If I were a polished country music singer with pretty teeth and lyrics which celebrate my southern culture, I hope my agent would make this photo my album cover. Nevermind my tuner is twitchy and my pitch is pitchy. I would look George Strait handsome holding a six string guitar even though my fingers couldn’t play a chord. My Wrangler jeans worn a little too tight and my belt buckle a little too big would be my stage costume at night, but I would wear swim trunks and hoodies in the light of day. My hat would hold ten gallons of twang and my boots crafted from rattlesnakes with pointy toes and a high heal.

If I was feeling a bit saucy, shiny gold spurs would adorn my boots with metal taps on my souls so I would go click-clack as I crossed the room. I would sing songs about neon moons, lost loves, little towns, mamas, and rodeos. I would have a great big tour bus with little pimento cheese hors d’oeuvres as snacks and a keg of sweet tea in the back. My fans would love my public profile, but loathe my lonely, mundane real road life. It would be the best of times: it’d be the worst of times.

I would sing songs about neon moons, lost loves, little towns, mamas, and rodeos.

Since the good Lord has set my life’s compass on a different path, I do not need to concern myself with looking handsome, wearing tight jeans, or boots that hurt my toes. Swim trunks and hoodies would be the uniform of the day. I am just a simple man, with simple ideas, and simply, when I approach life’s threeway intersection, I sometimes wonder, should I turn left or turn right. The fear of the unknown can shift my go-getter gear into park. For some, the stage of life, even donning the latest fashion, bling and friends in tow can leave a heart begging for Siri to point the way.

Feeling inadequate to decide life’s direction will mine one’s inner core, mostly without their permission. Standing here alone, in the middle of an asphalt vein of indecision, which bleeds through the black, rural dirt of eastern North Carolina, I feel as if the wind, that pushes strong across these fields, could lay my bones flat as a pronunciation that I am powerless to decide in my own strength. If I were a famous stage performer, I would seek advice from my “people” to guide my steps, but deep inside, question their motives.

My prayer is, when my decision is imminent in the midst of a wayward heart, I’ll have the wisdom to reach for that ol’ compass and search for good people to push my go cart along. Like Miranda Lambert once proclaimed about her “her little red wagon”, “the front seat’s broken, and the axel’s draggin’”. At least I’m in good country company. My hope is, the bearing I set would point my ship’s bow to veer a little more right, even if the winds of influence are blowing a bit more left.

“God grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change, the courage to change the things I can and the wisdom to know the difference”

Reinhold Niebuhr

I miss scratch and sniff books. Although, as an adult, this idea does’t cultivate such pleasant thoughts as it did when I was four. Chocolate, mint, grape and orange were some of my favorites. If only the delightful aroma of bacon, the pork heaven of all hog connoisseurs, existed in these story books back then, like a good bird dog on point, my teacher would’ve found a reason to hit the shock collar to redirect my attention.

Our senses have a unique way of taking us back to some fond memory of a place in time where something that dearly mattered occurred in our lives.

For me, it’s my time spent on the beach as a young child and now as a more grey and mature child. There, I find the smell of salt in the air and the stink of cut bait on my hands intoxicating. It’s like southern comfort but not the hundred proof liquor that will turn even the most experienced libation consumers inside out.

The sound of waves tickling the beach, crickets in the dunes and seagulls cackling overhead is the reason why noise machines were made to relax our busy minds.

The taste of a gooey PB&J, which is always better when your mama makes it, and a freshly popped Coke is as good to me on the beach as a fine steak on any given day.

The gritty touch of sand and aged shells under my toes along with the salty ocean veneer on my skin that follows me home is such a sweet gift given by God for me to treasure.

Until the brightest of the bright minds among us develop a scratch and sniff picture book that can capture the awesomeness of what I see before me, you’ll find me here, sitting in my old beach chair, with the Embers and Band of Oz in my ears, watching a fishing line that may never pull, eating a PB&J and sipping on an icy cold Coca-Cola.

As a child, around the time when girls had been cured of cooties, one of the only things my mother insisted I do, even worse than taking a bath, was trying on clothes at the local department store. Because the saying, “growin’ like a weed”, means something in the south, I unfortunately had to endure this torture every five-six months lest my britches seem as if they’re receding from the rising tide. The changing of the seasons was the worst.

Now that I am a mostly functioning adult, I still dread shopping for anything, especially knitted garments. I am ashamed to admit, but I have more than one pair of pants somewhere, buried like an old dog, deep in the bowels of my closet, which I have never worn. Had I just tried them on before I left the store, there would be no need to explain to the First Lady why I only wear three of the ten pairs of pants in my closet. But, because I am not Superman, I have no interest in changing clothes inside a public phone booth.

One would think I would learn, but once home, not being able to snap the button to unite the east and west side around my waistline is a clear sign I should not clothes shop unsupervised. Because I can be lazy, and it takes great courage for me to cross the threshold of any department store, returning my ill begotten purchases is usually not within my purview. I guess those designer blue jeans will just need to remain on my shelf another season. I am sure they will fit one day.

At least I tried…

Been traveling a bit this week for work. My cubicle? Washington, NC along the Pamlico River. The Inner Banks some call it. It’s a sportsman’s paradise with a cup full of breath taking river vistas, two tablespoons of glorious sunsets, and a heavy dash of small town southern charm.

I love Carolina beach music. I’m a wanna be groupie of sorts born to be a beachcomber who’s content to plant my roots in a lounge chair and just stare at God’s wonder.

So, why the nostalgia? I’m missing my sweet lady. My children’s mama. My Carolina girl. I love this song. Maybe you do too. It brings a tear to my eye. Great memories. Fun times. Carolina girls really are the best in the world.

My mother rarely allowed food crumbs to linger long on our Kitchen floor and sustenance, of any kind, was never to cross the door threshold leading to our Living Room. Her Dust Buster was always charged and close at hand to corral any little runaway morsels who dared to escape the confines of our dishware. Needless to say, as a boy who ate his meals like the Cookie Monster, she constantly wielded that thing as if it were a sword poised to slay the fire breathing dragon who lived under my bed.

Now that I’m a somewhat independent adult with my own home, I’m no longer haunted by the sound of Mr. Black & Decker nipping at my heels nor am I as concerned about that fire breathing dragon.

Because, “your mama don’t work here”, mantra my sweet wife has been known to remind me of over our twenty six years of marital bliss, any grub refugees who’d rather flee from my paper plate than take a ride down my gullet, are now my responsibility to wipe clean. So, with that said, I often retreat to my front porch to find respite from table manners.

 

Seated on the thrones of front porch history, I often reminisce of when Sunday afternoons were lived in black and white. Amazing Grace was a sweet sound in my ear. A bottle of pop and peanuts were sufficient to whet the appetite while Grandmama’s mashed potatoes warmed on the stove.

Anyone, short of a fortune teller, could predict cat naps were looming around the dinner table corner. A cool, shady breeze, porch swing, and the harmony of bluegrass on Grandaddy’s transistor radio were all the ingredients needed to commence to slow talkin’, and head noddin’.