I’m spending my birthday in Central Eastern Europe this year. We’re coming into the final stretch of our tour, leaving Vienna, enjoying Bratislava for an overnight, and then reveling in our last three days together in Prague. We’ve visited palaces, cathedrals, monuments, and castles galore. The sunny weather has cast a festive atmosphere over everything on the agenda. At our group dinner in Vienna, I was feted with a yummy birthday cake: a Sacher tort complete with a metal flare shooting sparkles to the ceiling. How do you beat that?

Inevitably birthdays cause a person to think. The group on this Smithsonian tour consists primarily of people from my generation or older. Not surprisingly, we find ourselves reflecting the world in which we were raised, an era where decency, honesty, perseverance, and respect were vigorously taught and rewarded.

The basketball coach in the clip below embodies the qualities expressed by our teachers, neighborhood mentors, and family members back in those long-ago days. Trust me, I am not unaware of the distressing problems facing us in today’s world. My frequent travel only reinforces my awareness and concern. Still, this “sermon” by the Coach Buzz Williams of Virginia Tech brought tears to my eyes, so I wanted to share it with you.