This is a small restaurant. A meat-and-three, where waitresses wear T-shirts. Where your iced tea never falls below the rim of your glass. Where catfish is fried whole on the bone.

I have two dates accompanying me tonight.

My mother-in-law—who holds my arm for balance. I’m carrying her purse. And my wife—who walks ten steps ahead of us at all times.

The dress code is summer weekend casual. I’m wearing jeans. My dates are wearing pearls, pumps, and ruby lipstick.

They always do. In fact, I’ve never seen them exit the house in anything they wouldn’t want to be buried in.

We order a round of teas. My dates scan the menus without conversation. When our server arrives, my dates have questions.

“Is your tartar sauce made with DUKE’S?” asks my wife.

“Are there REAL ham hocks in

your collards?” asks my mother-in-law. “I don’t like those ham-flavored packets.”

“What’s in the potato salad?” asks my wife. “If I even LOOK at a stick of celery I start gagging…”

“Are your French fries STEAK fries, or shoestring?”

“What kind of cake do you have tonight?”

“Where’d you graduate high school?”

“What’s your stance on foreign commerce?”

“What’s your social security number?”

The server looks to me.

“I’ll have a barbecue sandwich, ma’am,” I say.

Two more women enter the restaurant. They have white hair, and they are also sporting pearls. They sit behind us. They speak with accents that are soft and sophisticated.

As fate would have it, my two dates know them—sort of.

Miss Youth Dew and Miss Dignified are from Anytown, Alabama. My mother-in-law…

I ran into the grocery store. I was in a hurry. I walked the aisles with groceries beneath my arms.

And it happened. I got recognized in the dog-food aisle.

I was busy trying to decide between beef chunks with gravy, or lamb with rice. A family of five walked toward me. They stopped. They stared.

The oldest daughter said, “You’re Sean!”

I looked in both directions. I was just about to explain that I had already filed for an extension this year when she hugged me.

Mother hugged me next. Then Brother. Then Father. Then Granny joined the clot.

“I can’t BELIEVE we’re meeting you here,” said the teenage girl. “It’s JUST like your stories. Oh my God, are you gonna change my name when you write about me, too?”

I made a series of unintelligible mumbles.

“I want you to call me something really crazy,” she went on. “Like Scarlett O’Hara or something.”

Admittedly, this name is a little overdone, but an overall good choice if you ask me.

Granny piped into the conversation: “Hey, I JUST read what you wrote

about Chick-fil-A, only a few minutes ago.”

Right. It bears mentioning: the subject of Chick-fil-A has been a hot topic in my inbox today. I’ve received approximately—and this is a low estimate—six hundred thousand messages regarding a misinterpreted sentence I wrote about Chick-fil-A.

I don’t have time to explain here, but let’s just say that some of the emails have been less than kind. Some have been downright scary.

Readers like Dan from Georgia, for instance, wrote: “If you were up in Georgia, I’d take your [bleeping bleep] behind the woodshed and wear your [bleeping bleep] out. LOL.”

Hey, thanks for the letter, Dan. You sound like a fun guy. LOL.

But thankfully, the folks in the grocery store didn’t want to scalp me with cheese graters. No, these were kind hearted people, from Alabama.

“I think…

DEAR SEAN:

You are a hater, so I hate you. Seriously, I’m finished with you. I’m disappointed in the negative statement you made yesterday about Chick-fil-A!

You wrote [quote]: “...we played [music] at the grand opening of a Chick-fil-A. I’m not proud of that.”

I was mortified when I read that you actually hate Chick-fil-A... And all I can say to you is... [bleep, bleep, bleepity bleep].

It’s been real,
TIME-TO-QUIT-SEAN-DIETRICH

DEAR TIME-TO-QUIT:

Hi. How’s your day been going? I hope you are well.

Listen, I don’t mean to burst your bubble, but I’m reading your letter while eating a Chicken Biscuit, sitting inside a Chick-fil-A. That’s right, I’m in a booth at THIS VERY MOMENT, writing you.

In fact, I just read your words aloud to the woman sitting next to me. Louisa, is her name. She has an eight-year-old daughter with her.

After I read your words, Louisa’s daughter remarked: “Wow, that person needs a nap.”

Her words, not mine.

Anyway, maybe you don’t know this, but my mama worked at Chick-fil-A when I was young. To make ends meet, Mama made waffle fries, scrubbed kitchens, mopped

the floors, and wore a uniform. My sister worked here, too.

This place was good to my family. And by “good,” I mean: they helped us survive. Hate them?

Do what?

Why, if you ask me you couldn’t find better fried chicken if you looked in Aunt Bee’s skillet.

Admittedly, I don’t know anything about the organization. But I DO know that during my youth, I’d visit Chick-fil-A to see Mama’s smiling face. And those memories are plated in gold.

Oh, but you didn’t want to know that. You wanted to be angry. So okay. Let’s talk about the sentences you didn’t like:

“...we played [music] at the grand opening of a Chick-fil-A. I’m not proud of that.”

Journey through time with me, friend. Let’s travel backward several years.

[Cue…

I’m throwing a barbecue. I invited a few friends over for the holiday celebration. A few turned into a lot. Now I am surrounded.

And I am happy.

I don’t want to get mushy, but I couldn’t be happier if I won the Florida Powerball. There are two kids playing catch in my front yard. People are reaching into coolers full of ice.

One bloodhound is running around—off leash. And one toddler named Grayson is running around—Grayson is wearing a leash.

And I’m standing at a grill. I’m wearing a ten-gallon hat, and an apron my friend bought me.

The apron was a gag gift, it reads: “Never use gasoline to light a grill.”

Friends.

There’s no need for this apron. But aprons help me appear like I actually know what I’m doing. And it’s important to look like you know what you’re doing when cooking raw meat for several innocent bystanders.

The truth is, I am not a good cook. I’m a writer and an accordionist. And writer-accordion-players are only good at bouncing checks, and using-way-too-many-hyphens-in-one-long-sentence.

Case and point: long ago, my wife bought

me a grill when we first got married. And before I tell you the rest of this story, I should also explain that it was one of those K-Mart jobs, with an instruction booklet written in Mandarin.

The grill didn’t cooperate. So, like any responsible American problem solver, to light the grill I resorted to using an acetylene blowtorch and gasoline.

Thus, the apron.

Since then, my friends have never let me forget about those foul tasting hamburgers. Neither will they let me forget about the following day, when I attend my cousin’s baby dedication with hairless forearms and no eyebrows.

But today, I’m not worried about food because I’m here with friends. I’m feeling nostalgic.

I’ve known some of these people for a long, long, long time. And they’ve been good to me.

Take…

There was a ghost in the car with me. It surprised me that he showed up, it’s been a long, long time. But I am glad to see him.

I ask what the occasion is.

“Oh,” he says. “I just came to say ‘hello.’”

The ghost looks just like me. Or rather, I look like him. We are close in age—he was only forty-one when he died.

I still miss him.

Anyway, he and I drive past prairies and cotton fields. The sky has never been so blue. The music on the radio has never been better. Willie Nelson’s Greatest Hits.

Salve to the ears.

My father used that word a lot. “Salve.” There was no such thing as “ointment,” “balm,” “Mentholatum,” or “Vaseline.” To him, everything was salve.

He would rub salve on my sunburns every summer—I spent three quarters of my life sunburned. Redheads are like that, of course. Fair-skinned people like me can’t mention the sun without blistering.

A lot of redheads are also allergic to poison ivy. In fact, I can’t bear to talk about this subject. I’m sorry I

even brought it up.

My father would rub salve on all my rashes. He was every bit as redheaded as I was. Every bit as fair.

I’m passing Kinston, Opp, Elba, and Brantley.

I pull over at a gas station. I buy black licorice, Coca-Cola, and hot dogs. He loved black licorice. He loved hotdogs.

Funny, I forget most of the things he hated, but I remember what he loved.

On the road again. There’s not a cloud for miles. His arm is dangling out the window. Mine is too. Willie is still singing. I’ve already finished my Coke and dog. He hasn’t touched his.

Luverne, Rutledge, Highland Home.

He’s not telling stories today. So, I’m remembering some of my own.

I remember the time I fell off the tire swing and knocked the wind out…

It’s night and I am on a beach in Destin, Florida. I am sitting on the shore, watching the mighty Gulf of Mexico. It never stops moving.

Never.

A few hours ago, I was in a beach bar having dinner with an old friend. He looked good. He’s a family man now, with a good job in Birmingham. Two kids. A nice wife. I haven’t seen him in decades. Not since we were ugly young men, operating nail-guns together.

Long ago, we had things in common. His father left before he was born. Mine died when I was a boy.

Back then, we had the same idea on life. Namely: that life wasn’t fair.

We had fun tonight. There was a band playing top-forty hits. The lead guitarist sang “Brown Eyed Girl” like a donkey with a sinus infection. And people danced.

My friend and his wife ordered fruity drinks and two-stepped until they were sweaty. I said Goodnight Gracie and left early.

On my way home, I stopped here. And the memories came back by the metric

ton.

This used to be my beach. I haven’t been here in years. We lived a few streets over. Our family’s old block house was yellow. And tiny. I slept on a pull-out sofa. My sister slept with my mother.

I would sit on the back porch steps when I couldn’t sleep, and look at the night. And I’d wonder things. Important things.

Things like: why does the Pope wear pointy hats? Who invented drive-thru liquor stores? Is it bad luck to be superstitious? And why does it seem like life is out to get me?

Anyway, this town has changed. Once upon a time, Destin was a sleepy fishing village. It had one traffic light—two at the most. It wasn’t swallowed by chain restaurants. There were only a few dives, a Shell Station, and the docks on the harbor.

But progress…

Jacob was a foster child. He grew up in the Foster Pinball Machine. Birth to graduation. He was never adopted by a family.

He and I weren’t good friends, but we knew each other. I lost track of him at age fifteen. He moved away to a group home.

We got in touch a few years ago. I expected to learn he had a wife and kids, but that wasn't the case. Jacob has animals.

Six dogs, three cats.

I don’t think Jacob would mind me saying that he marches to the beat of his own tuba.

He’s had little choice. His childhood was spent bouncing from family to family, looking after himself, remembering to eat regularly.

Today, he leads a good life. He’s a restaurant cook, he likes to hike, camp, and he’s had the same girlfriend for ten years.

I asked about all his animals.

“I dunno,” he said. “Just love animals. Growing up, I was never allowed to have any.”

Jacob found his first dog after work one night. It was late. A stray black Lab was sniffing trash cans

behind a restaurant.

The dog bolted when it heard footsteps.

Jacob tried to coax it with food. The dog wasn’t interested. So, Jacob resorted to heavy artillery.

Raw ground beef.

He left an entire package on the pavement. The dog still wouldn't come. Jacob gave up and crawled into his car to leave. Before he wheeled away, he glanced in his rear mirror.

The dog was eating a pound of sirloin in one bite.

“Started feeding him every day,” Jacob said. “I just wanted him to know somebody cared.”

For two months, Jacob cared. He fed the dog from a distance seven nights per week—even when he wasn’t working.

And on one fateful night, the old dog walked straight toward Jacob and had a seat.

“You shoulda seen how he was looking at me. He was like:…

She and her daughter visited the beach. She's up in age—walking through sand can be an ordeal. She carried a Foldger’s coffee can. The old metal kind people keep roofing nails in.

They walked toward the Gulf of Mexico and removed the lid. They scattered brownish powder into the water.

There wasn’t much breeze. They tell me most of the dust fell like sand. But it was a beautiful ceremony, nonetheless.

“My husband and I kinda grew up coming here,” said the old woman. “Before all the big condos and high-rises. His family had a place down that’a way.”

She was nineteen when she met him. After a few dates with the skinny boy, he invited her along on an annual family beach vacation.

The family stayed in a big camp-house cabin. They went fishing. They sat on swings, stayed up late, talked, watched the moon above the bay.

He was almost three years younger than her. He called her an old lady, it infuriated her.

They

made a nice family. Two girls, they adopted a son. They took walks after supper. They played cards. They traveled.

He inherited his family’s service station. He could fix anything with wheels. It was a lifelong obsession, tinkering beneath hoods. They weren’t rich, but in many ways they were.

A drunk driver killed him.

It was a twenty-year-old girl with friends in her car. Nobody knows what happened exactly. The theory is: he was doing sixty-five and the girl was doing ninety. She tried to pass him. He switched lanes to let her over. She was going too fast. Four people died.

It happened almost sixteen years ago, her wounds have turned into scars.

Ever since his funeral, he’s been sitting on her closet shelf, in a…

She lives in a forty-foot single-wide trailer with her brother. She’s in her early thirties, but seems older. And wiser.

It’s a nice place. Decorated. Frilly curtains. Laundry hangs in the backyard. Photographs on the coffee table. A few scented candles.

Her younger brother is making a sandwich in the kitchen. He’s skinny, tattoos cover his arms. He walks into the living room.

He hugs her before leaving and says, “Love you, Sissy, I’m working late tonight.”

To him, she is more mother than sister. She raised him. She did all things mothers do: diaper changing, wiping hindparts, and she’s washed enough laundry to populate the county landfill.

Her mother died when she was nine. She and her brother lived with their grandfather in this single-wide.

“I remember when I was thirteen,” she says. “I realized it was up to ME to be a mom.”

On the wall is a photograph of her grandfather. She’s in the photo, too. She is young, blonde. She stands behind the old man—arms wrapped around his neck.

“Cancer,” she tells me. “He was seventy.”

He was diagnosed when she

was a sophomore. She cared for him during the last few years of his life.

On his final day, she drove him to the emergency room because he couldn’t catch his breath.

In a hospital bed, he told her, “I’m so sorry, baby. First your mama left you, now I’m leaving you.”

Those were his last lucid words.

But.

I’m not here to write something that makes you feel sorry for her. She's too exceptional of a person for pity. I’m writing about something else.

She met someone.

He is a fireman-paramedic. When they were first introduced, he asked her on a date. She refused.

“I’d never BEEN on a date,” she says. “I was so awkward and just so nervous that he would even ask me.”

He persisted. She gave in. He took her…