Some of y'all never met Jimmy Matthew. I reckon it's time you did.

A Piedmont Porchlight Story Last Saturday we gathered to bury Jimmy Matthew. Not Jim Leroy. Around our family, there wasn't but one Jimmy Matthew. I bet the grown folks was mighty glad of that! If you said "Jimmy," somebody'd ask, "Which one?" If you said "Jimmy Matthew," everybody knew exactly who you meant. Now, before you get the wrong idea, this ain’t meant to be an obituary.

An ordinary trip to Blackwelder's becomes an unforgettable front porch tale in today's Strange Tales of Piedmont.

A Strange Tale of Piedmont There was one chair at Blackwelder's Hardware nobody ever seemed to sit in. Mind you, it wasn't anything special. Just an old oak ladder-back chair with one spindle missing and enough scratches on it to tell half the history of Calhoun County. It sat over by the cracker barrel, close enough to the potbellied stove to keep your feet warm in winter, but far enough away that your britches didn't catch fire.

When gospel singer Havis Albea died in 1979, his family gathered in a little Piedmont church to say goodbye. Then his own voice began to sing. A true Southern family story about music, memory, and the...

A Piedmont Porchlight Story I reckon there's only one man I ever knew who sang at his own funeral. That'd be my Uncle Havis Albea. Now, before you start wonderin' whether this is one of those October stories where strange things happen after dark... it ain't. Matter of fact, what happened that afternoon was about as ordinary as love gets.

Miss Lorene insists she saw The Irish Blackthorn leaning against the depot bench one October afternoon. Sheriff Booker says it was only a shadow.

Clifford always insisted he saw The Irish Blackthorn only once at Magnolia Mortuary. Other folks claim they saw it there more than once. Clifford never argued with them. He simply said, "I only tell t...

Another Strange Tale of Piedmont is here. Around here, even the simplest errand can lead to a story... if somebody happens to say, "Reminds me..."

A Piedmont Porchlight Story If you ever spent much time in Blackwelder’s Hardware, you learned pretty quick there wasn’t much Mr. Blackwelder couldn’t find. Didn’t matter if…

A Piedmont Porchlight Story Everybody in Piedmont knows Blackwelder’s Hardware. Mr. Blackwelder always swept the sidewalk before opening. Every morning. Didn’t matter if there wasn&#821…

A Piedmont Porchlight Story There used to be a fellow over on North Centre Avenue named Walter Gresham who never locked his front door. Didn’t matter whether he was gone ten minutes or ten da…

A Piedmont Porchlight Story October always feels different in Piedmont. Not because the leaves turn. Lord knows they take their own sweet time about that down here. It’s the air. One mornin&#…

A Piedmont Porchlight Story I’ve lived in a fair number of houses over the years. Some were little. Some were bigger. Some I remember better than others. But I’ve come to believe someth…

A Piedmont Porchlight Story Every Southern kitchen had a window over the sink. I don’t know if that was written into the buildin’ plans or handed down with the Ten Commandments. It just seeme…

A Piedmont Porchlight Story The lights went out just after supper. Not a flicker. Not one of those little blinks that make you reset the microwave clock. I mean… Everything. Good and dark. Fo…

A Piedmont Porchlight Story You didn’t need a calendar. You didn’t need an invitation. And you sure as the world didn’t need Mama to tell you. If you paid the least bit of attenti…

A Piedmont Porchlight Story Folks wear expensive watches these days. Their telephones tell them the time before they even ask. Cars, microwaves, coffee makers… Seems like everything in the wo…

A Piedmont Porchlight Story Every town has one. A fellow who waves at everybody. Not because he knows everybody. Because he believes he ought to. In Piedmont, that fellow was Mr. Charlie Benson. No…

A Piedmont Porchlight Story I’ve noticed something over the years. The most important conversations almost never happen where you expect them to. They don’t usually happen sitting aroun…

A Piedmont Porchlight Story You could set your watch by the Coffee Cup. Five-thirty every morning, lights came on. By six, the first pot of coffee was already earning its keep. By seven, half of Pi…

A Piedmont Porchlight Story When I was a boy, I thought old dogs slept because they got lazy. Turns out little boys ain’t nearly as smart as they think they are. Daddy had an old Black and Tan Coon…

This post from last year popped up. It’s one of my favorites, and I’d like to offer it again for folks who may not have seen it. I do hope ya’ll will enjoy it!

A Piedmont Porchlight Story Every gardener knows about the last tomato. Not the first one. The first tomato gets all the attention. Folks brag about it. Take pictures of it. Argue over who picked t…

A Piedmont Porchlight Story Every house I ever knew had one good chair. Not the prettiest one. Not the newest one. Just… The chair. You knew better than to claim it for very long. At Mawmaw a…

A Piedmont Porchlight Story People use the words alone and lonely like they mean the same thing. They don’t. Not even close. I learned that lesson a long time ago. Oddly enough, I learned it …

A Piedmont Porchlight Story There are some sounds a man never outgrows. Rain on a tin roof. A screen door closing. A whip-poor-will calling from somewhere out beyond the pasture. And the long, lone…

A Piedmont Porchlight Story I still have one of my Mawmaw’s quilts. It’s faded now. The reds aren’t nearly as bright as they used to be. One corner has a little place where the st…

A Piedmont Porchlight Story I reckon every town has one dog that belongs to everybody. In Piedmont, that honor fell to a scruffy old mutt folks simply called Jake. Now, if Jake had belonged to anyb…

A Piedmont Porchlight Story Every town has one. One house where the porch light always burns. Not just on holidays. Not just when company is expected. Every night. Rain or shine. Summer or winter. …

A Piedmont Porchlight Story There are two kinds of mysteries. The kind the sheriff worries about, and the kind old folks discuss over pie. This here one belongs to the pie category. For as long as …

A Piedmont Porchlight Story There are three things you can count on finding at the Coffee Cup before eight o’clock. Fresh coffee. Hot biscuits. And somebody absolutely certain they know how t…

Hello lovely readers and followers. I know…I’ve been absent for some while. Lots have happened in the Brixham household. Firstly, my husband of many years passed away. His failing heart finally cau…

A Piedmont Porchlight Story If you wanted your hair cut in Piedmont, there were fancier places. Well… there was one fancier place. It had shiny floors, magazines less than six months old, and…

A Piedmont Porchlight Story Every small town has somebody who’s as dependable as the sunrise. Around Piedmont, that somebody was Mr. Walter Dobbs. If you wanted to know what time it was, you …

A Piedmont Porchlight Story People ask me from time to time why I retired from Magnolia Mortuary. They usually expect some dramatic answer. That I’d simply grown weary of funerals. That I&#82…

A Piedmont Porchlight Story People who’ve never spent much time in cemeteries imagine they’re all alike. Rows of stones. A few trees. Some flowers. Maybe a flag or two. Spend forty year…

A Piedmont Porchlight Story Somewhere around five o’clock this mornin’, while the rest of Piedmont was still asleep, summer slipped out the back door. There wasn’t no announcement…

A Piedmont Porchlight Story I did something this mornin’ that was so like my little Mawmaw. I’ve been smilin’ about it ever since. Having been born in 1899, you can imagine that Mawmaw didn’t grow …

Dear Piedmont, I’ve been meaning to write you for years. Truth is, I never could figure out where to mail the letter. So, I reckon I’ll just leave it here. Maybe the wind knows your add…

The Last Passenger Train to Stop in Piedmont There are some days a town doesn’t know it’s making history. It just thinks it’s Tuesday. I got to wondering about that one morning ov…

Dear Friends, Several of you have noticed that I’ve been quieter than a Baptist church during the fourth verse and have asked where I’ve been. I appreciate the concern. I reckon I owe y…

A Piedmont Porchlight Story If somebody ever builds the Museum of Ordinary Things, they’d better save a place for an old tin dipper. Not one of those shiny decorative ones hanging on a restau…

A Piedmont Porchlight Story If somebody ever builds a Museum of Ordinary Things, I already know what ought to be sitting in the very first display case. A Mason jar. Not polished. Not painted. Not …