City of Columbia host second “Sistercare Saturday” on Saturday, September 13 at Boyd Plaza
September 9, 2025This is the last Sistercare Saturday event of the season. This is a fundraising event for Sistercare, which helps victims and families recover from domestic violence. Join us in Boyd…
Read MorePosted in: midlandsbiz Category: government, life, non-profit, on-the-move
City opens registration for the 2025 Mayor’s Walk Against Domestic Violence
September 9, 2025The 2025 Mayor’s Walk Against Domestic Violence will be held on Saturday, October 25, 2025 at Page Ellington Park, 2220 Gregg St, Columbia, SC 29201. October is Domestic Violence Awareness Month and for the 19th year,…
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Lexington’s inaugural Week of Restaurants set for September 11–21, 2025
September 8, 2025
The Lexington Chamber and Visitors Center, in partnership with the Town of Lexington, is excited to announce the inaugural Lexington’s Week of Restaurants, September 11–21, 2025. This 11-day initiative will…
Read MorePosted in: midlandsbiz Category: food, life, on-the-move, restaurant
A conversation with my GPS
September 4, 2025
By Jeff Becraft There are several things I like about my phone. I like the camera… I really enjoy being able to just pull it out of my pocket…
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The Hometown Weekly
September 3, 2025
By Tom Poland In my youth we had a daily newspaper, The Augusta Chronicle. What we didn’t get every day was local news. That’s what made The Lincoln Journal…
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Caffeine
August 29, 2025
By Tom Poland “Cocaine,” JJ Cale wrote it. Eric Clapton sung it. Clapton described the song as anti-cocaine and that seems to be the case, if you read between…
Read MorePosted in: lowcountrybizsc, midlandsbiz, upstatebizsc Category: life, on-the-move, the-arts
The freedom of forgiveness
August 27, 2025
By Jeff Becraft There is no freedom in unforgiveness. We may try to talk ourselves into that our attitude and actions are right, and this is what we should…
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Learn about the M16 at West Columbia library – Sept 12
August 27, 2025
If you’ve served in the U.S. military in the last 60 years, you are quite familiar with the M16 rifle – intimately so, if you were in the Army or…
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The Fun Is in the Action: Lessons from Fairway Outreach
August 21, 2025
By Jeff Becraft Back in the Fairway Outreach days, when we were reaching out to inner-city kids and kids from children’s homes (abused backgrounds), one of the things I…
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Lonely Lone Star
August 21, 2025
By Tom Poland I’ve long felt that two South Carolina community names ascend to prettiest—Silverstreet and Lone Star. Those names, evocative and wistful, charm the ear. One conjures up…
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A Lesson in Leadership from a Genuine Friend
August 13, 2025
By Jeff Becraft When I was a freshman, 18 years old, at Virginia Tech, I met a guy by the name of Rick Harman. Going in as a freshman,…
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Grandma’s Petunias
August 13, 2025
By Tom Poland A Short and Sweet, Fragrant Memory Vintage petunias, those flowers my grandma loved, I saw them in youth. As I sort through my memory album they…
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Queen Of The Shoals
August 7, 2025
By Tom Poland Her May-June reign approaches. The rocky shoals spider lily, Hymenocallis coronaria, will soon flaunt her crown of white, green, and gold. Exquisite, ephemeral, and periled. Much…
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Twelve No’s and a Yes: One Man’s Journey to Building a Business
July 30, 2025
By Jeff Becraft I have mentioned before that years ago I was with an organization called Fairway Outreach. One of the kids that was part of Fairway Outreach was…
Read MorePosted in: lowcountrybizsc, midlandsbiz, upstatebizsc Category: life, on-the-move
Highway 13, Cemetery Road
July 30, 2025
By Tom Poland Pot holes pockmarked the old road. She promised a bumpy ride, but rivulets of tar stitched her together, and that was good enough for me. I…
Read MorePosted in: lowcountrybizsc, midlandsbiz, upstatebizsc, laurenscountybuzz Category: life, on-the-move, the-arts
Regional leaders unveil unifying riverfront brand for Midlands
July 27, 2025On Thursday, July 24, regional leaders from the Midlands Business Leadership Group (MBLG) and the River Alliance gathered at the Saluda Riverwalk to unveil a new brand identity designed to…
Read MorePosted in: midlandsbiz Category: economic-development, life, marketing-and-communications, on-the-move
Focus, Interrupted
July 24, 2025
By Tammy Davis What a Former Mobster Taught Me About Going After What You Want Chaos tends to follow me around. I like to blame my unmedicated ADHD brain, but…
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What’s Vital Is Often Missed
July 24, 2025
So I needed to get a new driver’s license. This is one of the REAL ID driver’s license… because without it, I couldn’t fly. Now we don’t fly very often.…
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My Love Affair With Miss Zebco
July 24, 2025
By Tom Poland I fished many a farm pond as a boy. When I left my red-varnished cane pole for Miss Zebco, I fell in love. I filled my…
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Blink Book Review: “Careless People: A Cautionary Tale of Power, Greed, and Lost Idealism” by Sarah Wynn-Williams
July 17, 2025
By Reba Hull Campbell For anyone who hates social media – and Facebook in particular – you’ll get a real satisfaction from reading this book and all the awfulness surrounding…
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My Southland, Maybe Yours
July 16, 2025
By Tom Poland April, along a back road to Athens, G-A, I saw ghosts. Amid new homes a shed and barn cast blue shadows across brilliant-green grass. Then I…
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Sequins at 3 AM and My First Night Alone in Vegas
July 16, 2025
By Tammy Davis Departure For years—maybe even decades—my college roommate invited me to join her family’s annual Vegas getaway, but I always had an excuse: too broke, too single,…
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Something to be glad about
July 16, 2025
By Jeff Becraft I have no micro-motor skills. Or if I have any, it’s very little. It takes me forever to get the key into a keyhole and to…
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Hanging together
July 10, 2025
By Jeff Becraft We just celebrated the 4th of July, Independence Day, in our country. Way back when the Declaration of Independence was signed, Benjamin Franklin said, “We must…
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Nailing Down A Mystery
July 9, 2025
By Tom Poland Old doors rife with nails. Rows and rows of nails. Studs. Like handsome lads, all in a row. All in precise order. I’ve come across two…
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Summer Blink Book Review: “A Bit Much” by Lyndsay Rush
July 3, 2025
By Reba Hull Campbell Each summer during my personal reading challenge, I try to include at least one book of poetry. This isn’t my usual reading genre, but I like…
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Bathroom renovation update
July 3, 2025
By Jeff Becraft There are two bathrooms in our house. There’s one in the hallway, and there’s one in our bedroom. As the kids were growing up, they used…
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Mekong Memoirs: Come hear the story of a Vietnam veteran from South Carolina
July 1, 2025
Glen Inabinet was a bit farther along in life, a bit more mature, than the average draftee who went to Vietnam. He was an old married man of 25, and…
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The Songs Of Summer
June 30, 2025
By Tom Poland Nature blessed my boyhood summers with music. Cicadas’ rising-falling singsong gave days rhythm. Katydids chimed in evenings with a nightshift song backed by cricket twitter. The…
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Summer Blink Book Review: “That Which Binds Us” by Cathy Rigg
June 26, 2025By Reba Hull Campbell When traveling light, I still indulge in the luxury of carrying a hard copy book with me. For a recent vacation trip, I chose Cathy Rigg’s…
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Granddad’s Fiddle
June 25, 2025
By Tom Poland Long did Grandad’s fiddle hang on my mother’s living room wall. I could never walk by it without wondering … “What’s its story?” Best I recall,…
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A seat at the table
June 25, 2025
By Jeff Becraft Last week I was at a week-long retreat with a children’s home. As part of this retreat, we all have meals together. We wait until everyone is seated…
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Identifying what’s most important
June 19, 2025
By Jeff Becraft I finally got another car. The car I was driving, which has been a fantastic car, was fifteen years old and had over 316,000 miles on…
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Blink Book Review: “Uncommon Favor: North Philly, My Mother, and the Life Lessons I Learned from All Three” by Dawn Staley
June 18, 2025
By Reba Hull Campbell I’m not usually one to pick memoirs by sports icons. Musicians, journalists, writers or politicians, yes. But not often sports heroes. I admit, I just…
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They Just Upped And Left
June 18, 2025
By Tom Poland Late 1950s. May 1. Riding with Dad by a cement block house. White. A few clothes out back on the clothesline. Diapers mainly. A tricycle with…
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Miss South Carolina Scholarship Organization announces 2025 judges’ panels
June 17, 2025
The Miss South Carolina Scholarship Organization has announced the panelists tasked with selecting the next Miss South Carolina and Miss South Carolina’s Teen. The 2025 competition, taking place in Columbia…
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My Perfumed Nights
June 12, 2025
By Tom Poland Squall lines, thunder and lighting, and tornadoes signify the changing of the guard. Winter’s heavy air gives way to lighter air, and soon air conditioning will…
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Four guys and 10 minutes
June 12, 2025
By Jeff Becraft Since I recently talked about Wallaby, and also Mr. Mert, I am going to tell another story that happened at Mr. Mert’s wedding. There were four…
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Blink Book Review: “Grace Will Lead Us Home” (reprise in memory of the 10th anniversary of the shootings)
June 11, 2025
By Reba Hull Campbell If it’s summer, that means it’s time to gear up for summer reading. (Writer’s note: I wrote this review in 2019 shortly after the book…
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Fences Say A Lot About Folks
June 5, 2025
By Tom Poland A fence has become more than a way to mark property—delineate—as a five-dollar word goes. “I put that fence up to delineate precisely where my line…
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Summer Blink Book Reviews are back for 2025
June 5, 2025
By Reba Hull Campbell If it’s summer, that means it’s time to gear up for summer reading. Remember those summer reading clubs from childhood? In my family, we would…
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Saying thank you
June 5, 2025
By Jeff Becraft As I’ve said before, my Dad was a great man and my Mom was a great woman. They were two incredible parents. And so, as time…
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Wallaby, the Soldier We Never Expected
May 29, 2025
By Jeff Becraft Years ago, I was at a friend’s wedding in Virginia Beach and one of the friends who was also at the wedding was telling me about…
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Man Will Always Wage War
May 29, 2025
By Tom Poland Cynicism Sometimes Is Backed By Reality I remember the Vietnam anti-war protests at the University of Georgia. Some group firebombed the Army ROTC building and I…
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Free lecture on the Battle of Bunker Hill, 250 years later
May 29, 2025
There were more Revolutionary War battles fought in South Carolina than anywhere else, but we have to admit that there were SOME significant fights elsewhere. And the 250th anniversary of…
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‘Tis the season for graduations … and this year’s update of “20 life lessons”
May 22, 2025
By Reba Hull Campbell ‘Tis the season for graduations, new jobs and life transitions. It’s also the season for my annual updated “20 lessons” list. A number of years…
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Sometimes I Hallucinate
May 22, 2025
By Tom Poland Fate lays its hand on me. While driving the Fall Lines Freeway to Dry Branch, Georgia, the time to medicate arrived, 9 a.m. I had a…
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Our mistakes do not define us
May 20, 2025
I may have talked about this before, and to be honest, I really can’t remember. Some of the early Friday emails got lost when we changed servers years ago… but…
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Pizza and fried chicken
May 15, 2025
A couple of Friday nights ago I needed to work late, which meant I had to eat late. Brenda was not feeling well. as she was fighting off a cold,…
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Juke Joints & Dive Bars
May 14, 2025
By Tom Poland Mom never darkened the door of a juke joint, but that didn’t stop her from rendering a harsh judgment. “The only people who go to juke…
Read MorePosted in: lowcountrybizsc, midlandsbiz, upstatebizsc Category: life, on-the-move, the-arts
