A trip to the local Walmart the other day provided the comely and kind-hearted Miss Brenda -- and her manly-man, the Colonel -- with more than enough laughs for the week.
The Colonel's vast holdings here at the shallow northern end of deep southern nowhere lie a few miles north of the center of the southern cultural universe: Oxford, Mississippi. Oxford would be just another unremarkable southern town, were it not for the presence of its raison d'etre -- a rather remarkable university whose nickname is tattooed on the hearts of its alumni...
Ole Miss
Home of the Rebels...
Former home of Colonel Rebel...
Former home of Rebel Black Bear...
Current (and temporary) home of Tony the Landshark...
Future home of some other spineless attempt to appease a tyrannically unappeasable minority with a politically acceptable mascot. Heck, at the current pace of the administration's race toward the event horizon of the soul-sucking black hole of political correctness, a lump of mud will eventually be entertained as mascot material... and be found wanting by some progressive (the most incorrectly used word in the current cultural zeitgeist) social justice whiner for its passive aggressive retro-reference to a by-product of a culturally appropriated geologic process.
But, the Colonel digresses...
There is a remarkable love-hate relationship between Oxford and Ole Miss. The town loves their money, but hates the students -- particularly their rich daddy-bought SUV-causing traffic that congests a local road infrastructure designed for half as many vehicles as travel the streets when school is in session. (And, don't get the Colonel started on the choking carmageddon of an SEC home football game.)
To drive down one of Oxford's main thoroughfares during rush hour is to invite collision with either, a rich daddy-bought SUV driven by a coed dividing her attention roughly 90/10 in favor of the latest OMG text over the vector and velocity of her minimally-guided wheeled missile; or a rich daddy-bought monster pick-up driven by a testosterone-overdosed frat-rat dividing his attention roughly 90/10 in favor of the OMG-texting coed over the lyrics of the latest rapine rap (for the LSU fans following along, that leaves zero percent of attention to the velocity and vector of the rich daddy-bought monster pick-up).
If one survives the death-race on Jackson Avenue, one still must negotiate store parking lots through which race coeds and frat-rats at very nearly the same velocity and errant vectors achieved on surface streets.
So... the Colonel and his best friend limit their trips to town to coincide with the ebb of the daily traffic tide (settle down, Bama fans -- this is an rtr-free zone) and minimize their trips to town by maximizing the errand-running and resupply efficiency of each trip. The SOP (Standing Operating Procedure for the meager civilian readership of this egregious waste of precious rod and cone time -- not to be confused with Standard Operating Procedure which would imply universal use of the Colonel's and the comely and kind-hearted Miss Brenda's unique spouse squad procedure) employed by the Colonel and Miss Brenda upon safe arrival at a store front is a sacrosanct routine born of years of shopping survival success.
Step 1. The Colonel vigilantly escorts the comely and kind-hearted Miss Brenda across the parking lot and through the store's front door. Great care is exercised to ensure that a minimum 5-yard buffer zone is maintained surrounding the Colonel's bride to prevent inadvertent jostling of the most precious of the Colonel's possessions (yes, he used the word possession to describe the comely and kind-hearted Miss Brenda -- deal with it).
Step 2. The spouse squad member whose personal shopping list contains the least number of items located in the least disparate aisles of said store procures a shopping cart. Great care is exercised in the selection and preparation of the shopping cart to ensure it is clean and serviceable.
Step 3. The spouse squad member whose shopping list contains the least number of items is responsible for security, navigation, and efficient loading and organization of the shopping cart. Ordinarily, particularly when shopping at Kroger, the Colonel has cart duty. This does not preclude, however, the comely and kind-hearted Miss Brenda from taking temporary custody of the cart and sending the Colonel back to a previously navigated aisle to procure a missed item. At Walmart, on the other hand, the Colonel normally has the most items on his list and the comely and kind-hearted Miss Brenda navigates the cart on her slow meander, while the Colonel ranges throughout the store finding his items on disparate aisles and rendezvousing frequently to deposit said items in the cart.
But the other day, the Colonel had just a few items on his list and they were all in the pharmacy/over-the-counter meds section. Sounds simple enough -- but, in reality, finding just the right personal medication and/or toiletries in Walmart is actually one of the most challenging acts of shopping the Colonel ever attempts. Ranks right up there with finding trousers in the appropriate length and waist size. The Colonel was taking, in the estimation of the comely and kind-hearted Miss Brenda, an inordinate amount of time, so she said, "Knucklehead, you find what you need and come find me. I'll either be in housewares or mumbledemumble."
The comely and kind-hearted Miss Brenda returned a few minutes later and dropped a couple of items in the cart. The Colonel was bent over scanning the bottom row of a disheveled shelf looking for the second item on his list. Miss Brenda spoke from behind him, "I just found the cutest mumbledemumble for mumbledemumble. I'll be in mumbledemumble or..." The ringing in the Colonel's tinnitus-ravaged ears drowned out the rest. The Colonel stood to face her and ask for a say-again.
She was gone.
Poof.
The comely and kind-hearted Miss Brenda's super power is her ability to disappear in a store in the blink of an eye. Turn your head on her and she'll beam up right there in the antihistamines and roll-ons, and back down instantaneously in the dairy and orange juice. She can also unconsciously sense the direction in which the Colonel will begin his search pattern and adopt a diametrically opposed path.
The Colonel has learned not to panic in these situations. If he doesn't find her in his first pass through the store, he heads for sporting goods and waits for the comely and kind-hearted Miss Brenda to come find him -- she knows that's where the Colonel always ends up.
Ordinarily, the Colonel pushes his cart through Walmart with hardly a glance from fellow shoppers. The coeds have their noses in their phones and the frat-rats have their noses in the coeds. The adults are too busy trying to keep from being run over by coeds and frat-rats to notice the Colonel.
But..., something was different.
A few coeds smiled at the Colonel. A frat-rat looked at the Colonel and snickered. A man about the Colonel's age smiled and winked at him...
The Colonel quickly checked his fly. Barn door all secure.
What was going on?!?
Then the Colonel looked down into his cart and his blood ran cold.
Perched at the back of the cart facing forward was a stuffed animal.
A pink stuffed Care Bear.
A pink stuffed Care Bear with a huge rainbow across its chest.
The Colonel quickly reached down and pushed the pink, rainbow-bedecked stuffed Care Bear over on its stomach.
But it was too late...
The Colonel looked around and found a circle of folks grinning at him and one particularly dapper gentleman smiling broadly at him.
The Colonel dug his phone out of his pocket and thumbed Miss Brenda's number. She answered in the way she lovingly reserves for only the Colonel, "What, knucklehead? Are you lost, again? Just head over to sporting goods and I'll come get you."
The Colonel summoned his deepest and most manly command voice, "Brenda! You need to find me right now and take this cart!" He raised his voice a score decibels higher so as to be clearly heard in a 100 yard radius, "Your pink, rainbow-bedecked, stuffed Care Bear is drawing way too much attention!"
The comely and kind-hearted Miss Brenda was understanding and sympathetic as always, "C'mon, Knucklehead! Thought you were secure enough in your manhood to handle something like that. It's just a pink stuffed animal."
The Colonel's voice climbed another 20 or 30 decibels, "With a huge rainbow on its chest!"
"I know, Knucklehead. Isn't it cute?"
"Brenda!" The Colonel's voice was drowning out the loudspeaker calling for clean up on aisle five. "You left the Colonel to wander around alone in a store with a pink stuffed Care Bear that has a huge rainbow on its chest!"
"Ohhh... Hahahahahaha!!!
The Colonel didn't need the phone to hear his best friend's cackle. Everybody else in Walmart heard it.
Everybody else in Walmart heard it for the next two minutes as she slowly made her way back to sporting goods.
The Colonel's vast holdings at the shallow northern end of deep southern nowhere -- known to him and the comely and kind-hearted Miss Brenda as Egeebeegee -- ain't an easy place to find. As the Colonel told a sub-contractor working on renovations to the big house who remarked about the location, "You've got to be wanting to come here. You aren't going to just drive by this place."
Everyone who pulls off of the road through the middle of nowhere and up the long drive that curls around Lake Brenda, climbs out of their vehicle with nearly the same comment:
"Beautiful place you got here."
And then, "Any deer in these woods?"
The Colonel has taken to replying to that query with, "Nope. The elk keep 'em run off."
The response is always a variation on the same theme, "Elk? Did you say you got elk out here? Didn't know we had any elk in Mississippi. Least wise I ain't never seen one."
The Colonel twitches the lure enticingly, "Been watching a herd down by Lake Brenda all morning. You musta drove right by 'em."
"Lake Brenda? Oh, you mean that there little pond between here and the road."
"It's not a pond! It's a lake! Lake Brenda!
"Uh, okay. Whatever, mister.
"Colonel."
"Whut?"
"Not a mister. Colonel. Call me Colonel."
"Huh? Oh.., heh, heh. You mean like Colonel Reb. I'm a State fan muhself. Hayul State!"
"Figured as much, with your diesel pickup all painted up maroon and white..."
"Purdy ain't it. Hayul State!"
"Musta been the diesel smoke that spooked the elk"
"Seriously? Didn't see 'em."
The Colonel reels up the slack in the line and sets the hook, "My elk are really hard to spot. Imported a special breed from Colorado a few years back. Game ranch out there does gene splicing and crossed an especially elusive elk with a hyperactive chameleon..."
"They crossed a eyulk with one of them little fellas from the insurance commercial?
"Gecko."
"Tha's whut ah sayed. Gecko insurance."
Or..., "Any fish in yore pond?"
"Lake. It's a lake. Ponds don't have names. That's Lake Brenda."
"Uh..., okay, mister..."
"It's Colonel..."
"You mean like Colonel Reb? I'm a 'Bama fan, muhself. Roll tide!"
"Never would have guessed, what with the great big A on the hood of your pick-up..."
"Purdy ain't it? Roll Tide! Hunnert and fifty-two Nachnul Champ'ships!"
"You ever even been to Tuscaloosa?"
"Nope, but it's on muh buckit list! Hey, you got enny fish in that there pond? I'd like to bring the younguns out and let 'em fish..."
"No fish in Lake Brenda -- the gator ate 'em all."
"Gator! You got a gator in yore pond?!?"
"Yep. Big one. Seen it pull an elk down..."
"A eyulk! You got elk out here!"
Don't even get the Colonel started on the black panthers and sasquatches...
2018 is shaping up to be a much different year for the Colonel.
He knows, there's still a good bit of 2017 to play through, but he's in the red zone with a comfortable lead. Besides, no year has ever beaten him.
One of the reasons that the Colonel is optimistic about a different new year -- different in priorities, if nothing else -- is that he's going to cleanse his soul of an addiction that has ruled him for decades.
The Colonel is going to kick the Ole Miss Rebel Football habit.
Allow him to be crystal clear on this point: the Colonel will always be an Ole Miss Rebel -- proud that when the choosing time was upon him in the halcyon days of his misspent youth, he chose to go to Ole Miss... instead of college.
It was the third best and second worst decision he ever made.
What was the Colonel's first and second best decisions, you ask? Well, for those of you who don't know the Colonel personally and to whom the answer is not obvious by personal observation -- the first and second best decisions he ever made were Jesus and the comely and kind-hearted Miss Brenda, respectively.
The worst decision the Colonel ever made is, frankly, none of your business.
Ole Miss ranks as one of the Colonel's best decisions because the school began the process that marked him as a little different than everyone else. The Marine Corps completed that process, but this missive isn't about the greatest fighting force mankind has ever seen.
This missive regards an institution whose very soul embodies the best and worst of the people from whose state it takes its name.
And, Ole Miss Rebel Football is the physical manifestation of all that is good (and not so good) about Mississippi.
To be an Ole Miss Rebel Football fan is to turn your back on the rest of the world and hike your kilt.
To be an Ole Miss Rebel Football fan is to pine for regular winning seasons, but take solace in the irregular upset of highly favored rivals.
To be an Ole Miss Rebel Football fan is to, with a straight face, walk proudly under the arch of the "Walk of Champions" even though the last football championships were so long ago that their memory exists only in the hearts of octogenarian Rebels.
To be an Ole Miss Rebel Football fan is to warmly and graciously invite opposing fans into your tailgate tent and then hotly and viciously tell them "we're gonna beat the hell out of you."
For the Colonel, his Ole Miss Rebel Football fandom has been a drug with unpredictable and monstrous effects. The highs are the highest and the lows are the lowest.
When the Colonel matriculated at Ole Miss in the mid-seventies Ole Miss Rebel Football was in a post-Archie Manning (and post- Johnny Vaught) hangover that left Ole Miss Rebel Football fans with so very little to cheer for that the only rallying cry of any consequence were the stirring strains of "Dixie" and the sight of tens of thousands of miniature Beauregard Battle Flags snapping to the beat.
By the time the Colonel retired from the Marine Corps, moved back to the shallow northern end of deep southern nowhere, and purchased Ole Miss Rebel Football season tickets, the miniature Beauregard Battle Flags had been banned in a spate of political correctness appeasement.
But, they still played "Dixie."
No matter how horrible Ole Miss Rebel Football got (and it got pretty stinkin' horrible) the Colonel and 50 thousand of his closest friends could (after shelling out way too much hard earned greenbacks for seats, parking, and stale concessions) fill the hallowed confines of Vaught-Hemingway Stadium and do what no other public collection of people in the world could do -- sing "Dixie."
Without malice. "Dixie" was our love song to a region that was way beyond the rest of the nation in racial reconciliation. Scoff if you must at that notion -- but if you weren't there with the Colonel and 50 thousand of his closest friends (black and white), you just don't know the truth.
Then, a paroxysm of political correctness appeasement once again seized the trembling hearts of the temp-help then poorly filling leadership positions in the University of Mississippi's administration.
"Dixie" was banned.
You could feel the spirit lift from the campus and drift away on a north wind of neo-reconstructionism.
Amidst this spirit-killing de-dixiefication of Ole Miss Rebel Football, the long-standing mascot -- Colonel Rebel -- took a politically correct knife to the back. He was replaced by a cartoon bear. The bear has just recently been replaced by a cartoon landshark.
What's next?
If the current trajectory continues, the nicknames "Ole Miss" and "Rebel" will eventually succumb to the fascism of political correctness.
Oh, and did the Colonel mention that the University of Mississippi -- a state-funded, public institution -- no longer flies the flag of the state?
What's next? Change the name of the institution, because the very name "Mississippi" offends the sensibilities of a very vocal and very small minority?
Will the flag of the United States of America slide down the pole in front of the Lyceum one evening, never to fly again, because it also offends the sensibilities of that very vocal and very small minority?
Here's a fact you can take to the bank. The Colonel, and his money, will no longer be a party to fascism. He'll no longer shell out way too much of his hard earned cash for seats, parking, and stale concessions, to sit in a half-empty stadium and have his tinnitus-ravaged hearing assaulted by bigoted and rapine rap.
The Colonel is kicking the habit. He will, however, forever loudly and proudly be an Ole Miss Rebel.
Even when the political correctness fascists get around to outlawing that self-identification.
The Colonel knew what he signed up for when he joined the Marines.
His mother was nearly apoplectic and his career Air Force NCO dad couldn't decide whether he was more upset that his son was going into the Marines or that he was going to be a [expletive deleted] officer. They, and everyone else in the Colonel's world, opined with amazing foresight that serving in the Marine Corps would be hard at first and then get worse.
So, the Colonel knew what he was getting into.
Nobody, however, warned the Colonel about the absolute gut-wrenching, soul-sucking, hate-inviting, head-in-hands, cap-throwing anguish that would attend his life every football season as an Ole Miss Rebel.
Thanks to his aforementioned career Air Force dad's assignments, the Colonel spent little time in Mississippi (his parents' home state), and knew precious little about Mississippi -- other than lots of doubled consonants. There was that fifth grade year ('66 -- '67) in Columbus, while his dad went to fight the communists in Vietnam -- but, other than that, he had no clue. He knew more about Morocco, Panama, and other foreign places (like Arkansas and Louisiana), than the 'Sip. He was 18 and a stranger in a strange land when the Colonel's folks dropped him off in front of his dorm in Oxford.
Ole Miss greeted the Colonel like something foreign on the bottom of a penny loafer. Ole Miss was old money, southern aristocracy, and partying preppies. None of which matched the Colonel's pedigree. To say he didn't fit is like saying you shouldn't put ketchup on a T-bone.
Duh.
And, yet... even though Ole Miss didn't love him, the Colonel fell in love with Ole Miss.
It wasn't love at first sight -- more like love at long association.
And, it was a tumultuous, if not torrid, affair, punctuated with Rebel yells and early fall mornings cutting through the Grove for that 8 o'clock class, alone on his path and in his thoughts, the greatest of which was why in the name of all that is righteous did he let his academic advisor sign him up for a 5 semester hour math class that met at 8 in the morning every... day... of... the... week.
An 8 o'clock 5 semester hour math class should have been enough warning to send the Colonel running for his life. That particular first semester freshman hell was, it turned out, harbinger of the nature of his life-long, love-hate relationship with Ole Miss.
And, speaking of harbingers... Ole Miss football in the mid-seventies was atrocious. The first season of games attended by the Colonel was painful.
Eleven on a scale of one to ten painful.
Root canal by a recent dental-school grad painful.
Bumper hitch ball - shin collision painful.
Listening to Donald Trump pa...
You get the picture.
Rebel football was so bad in 1974 that South Carolina beat us 10-7 on our homecoming.
Why is that so bad you ask?
South Carolina won just one football game that year...
Then, just when the Colonel finally resigned himself to muddling in the mire of Ole Miss football mediocrity, the Rebels would pull off a stunning upset (Alabama and Georgia in '76, Notre Dame in '77); playing football like they actually knew how to play to win.
The last ten years -- since the Colonel returned to, and re-retired on a slice of country paradise just north of the campus..., and bought season tickets -- have been particularly painful.
There have been spectacular wins against hated rivals and complete collapses against non-conference patsies. The emotional roller coaster that is to be an Ole Miss Rebel is not for the faint of heart.
Luckily, the Colonel, as has been pointed out by many close to him, has no heart...
Still, the Colonel gets entirely too wrapped up in the outcome of a game played by a bunch of teenagers. So much so that most Saturday nights during football season, he doesn't sleep.
Not one wink.
Win or lose, late into the wee hours of Sunday morning, the Colonel will toss and turn, replaying the game's turning points. It's stupid, the Colonel knows. But, he ain't smart and you can't make him...
Tonight, a hated rival -- LSU -- comes to town. Nothing epitomizes what it is to be an Ole Miss Rebel more than Rebel Nation's absolute and abject hatred for LSU. Tonight, the Colonel will pay way too much to park way too far away and hike way too long to climb way too high to his season-ticket seats for which he pays way too much of his hard-earned pension to yell way too hard for a bunch of teenagers in whom he invests way too much of his emotional energy.
In all probability -- if his long history with Ole Miss is any indication -- the Colonel will walk a couple of miles back to his car tonight, dejected, frustrated, and swearing that this is the last year he's gonna subject himself to this insanity.
Then, again... we might just win.
Either way, the Colonel won't sleep much tonight.
During his operational time as an infantry officer in the Marine Corps, the Colonel's radio call-sign was "Rebel." It was naturally and obviously acquired because the Colonel didn't go to college -- he went to Ole Miss.
When the Marine Corps advanced him, at the turn of the century (this century, not last -- he ain't that old) to the rank by which he will forever self-refer, the Colonel determined that he could and would also forever self-refer as the 21st Century personification of the Ole Miss mascot -- Colonel Rebel.
The Colonel is the real Colonel Rebel.
Imagine his dismay when, in 2003, the temp-help filling positions of leadership in the University of Mississippi's administration caved to a very vocal and very small minority demand that Ole Miss retire a mascot that very vocal and very small minority deemed offensive. Eventually, a rigged election selected a danged bear as the new Ole Miss mascot.
A bear.
A goofy bear -- bearing absolutely no qualifications nor any historical association with Ole Miss.
Em - bear - assing.
Well, as of this week, the bear is dead. The temp-help filling positions of leadership in the University of Mississippi's administration caved to a very vocal and very small minority of students who wanted the bear replaced by...
... ready for this?
A landshark.
The inmates are firmly in charge of the asylum.
The animals are running the zoo.
The second lieutenants are leading the regiment.
The monkeys are managing the circus.
Donald Trump is the pres...
You get the picture.
Unconstitutional political correctness is rampant on our Republic's college campuses and Berkley ain't the epicenter.
The Colonel declares, with not one scintilla of parochialism, that Ole Miss is the epicenter of unconstitutional political correctness -- the very poster child of the pestilence of idiocy infecting our nation.
Appeasement of the political correctness fascists (political correctness is the ultimate expression -- the very face -- of fascism) is a never-ending exercise in frustration and loss of physical and intellectual freedom.
Appeasement always begets additional demands from the appeased, because the demand to which the appeaser accedes was never really the reason for the protest. Political correctness is far less about social sensitivity and far more about accretion of social power at the expense of another's right to the innate human freedoms of expression, self-determination, association, orientation, and religious belief.
The slashing saber of political correctness cuts both left and right. For this reason, our wise (if imperfect) forebears incorporated in our republic's plan of governance certain protections (and a means for strengthening the original plan's protections) against the capricious societal use of mob rule (also known as "democracy" -- a term not found anywhere in the Constitution) to deny the holding of minority viewpoints critical in a truly "free" society.
But..., holding a Constitutionally protected minority viewpoint does not give an American citizen veto over the Constitutionally protected beliefs and actions of the majority. The Constitution does indeed protect the rights of the minority. The Constitution does not protect the feelings of the minority.
Governmental, or other authorities', actions which attempt to protect the feelings of the minority at the expense of the rights of the majority are UNCONSTITUTIONAL.
By the way... the Colonel is deeply offended by the caricature of a fisticuffs-ready leprechaun and the term "Fighting Irish." Irish mercenaries were enlisted to hunt down and kill the Colonel's politically outlawed clansmen (MacGregors) in Scotland several centuries ago. Irish immigrants were enlisted to hunt down and kill the Colonel's politically outlawed kin during the War for Southern Independence.
And..., exploiting a shark as a mascot is the very height of disregard for animal feelings.
Just saying.
Great pinnacles of success and fame all too often have their co-dependent depths of failure and disgrace.
And, often, the faster the rise in prominence, the more dramatic the fall from grace.
A good man and a good coach (not a perfect man, nor a perfect coach) fell from grace last week. There, but by the Grace of God, go all men. And, as with all men in disgrace, this good man has no one to blame for his fall but himself.
But, then again, maybe that's not completely true. Maybe some of the fault for a good man's tumble from a pedestal of prominence belongs to those of us who put him there.
We shine glory on public personas, in particular (but by no means exclusively) winning college football coaches. We, not so much they themselves, build cults of personality around the men who lead our favorite teams. The coach becomes a mythic being, bigger than the team he leads. We follow his every utterance, yearn for a glimpse of him in public, seek his signature on a souvenir, cheer the announcement of his name.
We Ole Miss Rebels made Hugh Freeze the celebrity he became.
We own the broken man that he is today.
Oh, we can claim to have been misled, hoodwinked, sold a bill of goods. But those claims are as empty as the Gatorade bucket after a big win.
Hugh Freeze was, is, just a man. Nothing more. Nothing less. But we made him more, encouraged his hubris, winked at his feigned humility, and, ultimately, abetted his transgressions. And, now, Rebel Nation is angrily reducing a good man (not a perfect man) to something less.
Own it Rebel Nation. Don't wash the stink of it off of yourself until your contrition is complete. Don't pretend to be shocked at behavior that should not surprise even the most morally-greased long-distance swimmer in the bitter cold cesspool of human nature.
Hugh Freeze didn't create by himself the bubble of personal perfection that surrounded him like a glowing aura. He had lots of help.
Rebel Nation help.
Mississippi help.
And, the good Lord knows we Mississippians have a near mortal headlock on the wearing of clean clothes over dirty bodies, presenting ourselves as upright in the daylight while crawling on our bellies in the dark.
Hypocrisy is our birthright.
So, let's not kick any harder at the prostrate form of a good (not perfect) man fallen from grace than we would want ourselves to be kicked.
Oh, and this sordid story is not through in its telling anytime soon. Not by a long shot. This is the gift that keeps on giving for sports writers and other journalistic moralizers. This stick will be poked into our eyes for years to come. We should be inured to that -- there are plenty of other sticks to the eyes we Mississippians have suffered, and will continue to.
And just when we think the wound has healed enough to remove the bandage of public shame, the scab will be ripped off by the next good (not perfect) man, whose edifice of our adulation we have built on the shifting sands of unreasonable expectation, comes tumbling disgracefully down.
Own it, Rebel Nation. We are Ole Miss.
Thirty years ago this week the Colonel, then a captain, was entrusted by the Marine Corps with one of its seventy rifle companies -- Company C, 1st Battalion, 8th Marines. He had been in the Marine Corps for nine years.
Nine years doesn't seem like very long to the Colonel today -- but, at the time he felt like he was the "old man of the Corps." He had already deployed around the world -- Panama for jungle training, Norway for arctic training, desert training in the Mojave, across the Western Pacific and Indian Ocean from the Sea of Okhotsh to the Gulf of Aden (including Japan, Hong Kong, South Korea, Thailand, Singapore, Australia, Somalia, and Oman).
He had completed the Infantry Officer Course, the NBC Defense Course, the Mountain Leader (Winter) Course, the Instructor Management Course, the Army's Jungle Warfare Course in Panama, and was an honor graduate of the Amphibious (now Expeditionary) Warfare School (AWS).
The Colonel had commanded rifle, weapons, and headquarters platoons and had been a staff platoon commander for two fifty-man platoons of lieutenants at the Corps' Basic School.
He believed he was ready for command of one of three rifle companies in an infantry battalion.
He was wrong.
The Colonel was prepared to step into the traces as the lead dog and pull 180 Marines down the trail as they prepared for and deployed to the Mediterranean as the helicopter raid company for a Special Operations Capable Marine Expeditionary Unit, known as a MEU (SOC).
He vastly underestimated the magnificence of the Marines of whom he was placed at the head.
They were already raring to go. The captain who had been in command of them -- Ed Larkin -- was an old acquaintance, and he turned over a company of hard-chargers led by a superb cadre of lieutenants and NCOs.
Turns out all the Colonel had to do was point them in the right direction and set the pace.
The amazing thing about Marines is that they crave a challenge, and the Marines of Charlie Company were no exception. The Colonel's challenge was to keep them challenged.
The First Battalion, Eighth Marines underwent a transformation of sorts in the summer and fall of 1987. Among the senior leadership of the battalion, only the operations officer (S-3) -- Mike Edwards -- remained as continuity. (Mike was a fellow Ole Miss grad and the Corps was taking a real chance putting two Rebels in the same unit!) In command of all three rifle companies, the weapons company, and the logistics staff section were new captains straight out of the Amphibious Warfare School. They called themselves the "Gang of Five." Two of them, the Colonel and Jim Welsh, had served together in the Western Pacific and at the Basic School. The battalion had a new second in command (XO) -- (then) Major, (later Colonel) Jon Inghram. The new battalion commander was (then) Lieutenant Colonel (later Lieutenant General) Jan Huly. LtCol Huly was an old hand at the MEU (SOC) business having already twice deployed as XO of battalion landing teams.
The battalion's last deployment had been a rotation to Okinawa. The next deployment, in the spring of 1988, would be as a Battalion Landing Team (reinforced with artillery and tanks) embarked on the ships of an Amphibious Ready Group. BLT 1/8 would be the ground combat element of the 26th MEU (SOC). The 26th MEU would also have an aviation combat element composed of a reinforced helicopter squadron and a logistics element to support operations ashore. Each rifle company in the battalion would be "task organized" for a specific specialty of ship-to-shore movement via either helicopters, amphibious assault vehicles, or small boats, and trained around a raid operation profile using that mode of transportation.
Sometime early that summer of 1987, LtCol Huly called the Colonel to his office, "Captain Gregory, good news. I've already decided Charlie Company will be the heliborne company for our deployment next year. Start building your training around heliborne raids. Get over to HMM 365 and introduce yourself to LtCol Magnus and his S-3, ASAP. Your company will be reinforced with a heavy machine gun section and a TOW section along with their jeeps (the Corps had gone to Humvees by this time, but the new vehicles wouldn't fit on the Corps' helicopters, so beefed up jeeps had been retained for the MEU(SOC) missions.). You'll also get a combat engineer platoon and it's mule (marvelous little flat-bed cargo hauler). These attachments will chop to you when we get designated BLT, around E -180. You'll also get an FO (artillery forward observer) and a FAC (forward air controller)."
As the boss talked, the Colonel's head spun. He wasn't crazy about helicopters. He had long held the conviction that the Marine Corps' love affair with its aging and vulnerable fleet of rotary wing aircraft was going to end badly someday on a battlefield saturated with anti-aircraft artillery batteries and hand-held anti-aircraft missiles (the Russian experience against the Afghan Mujaheddin was unfolding at the time and helicopters weren't faring well against the future Taliban carrying American-provided missiles).
Lieutenant Colonel Huly took a breath and the Colonel quickly interjected with his professional concerns about helicopters and that he would rather that Charlie Company be assigned as the "track" company.
Huly waved the Colonel off abruptly. "Alpha Company (Jim Welsh) is gonna be tracks." He leaned back in his seat, "Listen, your company will be on the LPH with me and the MEU Commander. I know that doesn't exactly thrill you and that you would rather have a little more independence on one of the other boats. But, being collocated with the bosses and our planning staffs means you'll be the priority unit for most missions. The rubber boat company will rarely get off ship due to too high sea state and distance from shore, and tracks aren't a very flexible or stealthy raid vehicle. The majority of the MEU (SOC) missions are heliborne missions. Besides," Huly leaned forward and locked his eyes on the Colonel's, "you bear watching and you'll get the wonderful benefit of my superb mentoring on a daily basis."
One would think that Jan Huly was being humorous -- and, he had a great sense of humor -- but, he was deadly serious. He remarked at a commanders and staff meeting early in his tenure, "Do as a I say and do, and you'll look brilliant like me." The yuks around the table died quickly as the look on Huly's face made it clear he was serious.
As the Colonel made his way back to his office afterward, he ran the numbers. The T/O for a rifle company was close to 180 Marines, and while most infantry units at the time were manned at about 80% strength MEU (SOC) outfits went out full strength. With reinforcing attachments, he would be commanding a company of closer to 220. He would have a full complement of lieutenants and senior noncoms. This was going to be a rare opportunity for any infantry officer.
Many leaders, when given so much responsibility, have a tendency to play it safe. Take few chances. Safety and micromanage everything to the point of near paralysis. Keep a tight lid on things and hope that nobody does anything that will jeopardize chances for promotion.
There's several problems with an approach like that.
One, micromanagement may work short term, but, eventually, subordinates quit making decisions on their own. This is deadly in any organization, but in an outfit executing raid missions requiring speed and adaptability, subordinate leaders have to be authorized to make rapid adjustments to the plan.
Two, the Colonel ain't smart enough and talented enough and energetic enough to micromanage.
Three, the young men in his rifle company didn't join the Marines to be safe and secure. They joined looking for a challenge. And, young men who are challenged both physically and mentally tend to develop an increased self-esteem that translates into self-discipline. Bored Marines make and find trouble. Challenged Marines are often too worn out to make or find trouble.
Fourth and finally, the Colonel (then a captain) had a personal professional performance philosophy that presumed he was at his "terminal" rank. He was going to do what the mission required and let the chips fall where they might.
So, Charlie company was going to be "Challenge" company. The Colonel didn't change the name of the company (the boss wouldn't let him), but his overarching command philosophy was to push the limits.
The first opportunity to really put the challenge philosophy into play came at the end of the summer of 1987 when 1st Battalion, 8th Marines deployed for a month to the Marine Corps' Mountain Warfare Training Center (MWTC) at Pickel Meadows, high up in the Sierras. The Colonel had been through the winter mountain leader course there in 1980 and had been there for a quick winter exercise in 1986 with the ground officers in his AWS class, but this was his first trip there without snow. When there was no snow on the ground at Pickel Meadows, the Marines referred to training at MWTC as the "rock package."
MWTC is one of the Corps' real training gems. Depending on the season it is two radically different environments. In the winter, it approximates the cold and deep snow Marines face in deployments to Norway to prepare for its wartime mission on the northern flank of NATO. In summer, the steep rocky terrain provides an excellent mountaineering training ground. Both environments provide a challenge.
The Colonel and Challenge Company pushed MWTC to the limits.
Most of the Marines loved it.
The Colonel says "most" because there was that time in the middle of a company movement across steep terrain that he was perhaps pushing (he was actually at the front of the column) it a tad too hard. A voice from the middle of the column called out plaintively,
"What's he trying to prove?"
That became the phrase with which his Marines most often addressed Captain Gregory's great challenge ideas. There were other words and phrases used, but the Colonel's mother reads this blog, so...
There was never a body of water that the company went around.
There was never a hill that the company didn't run up.
There was never a live fire and maneuver course that the company passed up.
There was never a challenge to which the company didn't rise.
The Colonel's prized memento of his time with C 1/8 is a framed picture of he and his lieutenants, faces camouflaged painted in preparation for a raid. The brass plate below it lists their names and in bold script the phrase,
"WHAT'S HE TRYING TO PROVE?"
Truth be told, the Colonel wasn't trying to prove anything. He knew he was mounted on a dragon and was just trying to stay in the saddle.
The year and a half with those magnificent Marines was the greatest experience of the Colonel's life. They were the best rifle company in the Marine Corps. If he could have stayed a captain in command of those men for the rest of his career, the Colonel would have jumped at the chance, without hesitation.
Of course, they had other ideas...
A right of passage changes one's definition.
Forty years ago this month, the Colonel was headed for Quantico, Virginia, with 250 other NROTC (Marine Option) midshipmen, and entrance into a crucible of physical and mental heat and pressure.
Three years previous, the Colonel had arrived on campus as a freshman to begin his matriculation at the cultural epicenter of the New South. The University of Mississippi (Ole Miss), and the little town of Oxford which hosted it, were hardly a decade removed from actual occupation by federal troops sent to quell a redneck insurrection surrounding the entrance of James Meredith. Ole Miss was also a little over a decade removed from the heyday of Rebel football in which the boys in red and blue had dominated the SEC and won National Championships.
The shock-waves of that era, like the fading roar of a storm-pushed wave crashing on a beach, still echoed on campus. Their effects were everywhere, both physical and psychological. The columns of the university's administration building -- the Lyceum -- still bore visible marks of the fusillade of rifle fire directed at the federal marshals holed up inside. Sent to usher Meredith on his integration march through the doors of the Lyceum, those feds were now pinned down behind them, and would be until troops of the 101st Airborne Division arrived.
Meredith was an echo heard but little discussed.
Football greatness, on the other hand...
The last great Ole Miss quarterback for a generation, Peyton and Eli's daddy, was now playing for the 'Ain'ts. From the heights of gridiron glory the Rebels had fallen fast and hard. The fall of 1974 would show just how hard: a 3 and 8 season was punctuated by a homecoming loss to South Carolina. The Gamecocks went 1 and 10 that year. But Rebel nation believed it was only a season away from renewed glory atop the polls. One season turned into forty before that happened, but that isn't important right now.
During his first years at Ole Miss, the Colonel was awash in the reverberations of past generations. And, it wasn't all about Ole Miss.
He had been offered, and had accepted, a full-ride NROTC scholarship out of high school -- a Marine Corps specific NROTC scholarship, that would result in a commission as a jarhead second lieutenant upon his accomplishment of a bachelor's degree. Oh, and there was one more requirement...
The Colonel would have to survive "Bulldog" -- the Marine officer corps' version of basic training.
Marine option NROTC midshipmen went (and still go) to Bulldog the summer between their junior and senior years. Every day of those preceding three years had some easily detectable gravitational wave emanating from a Marine camp on the shores of Chopawamsic Creek -- the home of the Marine Corps' Officer Candidates School. Every day was spent in some sort of preparation for Bulldog -- the seniors who had just returned from their crucible and the Marine officers and NCOs on staff made sure of it.
So, layered over the Colonel's undergraduate studies toward a degree in Political Science and History, were three coats of paint -- red and blue, black and white, and scarlet and gold.
Everywhere on campus were reminders of the history of Ole Miss, dating back to its founding in 1848 -- statues, plaques, and bullet holes. The red and blue, and black and white.
Everywhere in the Colonel's sphere of fellow travelers on the road to military service, and the hard men preparing them, were reminders of the history of the Marine Corps dating back to its founding in 1775 -- stories, plaques, and bullet wounds.
The ultimate objective was pinning on gold bars and becoming an officer of Marines. Qualifying for that commission required a degree, so a liberal arts education was a by-product for the Colonel. But, if truth be told in the Colonel's case, the layer of scarlet and gold was thick and smothering, nearly to the detriment of all else.
The intermediate objective, one of the pigments in the scarlet and gold, during the first three years of the Colonel's matriculation at the Harvard of the South (Harvard, by reciprocal agreement, refers to itself as the "Ole Miss of the North") was preparation for the summer of '77 and an appointment with a cadre of hard men (combat veterans all) who would provide the heat and pressure for a crucible and right of passage.
Semester studies may have temporarily satisfied examination requirements for transitory classes, but countless more hours than those were dedicated to steeling mind, body, and spirit for a summer of scarlet and gold hell.
The mission of the Marine Corps' Officer Candidates School (OCS) is: "to educate and train officer candidates in Marine Corps knowledge and skills within a controlled and challenging environment in order to evaluate and screen individuals for the leadership, moral, mental, and physical qualities required for commissioning as a Marine Corps officer."
That mission statement contains the phrase "controlled and challenging environment." From a candidate's perspective, while certainly "challenging," the environment of Bulldog was anything but controlled. Particularly the first few weeks. "Chaos" is a better word.
Chaos, heat and pressure, and very little sleep.
But, and credit goes to those who prepared him, the Colonel thrived in the chaos, heat and pressure, with very little sleep.
In August, when he, and the four others who had gone to Quantico with the Colonel, strode back onto Ole Miss' campus, it was as a changed man, now defined in a way only a few others were. He thought he was ready to take on the world.
In a way he was. In a larger way, he had no earthly idea what the next three decades would throw at him.
But, Bulldog was always the touchstone.
One surefire way to limit readership is to bloviate at length about one's sports team.
It's a padlock guarantee to glaze the eyes of even the thirstiest reader.
The Colonel knows this.
But he ain't smart and you can't make him.
Besides, the readership of this blog would have to be measured in negative integers if it were to get any smaller.
Thanks, Mom, for hanging in there.
Yesterday afternoon, the Colonel attended an Ole Miss Rebels basketball game. He last attended a Rebel basketball game over 40 years ago.
Let's be clear right up front. The Colonel loathes the game of basketball. At five - six and three quarters (and, never forget the three quarters) he never saw much future in pursuit of the sport.
The Colonel loves football. His diminutive stature never seemed to be the bar to playing football that he allowed it to be with Naismith's invention. The Colonel's football instincts were far too ingrained in his sports psyche long before he ever tried to play basketball -- in his short roundball career, he once fouled out without ever leaving the bench.
The Colonel would rather watch purple and gold paint dry while suspended by his thumbs from hooks in the ceiling, than to watch an entire basketball game.
The Colonel's number two son, who inexplicably excels at the game, reminded the Colonel a couple of weeks ago that yesterday's basketball game was going to be significant well beyond the importance of the non-conference match-up with a team whose RPI (the Colonel doesn't know what that is, but it adds a little basketballism to this treatise, does it not?) would matter less to the post-season tournament hopes of the Rebel roundballers (more gratuitous sport slang for authenticity sake) than the color of their socks.
The game against Troy would be the last ever played in the Tad Pad.
C. M. "Tad" Smith Coliseum, named for a Rebel sports great from early in the last century, was built 50 years ago. It's round, domed profile mimicked that of more well-known sports domes of the era. A Rebel frat rat, fueled by a flask of Rebel Yell, could squint through his swimming double vision as he stumbled across the parking lot of the Tad Pad and imagine that he was about to attend a game, or a concert, in the Super Dome.
With respects to the architects and builders of the edifice in question, the Tad Pad was -- and the Colonel is searching for the most delicate language possible -- a dump.
The Colonel apologizes to any dumps he may have just slandered.
The Tad Pad was supposed to be a multi-use arena, and it was.
Kinda.
In the old analog days, students filed into the coliseum to line up at tables in hopes of finding a seat in a too-quickly filled class for the next semester. The pain of this contributed, in no small way, to the Colonel's antipathy for the building.
For the last two years of his matriculation at the Harvard of the South (by reciprocal agreement, Harvard is allowed to call itself the Ole Miss of the North), the Tad Pad was the second thing he saw every morning on his way to class. The first was the sight of the comely and kind-hearted Miss Brenda -- the Colonel and his bride lived in an efficiency apartment in married student housing across the street for the even then crumbling coliseum.
The Tad Pad is finally being replaced. Next to Vaught-Hemingway Stadium, a beautiful new multi-use arena is set to open for business next month. The Pavilion at Ole Miss (to be renamed in honor of the next rich Ole Miss alum to shell out several million for the honor) will vault Ole Miss basketball into regions of recognition the team's play could never reach on its own.
So, the Colonel felt honor-bound to participate in the send-off of the venerable venue. He joined several thousand likewise lured to the otherwise avoidable game by one dollar general admission tickets.
The crowd, aged from 90 to 9 months, was missing a critical component. Weren't many students in attendance -- they are home for the holidays.
Nevertheless, the home crowd managed a modicum of meaningful, it not necessarily raucous, support for the Rebel B-ballers as they took to the Tad Pad court for the last time.
Did the Colonel mention that his consideration of the game of basketball ranks in the range of his appreciation for root canal surgery?
Near the end of the second period, Number Two noticed the Colonel's uneasiness and leaned over to reassure him.
"Don't worry, Dad. It will be over soon."
He lied.
Must get that from his mother.
In typical Ole Miss fashion, in the waning minutes of the game, the Rebels surrendered a 10 point lead to a team they should have dominated by twice that. At the buzzer, the score was tied.
If the Colonel believed in mythological sports gods, he would have been convinced that the basketball gods were high-fiving and pointing gleefully at the look of absolute horror on his face.
The Colonel, who would rather play touch football with a pack of porcupines than watch thirty seconds of basketball, was in his own personal version of sports hell. Overtime at a basketball game.
Then, the unimaginable happened.
The Colonel found himself on his feet.
The Colonel heard his own voice screaming appreciation for the sweet swish of ball through net.
Filing out of the Tad Pad, the Colonel heard himself ask,
"Hey, when's the first game in the new Pavilion?"
Well..., the Colonel needs to be there for history's sake, doesn't he?
The announced attendance was just north of sixty thousand, but if you can prove there were any more than two-thirds that number actually in the stands at Vaught-Hemingway Saturday to watch Ole Miss take on New Mexico State, the Colonel will give you a free swing at his scowl and jowl-shrouded jaw and give you fifteen minutes to drum up a good crowd to watch you take your best shot.
The Florida Gators chomped down hard on the Colonel's Rebels' special season hopes last week and their teeth did more deflating than the ball-boy in the Patriot's locker room. On the way to Gainesville last week, Rebel Nation was feeling the rare high of a top five ranking and liking their chances to represent the SEC West in the title game. Late Saturday night, a week ago, those dreams crawled mauled from the Swamp and limped back to Oxford like the remains of Pickett's division retreating from Cemetery Ridge.
But, holy apocalypse, Batman, the world didn't end. The season's not over. The Rebels are still 5 and 1. A trip to Atlanta is still possible...
...might be to play in the Peach Bowl, but, the good news is TCU will likely not get left out of the final four this year and take out their frustrations on us, again.
Rebel Nation is quite possibly the most cynically fickle collection of fair-weather fans in the history of collegiate sport. Our football team is playing some of the best ball that has been seen here at the shallow northern end of deep southern nowhere since Johnny Vaught won four National Championships, and we can't be bothered to show up and cheer for 'em on a glorious fall day with which God specifically blessed Oxford.
Yeah..., we were pouty-face disappointed our boys didn't defend their there-to-fore undefeated season against Florida any better than the French army defended Paris in the summer of 1940. And, yeah..., it was a truly terrible New Mexico State team that made the trip from several thousand square miles of kitty litter to several thousand square miles of kudzu to be the Homecoming hors d' oerves.
But, true fans SHOW UP. And, true fans STAY.
Okay, the Colonel will admit that he left the Tennessee-Martin game early. But, the Colonel is old and it was 157 and 1/2 degrees in the stands. He was sweating like an old, bald Marco Rubio, and grandson #2 had a belly ache that might have had something to do with rapid ingestion of four pounds of cotton candy while sitting in a sauna.
The Colonel will have you know, however, that he and the comely and kind-hearted Miss Brenda stayed to the end of game yesterday -- even if it was about as exciting as a Spring Game.
The Colonel takes that back. Seeing Archie Manning catch a football thrown up to his sky box from the student section was pretty exciting. Students caught a ball that the PAT net didn't and the most noise all game came from the game of "keep the ball away from security." Archie threw the ball back to the students -- wonder who it was that was last person to catch a pass from a Manning in the Vaught...
Speaking of Archie... Rebel Nation loves to recount the glories of his tenure under center, and how fans faithfully filled the stands to watch his exploits. We fail to remember, however, that Mr. Manning's Rebels only won seven games his senior season.
Of course, playing with a broken arm might have contributed to the loss column significantly, but you get my point.
Or, maybe you don't. The Colonel knows there are at least a few readers of his barely literate swill that are rabid Bama Bandwagon Boors, or equally rabid and just as pitiable bandwagon LSU fans, and are so used to win-filled seasons (even if you won't admit that is the only reason you are a Bama or LSU fan) that you can't conceive of not going to a game if you had season tickets.
At any rate, loyalty ranks right up there with integrity in the Colonel's character estimation.
See you in the Vaught, Rebel Nation.
Saturday was one of the longest days of the Colonel's life.
There have been longer days.
The last few days of shipboard deployments come to mind -- sailing slowly westward across the Atlantic, crossing time zones and setting the clock back an hour every other day. Time truly warps at sea -- the Colonel remembers looking at his watch and the time would be 0700. Eight hours later he would glance at his wrist and the time would be 0705.
Those were longer days.
Still, Saturday seemed to stretch laconically, each minute bending time and winding the Colonel's dysenteric bowels into ropes of tension so tight he could taste the friction.
Many of you, faithful readers and wasters of rod and cone time, may have missed the fact that there was a college football game of some import played in a small college town in Alabama Saturday night. The Colonel's Rebels played the Tide.
And, because Bama Bandwagon Boors comprise one of the largest demographics in the South (fairweather football fans who couldn't find the city of Tuscaloosa on a map of Tuscaloosa County, yet use the term "we" incessantly when talking about Alabama football), the game was reserved by ESPN for it's prime time slot -- kick-off at 9:15 ET.
9:15 ET in the PM.
That's a few hours past the Colonel's bedtime!
Has the Colonel mentioned that Saturday was a long day?
The Colonel tried everything he could think of to make time pass quickly.
He asked the comely and kind-hearted Miss Brenda if she had any small projects that needed doing. The Colonel's Lady maintains a list of "quick" projects. Her definition of the term "quick" and the Colonel's definition vary wildly -- one of Miss Brenda's "quick" projects can easily consume the better part of a growing season.
The Colonel's best friend rattled off half a dozen projects from memory and the Colonel set off in pursuit of rapid time passage.
Forty-five minutes later, all of the quick projects on Miss Brenda's list were completed.
Awww, Come On!
The Colonel tried taking a nap. He fell into a deep slumber, dreaming fitfully of fumbles and interceptions.
Ordinarily one of the Colonel's naps would make ole Mister van Winkle jealous.
Five minutes after assuming the supine position, the Colonel woke refreshed and wide awake.
The Colonel could continue to bore you with the minute by minute minutiae with which he attempted to abbreviate an interminable day, but he will be merciful instead. Suffice it to say that by sundown, the Colonel was exhausted.
The only thing keeping him awake was the gnawing reality in the acid-filled pit of his cast-iron stomach that no matter how good of a football team the Colonel's Rebels put on the field that night; no matter how well they played; no matter how masterfully the coaching staff orchestrated alignments and assignments; there was just no way Ole Miss was going to escape T-town undefeated.
It was going to take all of the above AND take more breaks than a worker on a union contract.
Ole Miss doesn't get breaks against Alabama.
Any Ole Miss fan (and, we are admittedly a small band) can recite year by year, game by game, quarter by quarter, more than a century of the breaks going in favor of Alabama.
To be sure, most years Alabama was clearly the better team -- but this year... This year... felt different. Last year was miraculous, beating top-ranked Bama at home; and magical, tearing down the goal-posts and parading them through Oxford. But, this year's team looks even better than last years.
Still, Saturday night's game was in Bryant-Denny stadium, where Ole Miss had won only once before. Visiting teams don't get breaks in Bryant-Denny. They get broken in Bryant-Denny.
But, as the Colonel watched in stunned unbelief punctuated with manifold losses of military bearing, the breaks fell lightly into the Rebels' outstretched hands like manna from heaven. A recovered fumble here, an interception there, and the boys in powder blue helmets had a two-touchdown lead.
In the second quarter...
In Tuscaloosa...
But, time and the Alabama Crimson Tide wait for no man -- they came storming back and the Rebels took a flimsy 17-10 halftime lead into the visitors' dungeon.
The Colonel has seen this game countless times before. Defeat snatched from the jaws of victory is a Rebel tradition.
Someone forgot to let Freeze and the boys in on that particular Rebel tradition.
The score was 30 to 10 late in the third quarter and the Colonel was as nervous as a long-tailed cat in a room full of rocking chairs. With good reason. Alabama hadn't gotten any breaks all game -- they were way overdue and way underpaid.
With time slowed to an inexorable crawl late in the waning minutes of the game, the Rebels clung to a slim 43 to 37 lead. Ole Miss had hung forty-three points on the vaunted Tide defense -- in Tuscaloosa -- and still had not been able to put the game away.
The cold, shrunken, flinty cinder that passes for the Colonel's heart was on the verge of exploding from his chest and filling the room with shrapnel... when, wonder of wonders, the inevitable game-winning Tide comeback faltered in a fast flurry of incompletions.
The Colonel sank into the warm embrace of his over-stuffed leather chair and pinched himself -- surely, he was still dreaming.
The dream endures.
