“Have a blessed day,” the little girl says to an old man at the counter.

He smiles.

Every customer at this thrift store gets the same blessing when they pay. A little brunette girl is the one who gives it.

Her smile is big enough to set the woods on fire. She wears pink shoes.

“We told her to greet customers, both coming and going,” says thrift store manager, Donna. “She's never missed a one.”

The girl is all kinds of friendly. But she is poor. Barefoot poor.

She volunteers here. In return, Donna lets her pick out whichever T-shirts she wants. Or toys. Or shoes.

I meet the little girl. She is sorting a pile of clothes at the counter.

“Are you having a good day?” is the first thing she asks me.

They've trained her well.

She’s tiny. She doesn't know a stranger. She’s wearing an “Eagles,” T-shirt—the band, not the team.

“Do you like the Eagles?” I ask.

“My dad does,” she says.

They tell me her daddy is dead. A car wreck. Her mother does what she can to keep bill

collectors at bay. Most days it’s not enough.

Donna says the church tried to help financially, but got rejected.

“You know,” says Donna. “Poverty don’t always want help. This is the Deep South, pride goes back several generations.”

And old times are not forgotten.

The thrift store sits facing a slow two-lane highway. Today, they get all sorts of shoppers. Mexican laborers, needing clothes. Young couples, looking for skinny jeans or vintage lamps. And poor folks.

Donna met the girl last summer. One afternoon, the girl’s half-barefoot family walked through the doors. They browsed the narrow aisles, quietly.

The little girl found a T-shirt with Princess Elsa on it.

“Put that back,” said her mama. “You got plenty of shirts. We’re buying school shoes for brother.”

That day, Donna was sorting clothes. She asked if…

A farm in South Alabama. We’re visiting a friend. She has two Golden Retrievers. Cody and Piper. They sit on the porch, staring while I eat a sandwich.

Cody is my new best friend. He’s giving me sugar.

I ask my friend how old Cody is.

“Six,” she says. “And Piper’s seven.”

That’s middle-aged in dog-years. Just enough arthritis to make mornings tough; just enough youth to make one stupid.

Take, for instance, me. I am a six-year-old dog.

Cody is big, reddish, and runs faster than I can throw sticks. He has a wide neck, big paws. When he gets excited, he pants harder than The Little Engine that Stunk.

He gives good sugar.

Piper is small. She is Cody’s manager. She leads by example. Her virtues are: calmness, patience, loyalty, and gluttony. She has talents, too. Piper can sit for three full seconds.

I finish eating. I’m taking a walk. It’s seven. The sun has just set. Crickets make me deaf. It’s a big field.

Cody and Piper are following. They stay behind, noses near my hands.

“They must like you,” says my friend.

I

wish, but I'm afraid there's more to it than that. The truth is, they’re staying close because I have beef jerky in my pockets.

Old Indian trick.

I’m a pathetic dog admirer. I’ve never met a dog I didn't talk to. I've owned my share, and I’ve even tried training a few.

I'm hopeless at it. I never get past the basic command: “Nonononodammit!”

That is, except with Lady. That dog was smart enough to pass the Bar Exam.

I was young. Lady arrived in our open garage. Black, curly hair. Floppy ears. A gash on her backside. At first, she didn’t give affection, she was too clever for that.

So, I filled my pockets with jerky.

She kept her distance for days. Finally, she wandered near and (snap) I got my sugar.

The woman in the checkout aisle is small, white-haired. Her cart is full, mounding with Gatorade, Cheetos, and ice cream sandwiches.

I love ice cream sandwiches.

She is bent at the waist, her joints are as thin as number-two pencils. She is struggling to push her cart.

I offer to unload her buggy. She thanks me and says, “Aren’t you a sweet little Boy Scout?”

A comedian, this lady.

If I am lucky enough to see old age, I will be a comedian.

She’s out of breath, leaning on her basket. If I didn't know any better, I'd guess her back is killing her.

“My grandkids are coming to town this week,” she says. “Wanna make sure they have enough food.”

This explains the Mountain Dew, the Goldfish, and the ice cream sandwiches.

We talk. She is friendly. No. She is perfect. Dressed to the nines, hair fixed. It is nine in the morning, she is bearing pearls and ruby lipstick.

She is the American granny. Nineteen hundred and fifty-nine, frozen in time. The kind of woman whose lifelong occupation

is to keep stomachs full while wearing matching blouse and shoes.

When the cashier finishes scanning, the old woman thanks me. I offer to take her groceries to the car. She tries to pay me.

No ma'am. I’d rather sell my soul to Doctor Phil for thirty pieces of silver than take your money.

I roll her cart toward the parking lot. She holds the side. I suggest she grab my arm. She does, and for a moment, I am ten-foot tall and Kevlar.

She has an economy Ford. The trunk is tiny. I have an idea: I ask her to let me follow her home and unload her groceries.

It’s too much. Too personal, too fast. This embarrasses her.

“No thanks,” she says. “I’ll have my grandkids unload when they get here tomorrow. My grandkids, they’re visiting me tomorrow.”

It’s early. We’ve left town before sunrise. We’ve got a long way to go. My wife is driving. My coonhound, Ellie Mae, rides in the backseat.

On long trips, my wife always drives. She’s a natural leader—she could make room-temperature honey walk in a single-file line. And I'm a natural sleeper.

In the backseat: Ellie chews on an empty plastic peanut butter jar. It’s the only thing she’ll chew inearnest. She doesn’t like bones.

I don’t often use the word “beautiful”—it’s overdone. But if I did, I’d use it on Ellie.

We drive past Paxton. Florala. Lockhart. Towns about the size of walk-in closets. I’ve watched a baseball game in Paxton.

I fall asleep. No dreams worth recalling. I wake up. We’re passing the JCPenney in Andalusia. I bought a necktie there once.

It was an engagement party. I arrived with nothing but a golf shirt and jeans. No jacket, no tie. My wife went ballistic.

That day, we stopped at JCPenney. She picked out a crimson tie. I looked like a bloated Baptist usher.

Miles ahead: a sign advertising the Hank Williams Museum in Georgiana. I’ve

visited that museum. Miss Margaret—the white-haired tour guide—made Domino sugar seem unsweet.

Interstate 65: the views have changed considerably. Small communities get replaced with fast-rolling pavement. Everyone’s in a hurry. This world moves too fast.

Ellie Mae has destroyed her JIF jar. She paints my upholstery with peanut butter.

We pull over in Camelia City—commonly known as Greenville. Think: sprawling antebellum mansions and the historic Confederate Park. I could live in Greenville.

Here, I buy upholstery-cleaner to scrub peanut butter from my upholstery.

Back on the road.

We approach Priester’s Pecans. I tell Jamie to stop. I go inside, use the little cowboy’s room. I buy a bag of Pecan Fiddlesticks. If you don’t know what those are, don’t start.

More driving. My wife turns on the radio. She sings along. She knows…

I'm at a small church. It's evening. The glowing sign by the highway reads: “Passion Play. Free to Public.”

The parking lot is full.

I have a thing for Easter plays. As a kid, my steelworking, hay-baling father took the role of Jesus in the church pageant.

“You want me to play WHO?” Daddy said into the telephone receiver one night. Then, he laughed until he was hoarse.

Of course, it was ridiculous. Sure, Daddy attended church. But he also had a scar on his hindparts from a glass flask, shattering in his back pocket.

He was no Bible character.

So I walk into the small church. I find a pew near the back. I sit beside a large family. The sanctuary is chock-full.

Beside me: a little girl wearing an Auburn T-shirt. Her name is Catherine. We shake hands.

Pleased to meet you, Catherine.

Anyway, when Daddy first agreed to play the part, he swore off beer and cussing. He bought a tape recorder. He sat in the barn, reading the red words into the microphone.

“What’re you doing?” I asked.

“Practicing,” he said.

“Is that Seven-Up?”

“Club soda.”

Gag.

Catherine shushes her little brother. The lights dim in the chapel. Piano music.

Actors take the stage, dressed in bedsheets. These are salt-of-the-earth folks with Alabamian accents and Birkenstocks.

The night of Daddy’s first performance, he was a nervous wreck. His hands shook while he drove to church.

I asked if he was scared. He didn’t answer—he was busy practicing the Sermon on the Mount.

When they crucified him, they painted him with strawberry syrup. And during the final scene, Mister Rick fired a shotgun blank while the foam stone rolled away from the tomb.

The choir sang. People applauded. It was maybe the highest moment of Daddy’s life.

Months later, his funeral was held in the same chapel. Minus the choir.

That was ten lifetimes ago.

Catherine…

DEAR SEAN:

I am a guy in high school. There is a girl at school, and we have come to be best friends, but now I value her a little more than a friend.

She’s the only girl I’ve ever come to love. I want to tell her what I feel, but she already has a boyfriend.

They are hopelessly in love. I've met her boyfriend, and he's hopelessly awesome, so I can't hate him. I feel terrible. What should I do?

Sincerely,
HOPELESSLY HEARTBROKEN

DEAR HOPELESSLY:

What you’re about to read is a middle-aged man’s retelling of his own pathetic youth. I’m the wrong fella to ask for advice.

I’m an ordinary stiff with one back-surgery under his belt.

As a young man, I was a friend to a girl. Let’s call her, oh I don’t know, Princess Ijustwannabefriends.

She didn’t have a date on New Year’s Eve, so she asked if I’d entertain her.

I really liked her, so I agreed. I took her to a party and promised her parents I’d have her home at midnight.

We pulled into her driveway at 11:58 P.M.

When my watch struck 12:00, I expected a handshake and a, “You know, you’re like a Labrador to me.”

What I got was a kiss.

I had to be resuscitated with paddles.

After that, I had this erroneous idea that Princess IkisswhoeverIwant liked me. But I was very, very wrong.

A few weeks later, she began dating a much taller, much broader-shouldered, better-looking quarterback with perfect teeth, and the amiable personality of Jesus Christ.

Yeah, yeah, yeah. I know. Who cares about my youth?

Well, I do. And I wish I could tell young, naive Sean a few things.

For starters: pretend, if you will, you’re dying. Bear with me, this is only a what-if.

Would this girl visit you in the hospital while you’re suffering from, say, kidney failure? Probably.

Would…

Some women are born to be mothers. Ami Jo is one of those women. She and her husband tried for a long time, but nothing happened. So, she took fertility treatment.

She got more than she bargained for. Triplets.

It was pure excitement. The baby showers. The tears. The back pain, the mood-swings. Eating for four.

At seventeen weeks, doctors found a heart defect in one of the triplets.

“I was devastated,” says Ami Jo. “They suggested we terminate the baby, so the others weren't at risk.”

It was a blow. But Ami Jo didn’t even have to think on it.

“I wasn’t about to,” she goes on. “My husband and I agreed to put our faith in something greater.”

Thus, one summer day, at Jacksonville Baptist Hospital, she birthed three babies. Two healthy infants, and one miraculous William Walter Gibson—who screamed loudest.

“We named him Will, after my father,” she says. “And, because it’d be God’s WILL if he lived.”

At three pounds eleven ounces, he was ‘God’s Will.’ But he wasn’t well. He had his first open-heart surgery at nine-weeks. Then another.

And

another.

Within five months of infancy, he endured four open-hearts. He practically lived at the hospital.

“Watching him go through this,” says Ami Jo. “Him nearly dying on several occasions, it's just been...”

Yeah.

Ten years went by. The family adapted to Will’s routine. An operation here, a heart cath there.

He got older, started school. Will grew into a normal boy—with the boyish odors and dirty fingernails to go with it. He learned to play a mean drum-kit. Likes swimming.

Then.

Last August, during an outpatient procedure, Will’s heart stopped. It was unexpected. Doctors compressed his chest for six minutes. His heart started again. Then quit. Oxygen debt. Seizures. Flailing. More CPR.

“Next time I saw my baby, he was on a ventilator, medically paralyzed, maybe even brain dead.”

ICU was hell—living on prayers…

Sneads, Florida—a place that's more farmland than town. Here, men still hunt with dogs, and young women know how to make chicken and dumplings from scratch.

This is a spot where kids still grow up barefoot on dirt roads. Where the biggest dangers facing local children are snagging feet on fishing hooks.

Georgie became a woman here. She started dating Trey at age fourteen. He was fifteen.

Their romance was the kind you don’t often see. The sort of teenage-love that adults warn won’t last six minutes. Trey and Georgie dated for six years.

Then, on one pretty October day, they visited the courthouse and said vows. They got straight to work, building a family. They started with Blakely Glen.

Parenthood agreed with them. The sleepless nights, the changing of diapers every nine seconds. Georgie got pregnant again.

Brenna Grace.

“She's always wanted a big family,” says Georgie's sister. “Lots of kids, spaced close together. She was so excited.”

But there was a problem. Georgie’s mother rushed her to the hospital. It was an emergency C-section.

Brenna Grace came into

this world two months early, tipping the scale at four pounds. It wasn't good. Bleeding on the brain. One collapsed lung. Jaundice.

They took Brenna Grace to UAB. The family has slept in waiting-room chairs, skipped meals, and survived on hospital coffee. To say it's been hard would be an understatement.

That was seven days ago.

But this story isn’t about Brenna Grace. It's not even about Georgie or Trey. This is about ordinary people.

In only seven days, ordinary prayers have reached across city lines, and into rural parts. Prayers have spread outward through the Panhandle and upward through Alabama—one steeple at a time. One ordinary person to another.

Communities pulled together. Some have donated money. Others are organizing suppers. There have been enough prayers to suffocate low-flying birds.

Then.

It happened overnight. One morning, doctors discovered Brenna Grace’s…

It was a bookstore. Late night. Many years ago. I sat in the corner, reading. I was enthralled in an important piece of classic American literature at the time.

A girl walked in. She made me nauseous. My ex-girlfriend. She’d done me wrong, and felt no remorse over her devilish behavior. None.

She sat beside me. “Hey, you," she said in a cheery voice. "What’re you reading?”

“‘The Far Side,’” said I. "Volume one."

She told me she was meeting someone. A Sunday-school teacher—she was substitute-teaching for a children's church-class that week.

Sunday school.

It's a wonder lightning didn't strike and fry off her eyebrows.

I stood to leave. But before I could, another girl walked through the door. She carried textbooks beneath her arm. Her hair was shoulder-length, and she walked with determination.

She was the Sunday-school teacher. She sat across from me and we made fast friends.

She wore a baby-blue sweater. She had hell-raiser eyes, and when she spoke, she sounded like Escambia County.

She was funny. She had a way of making me feel

like I’d met her before. Like, perhaps, we’d been friends in another life—if you believe in that sort of thing.

I thought about her all week. All month. For a few months. I am a slow thinker. Back then, it took me at least forty minutes to decide which dirty shirt I would wear for a given day.

Eventually, we had a first date. I took her for a drive. She was loud-talking, happy, honest to a fault. I saw her again. And again.

One night, we sat on her porch swing for eight hours. She fell asleep. Her head laid on my chest. When the sun started to rise, I told my dead daddy I’d figured out what my life was about. Her.

He didn't say much.

I asked her to marry me. She didn’t even think about it. We…