Rich: Tink and my nerves

Tink is getting on my last nerve. I am trying to do business and keep my company going but he’s like a little, dark cartoon cloud popping in on my deal-making. Normally, he would only know what I tell him which means he wouldn’t hear an entire conversation.

Rich: Red is still running

It’s been four years ago now. Tink and I were attending the annual NASCAR Hall of Fame Induction as we normally do with our friends, Darrell and Stevie Waltrip.

Rich: SEC football fans

Whenever I meet someone, inevitably, their first comment is, “You must be a Georgia football fan.” Truthfully, I reply, “I’m an SEC fan. I love to see all the teams do well and celebrate when one wins the National Championship.” In this column, I strive to sidestep controversy.

Rich: There’s gonna be some good gospel singing there

Tink and I were watching the award show for the Gospel Music Association Doves, which celebrates Jesus from traditional to Southern to contemporary music. The cameras moved to a black-clothed figure on a darkened stage. Her blonde hair glistened.

Rich: The worth of a good man

It started with a photo that my sister sent. In 1950s Black and White, there is a bespectacled man, standing in a mountain river with water up to his waist. He is wearing a white dress shirt with sleeves rolled up and dark pants. Some called him “Preacher.”

Rich: Praying in the right place

It happened recently. Tink and I had just finished a video conference call. Chatting face to face by video screen was something that I thought George Jetson would take to his cartoon grave and yet it happens regularly across the globe.

Rich: A Memorial memory never to be forgotten

The last living link to an almost-forgotten story that happened during an almost-forgotten time, took her last breath a month ago. Her name was Mildred Lawson. It’s easy to mourn a life well spent and well served to God, country, and community.

Rich: One is given, one is taken

A few years ago, a long and treasured friendship was lost. Not to death. Not then, at least. It was snatched away in a stealthy way that began with a car accident and a broken leg. The enemy, who stole from me a dear friend, looked remarkably innocent. A small, round, white.

Rich: Missing a couple of good mothers

It is not without a stab of pain that I, sometimes, drive past a spot where once stood a hometown restaurant. Nothing remains of it, other than paved parking.

Rich: Mountain quare, Southern eccentric

It has been duly noted here how odd are my ways or how my thinking doesn’t always line up with genuine logic. Any Southerner, born and bred, has charming degrees of eccentricity. In the Southern reach of the Appalachians, however, many of us have a heaping helping of oddness.