09/04/2026
I share the video below because I couldn't have said it better . . . for Dolly. I've listened to it quite a few times now and still get choked up. As they say, "You can take the girl out of the South, but not the South out of the girl." It's true.
I miss my grandmother's porch, the South I knew. The one who had our dear neighbor, who was alone, over on Sunday after church for the best fried chicken, biscuits, just-shelled peas, and sliced tomatoes from the garden; the sort of "different" lady, Alice, we'd welcome, who knew how to spin the best story about taking a road trip to California always with an ice-cold co-cola. Just the telling was as good as going. She'd disappear for long periods of time and then show up again always with sparkling earrings and combs in her hair. And that smile.
The original small Methodist Church had, well, still does, my granddaddy's name on a plaque under one of the stained-glass windows as he helped found the church. And, of course, we had our special pew as all the regulars did. There, when I'd look around, I knew just enough about the stories of each one to know they and the world sure wasn't perfect. No. Some of it was downright too ugly to even be spoken out loud. But as we all rose to sing, "Just as I Am," it didn't matter. It's what we'd all come for, the grace, that remembered we could hug one another going out the door, just because. It was enough. Maybe because we knew our own hidden stories too. It seemed we all yearned for the same thing sitting there on those slightly worn pews, to be seen, welcomed, just as we were.
And when I close my eyes, I still picture Alice racing down the old country roads with that ice-cold co-cola, smiling like crazy. I hope she made it to California.
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