A Chair That’s Empty Today
Some folks leave this world so quietly that the only way you know they’re gone is because the stories get heavier.
Yesterday morning, we lost Jimmy Matthew.
To some folks, he’ll be remembered one way. To others, another. Me… I’ll remember a little hardheaded boy who could turn an ordinary afternoon into something worth telling fifty years later.
The funny thing about storytellers is this: We borrow people we love. We polish ’em a little. We exaggerate here and there. Then we hand ’em back to the world wearing a story. That’s what happened with Jimmy.
Every time you’ve laughed at one of my tales about him, you were helping keep him alive. Jimmy Matthew loved the various comments about him in the comments section. You made him so proud! And I reckon that’s not a bad way for a man to be remembered.
Rest easy, Cousin and old friend.
Piedmont and our lives won’t be quite the same without you. But somewhere, I imagine the Good Lord’s already wondering what all the commotion is about.
olbigjim 