“This place was our life,” he said. “Growing up, going to meeting was everything.”

The country chapel sat empty, lights off. It looked more like a shed in an overgrown pasture than it did a church. Daylight peeked through the clapboards, the floor made creaky sounds. Seeing it from the road, it resembles a leftover from another world.

"See up there?" He pointed above the choir loft. “A hornet's nest was right up yonder, long time ago. As a boy, I had to knock it down. Whoooo-weee! I got stung to beat the band.”

This place hasn't had a real congregation for a half a

century, hardly anyone lives nearby anymore. But that doesn't matter. Because when he's in here, his face lights up. It's the same grin your face might have when you bump in to one of your aunts at Piggly Wiggly.

“Folks don't understand,” he said. “This weren't juss our religion. It was life. Out here in the sticks, some of us didn't have running water, women come here just to use the communal washing machine out back. Ladies all took turns.”

A different era.

He pointed to the rotary phone. “Most folks didn't have…

It's one in the morning, I'm in the ER waiting room with my wife. I have a gash in my foot from stepping on a piece of glass the size of a Dorito.

I'm only here for a tetanus shot and—God-willing—a free lollipop.

The waiting room is empty except for a white-haired lady at the desk who looks a lot like Aunt Bee. She talks like she's from a hundred years ago. Back when every child was either honey, sweetie-pie, or sugar; when women wore housecoats, put baking soda on bee stings, and fed anything that moved.

In only a few seconds, Bee manages to complete paperwork, fit me with a

plastic bracelet, and ask about my favorite baseball teams.

Through the automatic double doors walks a young couple. A girl clutching her chest.

“Oh, good heavens, what's the matter?” Aunt Bee says.

The boy can't get the words out. “M-m-my wife, she just woke up, short of breath...”

This fella is about as helpful as a pair of muddy boots. Bee turns her attention toward the girl. “Tell me what's wrong, baby.”

The girl says, “Panic... Attack...”

Bee escorts her to a seat. The girl is huffing while Bee…

When I first met him, it was early morning. He picked me up in his old truck, and we zipped off to Brewton, Alabama. The truck smelled like the backside of a filthy goat.

He botched my name. He called me either Shane, Sheen, or Seen. The Irish spelling didn't register in his brain. He finally settled on calling me, Jeezus, because of my beard.

I called him Brother Jim.

His religion was food. He believed in slaving at the stove, and he wouldn't fix his own plate until everyone had too much on theirs.

"You're looking puny," he'd say. "Getcha some more."

And then I'd go back for seconds,

thirds, and dessert.

He fried his catfish whole, smother-fried his dove, and whatever he did with squirrel was heaven on a fork. He barbecued like a fool, made his burgers too thick, and his creamed corn gave my life purpose.

He took me fishing, I caught several bream. He'd squeeze their bladders, making them squirt urine on my face.

He told jokes, long ones. He full-mooned me whenever he saw me riding up the driveway.

If you knew him, you'd know he had his share of problems. He made mistakes.…

"STOP THE TRUCK!" my wife screamed.

She scared the stuffing out of me. I slammed the brakes and nearly swerved into the ditch. I came to a stop in the middle of a cattle pasture.

"A rainbow!" she said, staring at a giant arch of color. “Can you BELIEVE it?”

I could believe a lot of things, but I wasn't in the mood to squeeze out a kidney stone over a rainbow.

This is because only few days earlier, our vacation had been full of thunderstorms and sadness. Jamie's father had just died—she was a wreck. And on top of everything else, it had been raining.

All week, we'd stayed inside

the condo playing five-card draw, using Cheetohs for poker chips, watching the rain.

So, we ended our trip early and left for home. And as fate would have it, as soon as we traveled three miles outside town, the weather broke. The sun busted through the clouds—it looked like God was announcing summer.

And so, there we stood, staring across ten acres of fresh Alabamian cow pies, watching moisture evaporate into color.

"Is that the tail?” she asked, pointing.

So help me God, the end of the rainbow was…

Donald has a Southern drawl that won't quit. It's the same accent many older folks from his walk of life have.

I wish you could hear him. He sounds like an afternoon in the shade, swatting gnats. And if you don't know what I mean, you probably own a snow shovel.

Right now, Donald is telling a story about his days picking tobacco in lower Alabama. But it doesn't matter what he's talking about. I could listen to him read the phonebook with that voice.

He uses old phrases, like: "you got it, buddy," instead of, "you're welcome." Or: “by all means,” which is how folks used to

say the word, “yes.”

There's a difference between new talking and the old kind.

Try listening to a few elderly women chat, you'll swear you've gone backward in time. All they have to do is open their mouths, and the old stories practically tell themselves. They'll carry on about catching frogs by the pond, outdoor country dances, and sneaking past the ushers in the old theater.

While you're at it, ask one of them for a sample of her poundcake—they always have cake on the counter.

When you do, all ten will…

I thought of you a few days ago. I was driving past a controlled burn. The fire department had lit up half of the lower Alabamian forest. It was terrifying but beautiful—the flames surrounding the trees. Fire trucks lined the road. It took several men on four-wheelers just to manage it.

"That's a prescribed burn," you said once, watching a forest fire. "It can save the woods, kills off bad things."

"Really?" I asked.

"Yes sir. You should see this forest in a few months. It'll be green, far as the eye can see. Fire ain't always a bad thing."

Maybe not. But

it's deadly stuff. I remember the day we burned off thistles and dead weeds in the pasture. After saturating ten acres with gasoline, the fire got all the way to the porch and nearly burned our house down.

The things I remember.

I also remember the time I wrecked the tractor. And how I did chores for god-knows-how-long to pay it off. Afterward, you rewarded me with a fishing trip, where I caught a large mouth the size of my leg.

You pulled it in the boat and said, “This here's the…

When I'm dead, I want my old truck donated to science. It has hundreds of thousands of miles on it. Every time I take the ratty thing to the mechanic, he says something like, “I don't know how this thing keeps going, man."

Me neither.

Maybe, scientists can figure out the secret, then bottle it up and sell it.

Also: I'd like to give all my money—every cent of it—to the children's choir for at-risk teens. Most of them come from broken homes that make my life look like Windsor Palace.

I once drove three hours to see those kids perform at a high school in

Alabama. I was one of twenty in the audience. Those children danced and sang for two hours until their clothes were sweaty.

For the life of me, I don't know what they have to be so happy about. Whatever it is, they deserve more of it.

Take my house and give it to a worthy cause. Maybe a place for abused women. If you put bunks in each room, you can sleep roughly sixteen. I've done the math. You're going to need a bigger kitchen.

And sixteen more bathrooms.

“My mom was so mad,” she said. “She just couldn't believe I was pregnant. She kicked me out. It was a really hard time for me. I moved in with my boyfriend.”

Her pregnancy was an accident. And at age sixteen, God knows, your whole life is an accident waiting to happen. Especially if you've been engaging in the same extra-ciricular activities your peers have—and I don't mean basket-weaving.

As soon as it happened, her boyfriend swore he'd stick around forever. He bought her a ring, even got a tattoo. But sixteen-year-old boys don't know how to make promises, and forever lasts longer than a tattoo.

Before her second trimester, he bolted for Tennessee.

“He just didn't come home one day,” she said. “My body kept changing, I felt abandoned, I couldn't focus on school, so I just quit going.”

A few years went by. The sixteen-year-old turned into a twenty-year-old. And life priorities became startlingly clear with age. She wanted more for her son than minimum wage.

“My cousin,” she said. “She's an X-ray tech. She makes decent money. She raises two kids by herself, and doesn't struggle to pay the bills. I thought to myself one day, 'hey,…