She has a box of to-go food in her hands. I overhear the man at the barbecue joint counter say she is missing two pounds of brisket.

The man apologizes to the people in line, then he tells her it will be coming right up.

“Don’t forget extra sauce,” she calls out. “The sauce is for my son, he’s a Dipper.”

Well, I can relate. I’m a Dipper, too. If it can be dipped, I dip it. French fries, for example, were designed by God to be ketchup delivery vehicles. Don’t even get me started on salads. My salads consist of a single sprig of lettuce with nine cups of ranch dressing.

She looks at me and apologizes for holding up the line at the counter.

The woman is about seventy, I’d guess. Maybe a little older. White hair. Slim. She takes care of herself. She’s wearing workout gear.

I don’t know what she’s doing in the to-go lane of a greasy barbecue joint. Usually, people who exercise a lot don’t openly consume cholesterol in public smokehouses. It just doesn’t fit

the health-and-fitness thing.

Seeing someone like her in here feels like seeing a Church of Christ preacher at the blackjack table sipping a whiskey sour.

“You ordered a lot of barbecue,” I say because I have a gift for pointing out the obvious.

“Oh, it’s for my son,” she says. “He LOVES barbecue, and so does his fiance, and they’re gonna need something for their road trip. Something that will hold them, they leave tonight.”

And we are knee-deep in a conversation. Her son and his fiance are driving toward Canada tonight. She’s staying behind to watch his kids.

“My son’s getting married this weekend,” she goes on. “They’re doing a private ceremony, just the two of them, way up in Canada.”

She tells me the Canadian province where they’re traveling. It is a French word, but I won’t…

DEAR SEAN:

It’s almost Valentine’s Day and I like this girl who is my friend, but I want to be more. I don’t want to say anything to her because if I do I’m afraid it will end our friendship if she doesn’t feel the same way, and I don’t want to lose her as a friend.

Thanks,
FRIEND-ZONE-IN-ASHEVILLE

DEAR FRIEND-ZONE:

Before I say anything, remember that I know Jack Squat about this subject. Thus, whatever else you read here will likely be about as valuable as a screen door on a submarine.

But here’s the deal. I don’t think things will go back to normal no matter what you do. Even if you never told her how you feel, things are probably already getting weird between you two. And trust me, they are about to get weirder if you open your mouth.

But I still think you ought to say something to her. Before you do, however, maybe ask yourself a few questions:

Such as, what happens if she doesn’t like you THAT way? How

will you feel when she starts dating Brad Pitt? And she WILL date Brad Pitt, they always date Brad Pitt. Will seeing her with him kill your confidence? Will you forever look into your mirror and see “Fatty” Arbuckle staring back at you?

Well, I can almost answer this question for you. And the answer is: “Who the heck is Fatty Arbuckle?”

I’m speaking from experience here. When I was younger, I was friends with a girl who, for the purposes of this column, I will call—oh, I don’t know—Medusa.

Medusa was very pretty; I was young. She considered me her lovable little pal. To her, I was sort of like Raggedy Andy, only less attractive. She gave me butterflies in my stomach. And I mistakenly thought she felt butterflies, too. But come to find out she was only feeling gas pains. Seriously.…

I got a letter from Phillip in Sacramento, California, who asked an important question. And by “important,” I mean life-or-death important:

“Sean, which brands of mayonnaise do Southerners like best?”

I immediately spotted the small error in his question. And if you live in the same part of the world as I do, you probably spotted it too.

Phillip’s question suggests that there is more than one acceptable mayonnaise brand. But there is not.

There is only one officially approved mayonnaise of the Southern Baptist Convention. This mayonnaise comes in a jar with a yellow lid and it is the secret to living a rich, satisfying life.

But I’m getting ahead of myself. Before I say anything else, please don’t misunderstand me. I don’t intend to be critical of other people’s mayonnaise choices. I would never do that. Just because you and I don’t see eye to eye on mayonnaise doesn’t mean that I think you are a communist. It simply means that you have strong tendencies toward communism.

So I don’t know much about Sacramento, but I’ve

heard that grocery stores out West don’t carry the yellow-lid brand I mentioned earlier. This is a shame.

Then again, I suppose that mayonnaise probably isn’t part of Sacramento’s historical heritage the way it is here.

Early Californian pioneers probably had WAY more important things to worry about like taming the Western frontier, building sod huts, droughts, and surviving destructive Grateful Dead concerts. Whereas our ancestors in the Southeast were primarily concerned with perfecting our congealed salad recipes.

Still, I’ll bet that Sacramento is probably like many cities. The stores probably sell many jars that LOOK like mayo. But don’t be fooled. Even though these jars appear to be filled with mayonnaise, the jars actually contain noxious commercial automotive lubricants.

I base this statement on a study conducted by a major university last year wherein scientific researchers discovered that most people in…

One of the first speaking gigs I ever had was in Dothan, Alabama. It was at the Houston County Public Library, and I did not want to be there.

At the time, I had been writing this column for a few years and had a couple books published. I had not done ANY public speaking. I was very worried that I’d make a fool of myself.

The fact is, I can always be counted on to make a moderate fool of myself. As a boy, for instance, my friend’s mother, Miss Martha, used to always tell me, “Think before you speak, Sean.” She was a cantankerous lady who was always saying this to me.

I had no idea what it meant at such a young age. After all, my usual policy was to think AFTER I spoke, when I had more free time available for reflection. But years later, I discovered what Miss Martha truly meant. She meant that I should shut up.

I wish Miss Martha would have

just come out and said that. It would have saved me a lot of embarrassment later in life. Because I wasn’t aware that she was absolutely right about me. My mouth did frequently make a fool out of me.

Like the one Sunday at church when I was supposed to read the scripture verse that would be the topic of the preacher’s sermon. A lay person always read the Bible verse before the preacher’s sermon and that week it was my turn.

My mother had written my verse on an index card and tucked it into a Bible so that all I had to do was open the Bible and read the bold letters on the card. But somehow I lost the card. And when I opened the Bible I had no idea where the verse and chapter were located. So I just read from the open page. It was Proverbs…

You’re a stay-at-home mother of three. And it’s going to be one of those days. You can tell.

You haven’t slept well for a few nights. You’ve got a perpetual low-grade headache. There are million things to do. The whole world rests on your shoulders.

How did motherhood happen? You wanted to be a writer once. You wanted to be a journalist, or a novelist. “Hah hah!” your brain often reminds you. “A writer! That’s a good one!”

You’re a soccer mom now. The laundry pile always grows. The dog always wants outside. Your husband always asks for clean underwear. And what in God's name are you going to have for supper tonight?

Supper. This question plagues your life like a recurring case of Bangkok Flu. “What’s for supper?” your kids are always asking. Sometimes, even strange neighborhood children appear from the shadows simply to ask this question. Occasionally you fantasize about setting fire to your house just to avoid this question.

Making dinner is not as easy as it sounds because it means you must

cook something EVERYONE loves. If you don’t, your children might refuse to eat and they might get so skinny that school teachers will alert Child Protective Services to haul you away because the word around school is that your kids are starting to look like refugee prisoners on a hunger strike.

And when the school counselor finally asks your child why he’s been losing weight, your son will simply burst into tears and says, “My mom always makes frozen lasagna!”

On second thought, Child Protective Services can have that child.

Speaking of kids. Their extra-curricular schedules get more complex every day. There’s volleyball practice. Baseball practice. Your youngest wants to go to her friend’s after-school party at the “ball pit.” Truthfully, you don’t even know what a ball pit is or whether it’s safe. So you pack her a turkey sandwich.

At the end…

It’s a gray afternoon and we are traversing Alabama. Today, we make our run across the Yellowhammer state. My wife only ever pulls over to buy gas or let me pee.

This is how we live. In the past years we have traveled all over the U.S. doing my little one-man show, living on gas-station burritos, while our friend stays at our house watching the dogs.

In the backseat is a guitar, along with all our hanging clothes. We travel, eat, work, and sometimes sleep in our little white van, which resembles a plumber's van. It’s the same kind of van driven by the LabCorp guy who visits your place of employment to collect urine samples.

It’s not a masculine looking vehicle. It’s small, a four cylinder. When the engine revs it sounds like a little cat hacking up a hairball.

In our years traveling we’ve become connoisseurs of gas station restrooms. We can simply look at a filling station and know whether the bathroom is going to be a total horror show.

Like last week,

a restroom in South Georgia took the grand prize. The men’s room urinal was detached and lying on the floor. And the commode had been removed so that there was nothing but a giant festering hole in the ground. And that’s not even the worst part. I WAITED IN LINE TO USE THIS BATHROOM. But I couldn’t do it.

My wife and I turned right back around and ran to the van. I told my wife, “Quick, find a cow pasture!”

Believe me, I know I’m giving you too much information, but I’m only telling you that we have spent a lot of quality time in cow pastures together over the years.

But anyway, when you travel you have to make do. Especially when it comes to creature comforts. That’s why we love our van. It’s sort of like our mini home. I’ve seen…

A middle-aged woman peeks into his kennel. She smiles. He wags his tail. Then she walks away.

Everyone who peeks into his kennel just walks away. Always. Nobody wants an old dog. At this shelter, most visitors end up adopting young dogs who can’t control their bladders.

If only humans could understand canine language, he would’ve told the lady all about himself and what a good boy he is. It’s a shame that humans don’t speak Dog.

He’s not sure how he ended up in this place. Once he had a family. And you’d think that your family would always be your family. The idea of them leaving you doesn’t even enter your doggy brain. But you can lose a family. He found this out the hard way.

They left him here. He waited for them, staring out his kennel door, but they never came back. His owners were simply done with him.

That was a lifetime ago. Since then, he’s been stuck in this loud room of kennels with dogs who cry all day long. Mostly, they’re just

begging humans to adopt them.

“TAKE ME!” they all scream. “PICK ME! PLEASE!” That’s all they ever shout.

He’s overheard their remarks about him. “How old is THAT dog?” “He looks kind of gray.” “Mommy, I don’t want an old dog.” “Poor guy, nobody’s gonna want that old thing.”

Old. They are right. Who would want an elderly dog? The worst part is, it’s been so long since he’s been touched. When you’re a puppy everyone showers you with affection. But when you’re an old dog they just get mad when you have accidents.

But he doesn’t have many accidents. This is one of his skills. In fact, he wishes he could tell the humans about all his skills. Being old has its advantages. He can hold his bladder, he knows how to watch TV and keep a person warm, he…

I just received an email that reads: “Hello, Reverend Sean! Congratulations on being ordained for three years…!”

I laughed because I thought it was junk mail. Then I realized—hey, wait a second—this was a legitimate email. Let me explain:

Three years ago, I actually became ordained in the state of Alabama so that I could officiate a wedding for a lady who wrote to me asking me to perform her ceremony.

I had never conducted a wedding before, so I was not enthusiastic about the idea. I’m not what you’d call an ultra-religious guy. I am just a Regular Joe who prays mostly during third down situations and happens to have several openly Episcopalian friends.

But the bride was insistent. So was my wife, who when she heard the idea indicated that if I refused to officiate I would be walking with a limp for the rest of my life.

Thus, the next step was to figure out how to legally perform an Alabama wedding. For help I called the Escambia County courthouse. The

conversation went like this:

ME: Yeah, hi, I’m supposed to be marrying two people, how would I go about this?

HER: Sir, polygamy is illegal in Alabama.

So we were off to a great start. What I learned was that I had to become ordained through a recognized religious organization. Any organization would do.

The lady never explained HOW exactly I was supposed to convince a major world religion to give me wads of unbridled authority. She just said it was against the law to conduct weddings if your only official religious affiliation was limited to saying the occasional grace at Thanksgiving.

I thanked her for her time, then called my friend Ray Jay who, aside from being a dirt-bike mechanic, once officiated his brother’s wedding in his backyard. I attended this wedding. I will never forget it. The Boone’s Farm Strawberry Hill punch and spray-cheese…

FAIRHOPE—This upstairs sewing room belongs to John’s wife, Celia. There are ironing boards, quilting looms, sewing machines, and a five-piece bluegrass band crammed into a tight space.

We are recording music tonight. The band, Blue Mullet, is making the music, and I’m singing along like a tone-deaf bloodhound.

The recording equipment is set up on an ironing board. All the musicians gather around an old-fashioned microphone that looks like something from the stage of the “Louisiana Hayride” radio show.

The band warms up and I’m listening through headphones while the “levels” get adjusted.

Levels. That’s a professional recording term. Pros are always talking about levels. When you record, your levels are always getting adjusted, checked, prodded, operated on, stabbed, massacred, resuscitated, and in some cases eulogized.

The fiddle player takes a solo. He plays so beautifully that makes you tear up and completely overlook the Saint Louis Cardinals cap he’s wearing.

My old man always said there were two kinds of people in this world: Those who love the Cardinals, and those who go to Heaven.

That’s just

a joke of course. I don’t know what happens to Cardinals fans after they get released from Purgatory.

Anyway, what I’m getting at is: Blue Mullet is a dang good band, Cardinals hats notwithstanding, and they have a great band name.

I’ve visited states where people don’t even know what a mullet is. A lot of people think it’s a style of haircut (shaved on the sides and long in back). But anyone who has ever fished the brackish bay water knows what a true mullet is.

My youth was spent on such a bay. On the shores of the Choctawhatchee, I tried to teach myself to throw a mullet castnet, but I never got the hang of it. I am a simple rod-and-reel man.

Many of my friends were mullet fishermen, though. They could hurl ten-foot nets that unfurled over the…

DECATUR—Right now I’m onstage at the Princess Theater. People in the audience are looking intently at me as though I am wearing thong underwear. This is what it feels like to perform.

The Princess is one of those theaters that’s expressly American. The tall neon marquee is unforgettable, towering over the wet streets of Second Avenue. Photographers come from all over to take the marquee’s picture because everyone loves art deco theaters.

This building was originally a livery stable back in 1887. Which means that this floor was once covered in, literally, millions of fresh horse apples. This gives me chills.

In 1919 they renovated the building, turning it into a vaudeville playhouse and silent picture theater. Soon, the floor was no longer covered in horse excrement, but popcorn. The theater entertained mostly kids who screamed at a silver screen while an elderly woman, probably named Miss Ida Mae, played an upright piano along with a Charlie Chaplain flick.

Throughout history some big acts played the Princess. Ray Charles once performed here, so did

Glenn Miller. They all stood where I am standing. That’s kind of cool.

In honor of this occasion, I’m playing my old crummy guitar. It was built in 1919, the same year this room was resurrected.

I got this guitar from a trim-carpenter in Houston who found the guitar shattered in a dozen pieces. He was not a guitar maker, just a run-of-the-mill carpenter. He glued it back together the best he could, but he admits he did a sloppy job. I didn’t care. I’ve been playing it ever since.

It’s not a valuable guitar. For its whole life it’s been a low-grade instrument owned by a list of no-name street performers. In other words, it’s a glorified piece of junk.

But I’ve always liked pieces of junk. Because when junk lasts for a hundred years, it’s no longer junk, it becomes archeology. There’s something to…