95 Picadilly

In the past, I’ve been about as fond of snow as I am of change.  That is to say:  not at all.   My motto has always been that it should snow on Christmas and in ski resorts and leave the sunshine for the rest, but I am coming around.  There is a pristine beauty…

Merry Christmas! Though it’s an almost forgotten piece of our culture, today very much is Christmas, the ninth of the twelve days of the Christian season, ending with the start of Epiphany and the arrival of the Magi, a season that commemorated with the birth of Christ. As Christmas 2024 came upon me so suddenly,…

Even when we’re young, there is something intrinsically nostalgic about Christmas. It’s in the way the boughs hang from staircases and across mantles, red baubles and plaid bows, and trees lighted like stars glistening by night, and it’s easy, as children, to suspend our worldly beliefs and welcome in a Dickensian realism, if only for…

Our world can seem far removed from the dark, damp days of fighting that engulfed the First World War. We can look back over time and see our lives as very different, only connected to the past by the stories left by our grandfathers and the great writings of such iconic literary symbols as Ernest…

While the church calendar says it’s only Advent, the next season, Christmas, has seemingly sprung up all around us.  Perhaps because, these days, we are seeing it even before Halloween, it sometimes seems hard to find the Christmas spirit, despite our best efforts.  After all, it seems clear that a modern Christmas isn’t exactly what…

By Shane Gilreath As we grow older, small things seem to mean more. It’s something I think about often: my appreciation of this or that and how things once were done. As we wake up this Thanksgiving, let us embrace the day for what it is – a chance for gratitude and to acknowledge the…

95 Piccadilly By Shane Gilreath For a time, as a kid, I thought I’d be a filmmaker. Heaven knows why! I was an eclectic kid with big dreams and a bigger imagination. The sky seemed the limit, full of stars crafted by a Hollywood machine. To be fair, there were many, many “I want to…

On November 5th, Americans went to the polls and overwhelming elected Donald Trump as the next President of the United States. I had the honor of attending his first inauguration, an experience I’ll never quite forget. Being hurried through security, within striking distance of chanting protesters was an experience that pales only to having to…

95 Piccadilly By Shane Gilreath As one of the go-to family historians, my cousin, Adam, posted to Facebook about the long tradition of military service in our family, and it made me think a good deal of the early days of Colonial America and the many conflicts, good and bad, that early Americans faced, including…

Recently, with autumn temperatures diving colder than I appreciate, I darted to the car and quickly started the engine on my way to the office. Before I could even crank the heat to tropical highs, I heard a terrible cry. Initially, I was certain that Kaitlyn’s cat, Kitty, had escaped her bedroom, as she’s prone…