In the mid-1950s, when I was 9 years old, I lived in a small farming town in Middle Tennessee. It was so small that they used to say the “Welcome To” and the “Y’all Come Back” signs were on the same pole. With a population of just over a hundred, there were no secrets. Everybody knew everything about everybody. Anything out of the very ordinary, up to salacious, was discussed in detail right outside in front of the big picture window of Whiteside Drug Store.
A select crew of old-timers, leaned back against the wall, sitting on nail kegs and stacked-up wooden Coca-Cola cases, would discuss a range of local nuggets of interest. Nothing was off-limits, though hardly any politics spoken. Mostly who dropped dead, who got caught foolin’ around with another woman, how much things cost and some very colorful local folklore. They drew an appreciative audience of some of the younger men who were there to listen, learn and have a few laughs.
After a while, one of the old men would get up and go home. That was the chance for one of the young bucks to push through the crowd and sit down with “country royalty.” It was understood that he’d be allowed to sit there, but the only time he could speak was when one of the elders called on him.
When the weather got bad, they took it to the back of the drugstore and sat around a black potbelly stove. They sharpened their knives, whittled cedar sticks and precision-spit Bull of the Woods chewing tobacco at a coffee can next to the stove. Sometimes, they’d miss and hit the stove and it would make a phsssssst sound. Mr. Jenkins, the town’s war hero, was by far the best spitter of the bunch. He’d had more practice.
Other than Mr. Jenkins, all the other men were pretty much the same age. The decades of dealing with the elements showed in their hard-lived, deep-wrinkled, sun-singed faces. Their swollen hands were strong and worn, like cowboy leather. Every one of them wore bib overalls, khaki or pale blue work shirts with the sleeves rolled up, lace-up boots and straw hats or International Harvester or John Deere baseball caps.