When I was a kid in Ashdown, Arkansas, I was surrounded by old people. It wasn’t so much that all of the other folks were actually old it’s just that when you’re a kid, everyone besides you seems old.

Not only did they seem old, they acted old. They ate old. They watched old. They drove old. They wore their hair old. They smelled old.

I’ll clarify that last one momentarily.

When you’re young, you have unlimited energy. I’m reminded of this every ...

We called it light bread. Others called it white bread. Regardless of what it was called, in my hometown of Ashdown, Arkansas and most of the rest of the South it was the foundation of the Southern food pyramid.

And it was found aplenty at our home on Beech Street. You never knew when company might come.

Over the years, I slowly fell away from light bread. I was encouraged to eat wheat and other “healthy” breads by well-intentioned doctors and wives.

But ...

The Jetsons got a lot right. Flying cars are now a reality. Zoom meetings. Robot vacuum cleaners. And video phones.

One thing that was absent from that cartoon show was something that’s been around for well over 100 years. Something we still use today, and I think will still be around in some form: The regular old telephone.

We don’t use a rotary phone anymore (maybe some of us still do), but if I had to narrow it down and pick just ...

If we’re honest, some products aren’t that different from each other. But during the 50s, 60s, and 70s, our moms were extremely loyal to the ones they liked.

And advertising had a lot to do with mom’s loyalty, and ours.

Growing up in front of a large, RCA console TV in Ashdown, Arkansas, I learned a lot about the products in the pantry, medicine cabinet, and bathroom.

Companies spent a fortune to send repeated messages designed to educate and convince you why their ...

Our grandparents had it figured out. They lived life on their terms.

Today, we live life on society’s terms. And the evidence that we regret it is all around.

The first bit of proof that my grandfather and grandmother had control of how their day would go is the fact that they had no alarm clock.

They didn’t need one.

As the rooster crowed, my granny was already in the kitchen pouring her and my papa a second cup of coffee.

The coffeemaker didn’t have ...

He left me a message, so I called him back.

It’s funny how, even if you haven’t talked to a childhood friend in a long time, the conversation picks up as if you had just spoken earlier in the day.

“Remember that location you always said you’d like to buy one day?” he asked me.

He was referring to a store in our hometown of Ashdown, Arkansas. For some reason, I felt I had a calling to be the proprietor of my own ...

They were called, “Victory Gardens.” And they were one of the weapons US citizens used to help win World War II.

With the bad guys throwing everything at us that they could, in return, we were throwing everything at them that we could.

What we were throwing was in the shape of bullets, bombs, aircraft, and tanks, all of which cost a lot of money.

With the military needing all of the commercially grown food for the troops, the president asked Americans to ...

Pee Wee Herman died.

He was a character, not a real guy. But, to many of us he seemed real. And that’s what made him so unique.

The actor Paul Reubens created Pee Wee Herman as part of his stage act in the late 1970s with a group of improvisational actors called The Groundlings. Reubens said he had around 15 or so characters, but none of them received the feedback and appreciation that Pee Wee did.

As a result, he said he began ...

When our parents would take my sister and me from Ashdown, Arkansas to Texarkana, often they’d succumb to our begging and stop for ice cream.

The only destination considered was Baskin-Robbins 31 Flavors.

Sure, there were other options, including Dairy Queen, Tastee-Freez, and A&W Drive In, but with Baskin-Robbins sitting right on the Texas side of Stateline Avenue between Interstate 30 and downtown, there was never any question where we’d go.

Also, my mother liked pralines and cream, which was only available from ...

A granddaddy long legs climbed onto my face while I was out brush hogging on the tractor.

I’d like to apologize to the neighbor for his fence, chicken house, doghouse, clothesline, and for leaving the scene of an accident.

I’d also like to apologize to my wife for laughing at her fear of spiders.

Generally, I have no fear of members of the arachnid family (certain politicians excluded), but that hot morning sitting atop 37 horses of diesel engine, I did.

I’m not afraid ...