“…Oh, so hold on to the ones who really care,
In the end, they’ll be the only ones there…”
from “MMMBop” by Hanson

MY 2025 BOOK & WORD OF THE YEAR: In an upset, a reread claims both titles. TRIBE. It was my committee of one’s sole nominee in both categories. The other worthy books & words, like Notre Dame from the CFP, excluded.
      The 2016 book was first offered in ‘22 with “I think you’ll like it”, from someone far brighter & younger than me. It was then & is now enlightening on our innate urge & need for a small, tight community. Our need to belong to something worthwhile, to aid in the daily coin flip of thrive or survive.
      The word, defined as a family or group joined by blood, religious, social or economic standing. In 2025 tribe meant “my people, found”. Not all people in all tribes but a Venn diagram of those that could be counted on in calm & chaos. A tribe giving me answers I need, not want, in the dynamic & static of the daily wounding, scabbing & scarring of the rise, the decline, the in between of sainthood & sinner, refugee & victor.
       A tribe that “checks you before you wreck you”. A tribe that makes me remember what I want to forget. That helps me realize that even at rock bottom, one can find higher ground. A tribe that gives me worth & accepts the faults & cracks of my human clay’s only firing in God’s kiln of.
      Those from a recently razed school house, the rarest breed, where faith, politics & shades of melanin don’t interfere with friendship. Locker room buddies that send you pics of their restaurant table number when it matches your jersey number just so you know you’re thought of. Classmates that have gathered for lunch since 1968 & see no reason to break the cycle. Teachers, two coaches whose faces are on my office door, a librarian & a janitor who are gone but long days & quick years have revealed they were in my tribe all along.
      Those young & those ancient. The encouragers of pen meeting paper, those that will make Volume 3 & its Chronicles possible in January. Those that know me as Papa, Miss Julie’s Pool Boy or Coach. Those that knew me as Chef or The Chaplain of Athletics & stay in touch, like two yesterday home for Christmas break that found The Chap to say hello.
       Those that come alongside to wander the dark nights of isolation & desolation & walk in wonder in the sunshine of revelation & redemption. Those that ride with me, ride for me & push when the gas runs out.
      The established tribes & the latest. The latest cloaked in blue & white. The blue & white I tried to avoid in 2023 but needed both it & its small gymnasium. A tribe that has given me far more than I’ve given back but has allowed me to pay back the work of others when I was cloaked in blue & white in a small gym that no longer exists.
       To my most important tribe, my most ardent believers, the other 8 chairs at my 9 chair table. To my other family tribes of blood & tribes of church, friends & work, tribes of family with different last names, thank you for payment of your membership dues. I couldn’t have surfed the waves of 2025 without you. Nor could I have gotten back on the board to paddle to another wave after wipeouts.
     May Christmas 2025 be the merriest, here’s to ‘26 being the best circuit of the sun yet & may everyone be as fortunate as me in finding words, books, their people & themselves …🌲🎉