looking forward to seeing you again soon.