Lake Martin is flat. Mirror flat. It is a perfect evening. The sun is low. The crickets are singing in full stereo. And I’m visiting with old ghosts.
My father would have looked at this calm water and said it was as “flat as a bookkeeper’s bottom.” Only he wouldn’t have used the word “bottom.” He would have opted for a more colloquial expression unfit for mixed company.
Unless, of course, my mother was around. In which case he wouldn’t have opened his mouth at all.
Because he was a man of few words, my father. Which is what I remember about him most. His quietness. My aunt used to say that my father once traveled with the circus, performing as a sideshow act: The World’s Most Quiet Man.
So right now, I’m taking up the family business. I haven’t said a word in a few hours. Mostly, I’ve just sipped my cold glass of Milo’s Famous Tea, and I’m happy in the company of my faded memories.
I am thinking about Granny. Granddaddy. Mama. And the man
I once called “Daddy.” I am thinking about what these people would be doing right now, if they were alive.
I know what they would be doing. My Granddaddy would be carving a figurine with his butter-yellow Case knife. My grandmother would be reading the Bible, humming hymns, and chain-smoking Winstons.
My mother would be sewing something with a hoop. My father would be shirtless—he was born shirtless. And he would be drinking something harder than Milo’s.
As it happens, I am a big fan of Milo’s tea. I go through three or four gallons each 60 seconds. And do you know why I like Milo’s?
Because they don’t try to do too much with their tea. They don’t dye it red or add weird ingredients like azodicarbonamide, diacetyl, drywall dust, or rodent excrement. They don’t flavor it with added crapola. It’s…