Ponderings by Dan Ponder

I have been shooting fireworks since I was a small kid.  Part of growing older is recognizing some of the foolish things you did in your youth.  Lighting M-80s and Cherry Bombs in your hand before throwing them into the air ranks at the top of my stupidity scale.  Nevertheless, I continued shooting fireworks all…

Years ago, Mary Lou and I took our children on our first trip to Montreat, North Carolina.  It was a paradise hidden in the mountains of western North Carolina.  Many of the homes were built at the turn of the past century.  They had large windows, high ceilings, and big porches.  In addition to their…

My mother, Jobie Ponder, has lived at Huntcliff Summit, an independent living facility in Atlanta for the past 12 years.  This week she was featured in a monthly program at Huntcliff called “This is Your Life”.  It is loosely based on the television series of the same name that was shown on NBC from 1952…

More than once, I have used a topic from a Sunday sermon to write my own weekly column.  It is usually not that I am rephrasing a sermon as much as I capture a thought and run with it in another direction.  This is one of those occasions. “How do you see it?”.  It seems…

For the past decade or so Mary Lou and I have enjoyed traveling the world with my college roommate and his wife, Bill and Pam.   Bill and I are blessed that our spouses get along so well, and we are good traveling companions. One of the challenges travelling every year is that you have…

Any success that I might have enjoyed during my career can mostly be attributed to the good people that worked for me. In fact, I have often said that my greatest talent in the business world was hiring good people and retaining them for a long time.   The fast-food world changed dramatically over my…

It started in the south, in the remnants of a bitter Civil War.  The deadliest war in American history was fought on our own soil, between compatriots and comrades, family and friends, even brother against brother. In the aftermath of a bitter, brutal loss, a group of southern ladies took it upon themselves to decorate…

Rev. Charles Cummings spoke recently at the regular Thursday communion held at 12:15 p.m. in the Founders Chapel at AUMC.  Mary Lou and I attend this midweek program as often as we can, finding the short service and communion a welcome respite during a busy week. Charles mentioned in his brief remarks that he had…

I have long been surrounded by southern ladies with a double name.  My wife is Mary Lou.  Her mother was Mary Nell.  My oldest daughter is Mary Catherine.  My paternal grandmother was Mary Florette.   After living in Auburn for a couple of years, we attended a dinner with some guys I had met.  We…

Mary Lou and I had the pleasure of hosting our second grandson, Will, and his buddy, John Clark, for the weekend.  The goal was to attend all three baseball games between the Auburn Tigers and the Ole Miss Rebels.  We did all that and more. The first game was on Friday evening.  We had the…