Rich: The Tinker diaries

In my office is a beige wicker suitcase with brown leather straps.Inside are 32 handwritten diaries produced by Charlie Tinker during his years working at the White House for his cherished friend, Abraham Lincoln.In another area, squirreled away by Tink, is a hand-duplicated set of those diaries.

Rich: The return

It happened the other night. He returned for the first time in 30 years.

Rich: One million words

One million words ago, I started this column.That’s a lot of stories to tell.Additionally, I have written eleven books, including one that was adapted into a television movie and another that is nearing its 50th printing.Those books would add, roughly, another 800,000 words of characters and...

Rich: Too funny to be true

This story sounds too remarkable to be true. You may doubt its veracity.But trust me: the truth it is.It began decades ago.

Rich: The colors of war

There is a multi-awarded country song, written by Jamey Johnson and Bill Anderson, with a line about two soldiers in World War II in a black-and-white photo: “You can’t see what those shades of gray keep covered; You should have seen it in color.”Last week, I was going through a drawer when I found...

Rich: When a landmark died

Perhaps, it is the older we get, the more it hurts.Or perhaps it is the more sentimental we get, the more it hurts.Growing up, we rarely ate out.

Rich: The frying pan

When brides stopped registering for china and crystal, making it less fun to shop for wedding gifts as well as much harder, I just started looking around my kitchen at what items I use the most.I miss going to a department store, looking at all the pretty, sparkling things, then having them wrapped...

Rich: The mother who was but wasn’t

She loved me so much.Often, she’d tell stories of my childhood and always begin with, “You were the cutest little thing I've ever seen.”Her favorite story to tell happened when I was three. “Your Mama always dressed you like a little doll. I ain’t never saw nothin’ like it.”

Rich: High heels and dresses

Several years ago, I was returning from a speaking engagement at the historic Greenbrier Hotel, flying from Roanoke on a small Delta jet into the Atlanta airport.The jet stopped on the tarmac, requiring that we deplane down the steps, walk under the tenting, and into the gate, where we climbed...

Rich: Rondarosa’s new boss

She wasn’t hired to be a boss. She wasn’t even hired. She was bought.It all started because I decided that our miniature donkey from Jerusalem needed a friend. There she was, a tiny thing, standing between two big horses that kept pushing her around — and she took it.Poor Sweet Tea.