Three Beautiful Things 11-25-2025: Liberal Arts, Football and Piano Practice, Building Chicken Soup

 1.  That Zoom discussion that Bill, Diane, Val, Bridgit, Colette, and I had on Sunday has had my head buzzing all week about the value of a liberal arts education. As I write this blog post right now, I don't have the oomph to get into plentiful detail about what, to me, the ideal liberal arts education is, but I do have the energy to say that because the word "liberal" originates from the Latin word  "liberalis", meaning free, that when it comes to education, the broader (the more liberal) the better.  Acquaintanceship with philosophy, music, rhetoric, different languages, mathematics, history, literature, the manual arts, theology, the fine arts, and so on is a source of freedom, of a free mind, a mind able to move flexibly among many different ways of seeing, thinking about, and writing about the world as well  as a way to take part in a variety of experiences. 

Of course, I continue to fall far short of such an education (but I try, Lord knows I try). I encouraged my students (did I preach?) to consider the merits of taking courses across many disciplines and, in this spirit, supported the efforts of our faculty to offer the widest variety of courses possible. 

I'll leave it at that for now. 

2. Here I go again. 

Again, I'm writing about Colleen Wheelahan, host of two classical music programs a day, the first on SiriusXM's Symphony Hall and second on KUOL. I listen to as much of these programs as possible, as often a I can. 

I subscribe to Wheelahan's Substack. She posts an essay about once a week and talk about a free mind. She makes connections to classical music with subjects such as Halloween, Peanuts, and, today, I read her essay connecting classical music to men's college football. 

Her essay began by reporting how on November 15th, Texas A&M stormed back in the second half of their tilt against the University of South Carolina to erase a 30-3 halftime deficit and triumph, 31-30. 

Colleen Wheelahan loved what A&M coach, Mike Elko, said after the game about how their team made such an unlikely and remarkable comeback. 

He answered, "We won that game six months ago with what we did in the winter."

Wheelahan riffs for a bit then about how "excellence in any venture comes from a long history of dedicated, hard work."

It comes from practice. 

And here is where Colleen Wheelahan connects A&M's miraculous win to performing classical music. 

Practice. 

After quoting musicians from Pablo Casals to Hillary Hahn and composers from Bach to Brahms about practice, she tells a story about herself: 

I remember a particularly valuable private lesson my freshman year of college, where I said something about how I felt confident on my notes in the piece I was playing. I had put in the hours, and was consistently accurate, so I thought I was ready to move on. My teacher pointed out that the solidity I had developed on it was just the beginning. You don't start making music until your technique is second nature. Until you're able to adapt. Until you're fluent in that piece. Expression isn't possible until "hitting the notes" comes naturally. 

 That only happens with practice. On the piano. On the cello. In an orchestra. On the football field. 

On our sibling outing this past Saturday, Carol and I talked about this exact principle of performance in the theater. Colleen Wheelahan's teacher said it better than we did. Indeed, expression on the stage isn't possible until delivering the lines, hearing fellow actors' lines, and moving on the stage comes naturally because of long hours, whether alone or with the cast, of practice. 

3. Lately, when it comes to cooking dinner for myself, I turn daily to two sources of comfort: stir fries and soup. 

Tonight, I stir fried onion, celery, carrots, and red pepper in the wok and later added sliced mushrooms. In a skillet I'd fried bacon in earlier, I fried chicken pieces in a light coat of bacon grease. When the vegetables softened and the chicken was cooked through, I put the chicken pieces in the wok, added a couple of chopped russet potatoes, and added a container of chicken broth. 

I had elbow macaroni left over from the Cincinnati chili I ate the night before and added it to my soup. 

I brought this mixture to a boil and then let it simmer for ten minutes or so and added oregano and Trader Joe's 21 Spice Salute. 

I ladled the soup into a bowl and added my favorite means of enlivening a soup: soy sauce. 

It was warming. 

It was comforting. 

It was delicious. 

It worked.