Sean of the South, The News Down South

Fourth of July

Sean Dietrich

“At nineteen, you think you're just gonna do your time in the military, get out, and carry on with your life. But Vietnam screwed everything up.

O beautiful for heroes proved, in liberating strife. Who more than self their country loved, and mercy more than life...

Carl, 92, U.S. Army: “During the war, we had everyone pulling for us at home, and we knew it, too. Even movie stars were rooting for the troops. Those were different times.

“As soldiers, there were moments, between the fighting, over in Europe, that we talked about personal things, stuff you don't never tell nobody else. There's a kind of bond between men who know they're going to die, a deep one. I just couldn't describe it.”

Phillip, 86, U.S. Air Force: “Shoot, I didn't even know what the Korean conflict was when I joined up. But, well, wherever they send you, you gotta go. I

wasn't too worried about it. In hindsight, I should'a been. Those were the worst years of my entire life.”

Johnny, 67, U.S. Army: “When I enlisted, I was only nineteen, man. I wasn't trying to be a good American. All I cared about was girls. Guys in uniforms got girls.

“At nineteen, you think you're just gonna do your time in the military, get out, and carry on with your life. But Vietnam screwed everything up.

“When I came back, I couldn't sleep indoors. I was twenty-four, spending the night in my mama's backyard—with…

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The News Down South

Pollard

Sean Dietrich

Ethel married Chester when she was nineteen. He was a hardworking boy who could do just about anything with his hands

Pollard, Alabama—to say the weather is beautiful today would be an understatement. It's magnificent.

Pollard sits off Highway 31, between Flomaton and Brewton. This sleepy place claims just over one hundred residents. With a few more people, you'd have enough for a baseball team.

It's an everyone-knows-your-mama town. The kind where county officials aren't elected, because hardly anyone votes. Men who run for office just show up to work one day.

“Pollard's different,” says one man. “Folks get free water, free garbage pickup, and if your cow dies, call the mayor. He'll haul it away for you. No charge.”

What a deal.

You might think people are the same the world over. Well, I don't. People in towns like Pollard differ from the rest.

Take, for instance, Ethel. She was the Avon Lady. And if you don't know what that is, it's because there aren't many left.

Ethel married Chester when she was nineteen. He was a hardworking boy who could do just about anything with his hands—he even built their farmhouse with those

hands. And inside that home, sitting on top the hill outside Pollard, Ethel and Chester made a family.

Theirs was an ordinary life—at least in these parts. A life revolving around fishing, homegrown turnips, field peas, and peaches so plump they should be rated R.

These were people of their times. Back when men knew how to use axes, and weren't afraid to stain their clothes killing supper. When women fried cornbread, carved meat better than butchers, and still had the gall to sell Avon.

Well.

Ask anyone around, this kind of quiet existence is easy on the body. Folks like Ethel and Chester often lived well into their golden years. They didn't slow down, either—since you can't move much slower. And the years of marriage just kind of lulled by.

At ninety-eight-year-old Ethel's wedding anniversary, a local reporter interviewed her. “Mrs. Turner,” the reporter said.…

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The News Down South

Old Willie

Sean Dietrich

Willie finished the concert by welcoming Jimmy and Rosalynn Carter onto the stage.

Last week, my wife surprised me with tickets to a Willie Nelson concert, saying, "Pack your bags, Miss Daisy."

The next thing I knew, we were sitting four hundred feet away from the redheaded stranger himself.

He played all the classics. One by one. And when he sang, "Mamas Don't Let Your Babies Grow Up To Be Cowboys," I cried. Since my mama decidedly failed in this regard.

Willie finished the concert by welcoming Jimmy and Rosalynn Carter onto the stage. Seven thousand of us rose to our feet and nearly tore the place apart. The ninety-one year-old president hugged the eighty-three-year-old cowboy. I couldn't have been happier if I'd seen Bear

Bryant and Jesus shake hands.

Then, Willie sang, "Amazing Grace."

So did Jimmy and Rosalynn.

So did I.

Seven thousand folks set their beers down—since this is what you do while singing hymns. The woman next to me sat down and just stared into the night sky, listening to all the voices.

Willie sang the second verse.

I closed my eyes.

We sang this song at my grandmama's funeral, at my grandaddy's, my uncle's, my cousin's, father-in-law's, and Daddy's. To people of my pedigree, this song is sacred.

…

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Good, The News Down South

Good

Sean Dietrich

Let me be frank, sometimes I don’t know what’s happened to the world. Each day it’s something worse. If it’s not a mosquito-borne disease killing babies, it’s a terrorist massacre in a public place.

I'll call him Bobby. He was a sheriff's deputy for a small area. Bobby stopped on the highway to help a young mother with a flat tire. While the woman's four-year-old watched Bobby loosen lug nuts, a car swerved toward them. Bobby's first instinct was to shove the child out of the way. He did.

After years of physical therapy, and handfuls of surgeries, Bobby uses a walker and drools while he eats.

He says, with labored speech, “I'd do it all over again. In a heartbeat.”

A heartbeat.

Here's another: in the supermarket parking lot, a teenage girl choked inside her car. By pure chance, two construction

workers pulled alongside the girl and noticed her in the front seat, red-faced. When they tried to open her car door, it was locked—the girl almost unconscious.

One of the men used a hammer to smash her window, dragged her out of the car, then performed the Heimlich.

Today, she's a real estate agent.

Outside Alexandria, Louisiana: two teenagers discovered a homeless man's camp one day while he was away. The next day, the kids delivered several wagons of canned food, pasta, rice, potatoes, snacks, and coffee. Enough provisions to last a…

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Good, The News Down South

Your Television Is Lying To You

Sean Dietrich

I watched a woman’s credit card get denied. Her three children had already finished their suppers.

Once, I saw a middle-aged man stop four lanes of traffic, just outside Atlanta. He did it for a confused dog. The frightened thing stood in the center of the interstate, panting.

When the man loaded the dog into his car, he said, “This old fella's gonna be nineteen tomorrow. He gets mixed-up, but he's a good boy.”

He looked like a good boy, too.

Shreveport, Louisiana: at Waffle House. I watched a woman's credit card get denied. Her three children had already finished their suppers. The woman hung her head and actually offered to return later and wash dishes.

The cook stepped in. “Sweetie, supper is on me.”

Without hesitation, the man removed his wallet and paid for the meal himself. Fifteen minutes later, as if on cue, four truckers tipped that man four twenty-dollar bills.

Enterprise, Alabama: I saw a child climb too high in a tree. He froze when he got to the top. A slew of parents tried to talk him down. No dice. Finally, a teenage boy kicked off his shoes and scurried up like an acrobat.

“Get on my back,” said the teenager.

That teenager carried sixty pounds all the way to the bottom.…

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