matt_ADMIN | O.Henry Magazine

Life’s Funny

LIFE'S FUNNY

Great Googly Moogly

Inquiring minds want to know some weird stuff

By Maria Johnson

If there’s one thing that internet search engines can confirm about human existence, it’s this: You’re not alone in your musings, no matter how offbeat.

Which is comforting. Sorta.

I became aware of this phenomenon a few years ago, when I broke my collarbone. The treatment included wearing a cross-body sling on my right arm, and I was struck by how much of a load that put on my left shoulder.

“I wonder how much my right arm weighs?” I thought to myself.

Pre-Google I would have had to settle for a guess. Either that, or I could have pulled out a scale and tried to weigh my arm, which would have been too painful and would have brought me back to guessing.

Well, no more.

I started typing my question into the Google machine.

“How much does a woman’s . . . ”

Autofill offered several disturbing ways to complete that search phrase, along with the relatively innocuous words “arm weigh?”

Clearly, others had wanted to know the heft of a lady-wing.

Who are these weirdos? I wondered . . . before proceeding to the answer, which is:

About 5% of her body weight.

I glanced down at my 6-pound appendage.

No wonder it felt like I was lugging around a small dumbbell. I was.

Since then, I’ve noticed that no question is so esoteric, so arcane, so flippin’ odd that other people haven’t wondered the exact same thing.

Here’s a small sampling of the questions I’ve searched in the last several months, along with a little context about why I wanted to know, and the readily available answers.

Question: Why does Amal Clooney hate George Clooney’s dye job?

Why I wanted to know: Because I’m a big fan of Guilford County native and legendary World War II-era newsman Edward R. Murrow (hello, Murrow Boulevard), and because George Clooney darkened his hair for his role in the Broadway show Good Night and Good Luck, which is about how Murrow exposed McCarthyism.

Answer: Amal hates her husband’s dye job because she believes that nothing makes a man look older than using hair coloring, which, in my humble opinion, is a double standard — and also very true.

Question: Are crows attracted to bones?

Why I wanted to know: My younger son was at a friend’s apartment recently when they discovered what appeared to be a fragment of a deer jaw lying on a cushion. Huh? The best explanation: The friend’s dog had dragged in the fragment from the balcony, where . . . a bird had dropped it. (Let’s hope.)

Answer: Yes, crows are attracted to bones and other bright objects. They have been known to leave bones as “gifts” for people they like. Or want to terrorize. That part is unclear, although another Google search confirmed that crows can hold grudges against particular humans. This led me to wonder about something else that, apparently, other people have pondered, too.

Question: Do crows laugh at people?

Answer: “There’s no evidence to suggest they find human actions humorous.”

Tough audience. Caw-caw-caw.

Question: Why do male tegus have two reproductive organs?

Why I wanted to know: OK, stay with me for a minute. I was talking to a veterinarian-friend about the most unusual pets she has ever seen, and she mentioned tegus, which are a kind of lizard. Then she mentioned in a by-the-by way — you know, how friends do when they’re discussing lizard genitalia — that male tegus have two, um, cold-blooded thingies, which led me to make a crude joke about how I know a few guys who might want to become reptiles.

Answer: Nature loves a Plan B. Sorry, human dudes.

Question: What does Cali-sober mean?

Why I wanted to know: I heard it on a podcast, natch.

Answer: Cali-sober (short for California-sober) means swearing off all intoxicants except weed, which, if you think about it, makes sense only if you’re high.

Question: Where does the phrase “great googly moogly” come from?

Why I wanted to know: Because it’s a phrase I know, but I’m not sure how I know it.

Answer: No less an intellect than author Stephen King has wondered the same thing. He traced the phrase back to 1950s bluesman Willie Dixon. Others point out that rocker Frank Zappa used the phrase in his 1974 song “Nanook Rubs It.” And apparently Grady uttered the words on the 1970s TV show Sanford and Son in clear anticipation of the internet age way before Lamont and the rest of us “big dummies” saw what was coming.

Question: How do dryer balls work?

Why I wanted to know: In case you haven’t noticed, dryer balls — which are balls that you put in a dryer; let’s hear it for the occasional obvious answer that is also correct — are on store shelves everywhere. I’d dismissed them as a gimmick until a veteran appliance repairman recommended them as a way to increase the efficiency of a clothes dryer.

Answer: Dryer balls work by “aerating” the clothes, creating more space between laundry items as they tumble, thereby cutting down drying time. I wouldn’t have believed it, but it seems to be true. The balls also soften clothes by beating the snot out them (my words, not the words of the dryer ball industry). And as an added bonus, your dryer will sound like a collegiate drum line, which should keep the crows from leaving deer bone fragments around your house. It works out.

Tea Leaf Astrologer

TEA LEAF ASTROLOGER

Gemini

(May 21 - June 20)

Perhaps you know that butterflies have taste receptors on their feet. But did you know they drink mud? Communicate through flight patterns and pheromones? As the social butterfly of the zodiac, you’ve learned to flit your way out of foot-in-mouth moments with charm and grace. That skill will come in handy this month. And on June 11, the full moon in Sagittarius just might rock your world with an unexpected romance.
Do try to avoid mud, flightiness and unnatural fragrances.
Read that last line again.

Tea leaf “fortunes” for the rest of you:

Cancer (June 21 – July 22)

Ignore the critics.

Leo (July 23 – August 22)

Operation Digital Detox. Capeesh?

Virgo (August 23 – September 22)

Pack an extra set of clothes.

Libra (September 23 – October 22)

It’s just not that serious.

Scorpio (October 23 – November 21)

No need to force things.

Sagittarius (November 22 – December 21)

Remember to pause before you speak.

Capricorn (December 22 – January 19)

Your song is somebody’s medicine.

Aquarius (January 20 – February 18)

Gift yourself a quiet moment.

Pisces (February 19 – March 20)

Tune into a different channel.

Aries (March 21 – April 19)

Don’t let your ego call the shots.

Taurus (April 20 – May 20)

Write this down: baking soda and vinegar.

2025 Department Tea Leaf Astrologer

Sazerac May 2025

SAZERAC

May 2025

Just One Thing

For Celena Amburgey, home is where the art is. “By intertwining paint, mixed media and deeply personal items like my daddy’s bed sheets, my work becomes a vessel for layered narratives,” says the creator of Blue Ridge Venus, which combines oil paint, vines, Mason jar rings, love letters from her father and a childhood bedsheet. “These intimate objects carry the weight of my heritage,” says the artist, who hails from Jefferson, N.C. Utilizing both personally precious as well as oft-discarded items such as plastic bags and grocery sacks, she says, “I craft a powerful dialogue on the tension between what is cherished and what is disregarded, drawing attention to how we assign worth and value in our lives.” Amburgey’s works, along with art by two other M.F.A. candidates, Paul Stanley Mensah and Nill Smith, will be on exhibit through May 25 at Weatherspoon Art Museum. Meet the artists on Thursday, May 8, from 5:30 until 7:30 p.m. Info: weatherspoonart.org/exhibitions/current-exhibitions.

May 25 Unsolicited Advice

If, like the rest of us, you’re trying — but struggling — to break up with your smartphone, this one’s for you. Those little buggers are full of dopamine hit after hit, lighting up our brain in a way that screams, “More, more, more!” When we find ourselves in a moment of quiet inaction, our fingers wander to that tempting touchscreen, desperate to fill the void. Well, we’ve come up with some digital-free ways to occupy those digits while taking a note from Depeche Mode: “Enjoy the Silence.”

Get hooked on something new: Learn to crochet. If you start now, you’ll have an entire collection of colorful hats to gift friends and family during the holidays.

Play solitaire. And not on an app, but with a real, tactile deck of cards. Best part? No one will ever know if you cheat — not that we’re endorsing that behavior. We just have the luck of the draw.

Try your hand at building. Scandinavians are consistently ranked among the happiest in the world and it’s probably because they’re constantly creating with Legos, which originated in Denmark, or putting together Swedish-made Ikea furniture. We certainly smile — through gritted teeth while cursing — when we assemble a Kallax shelf.

Read. As the proverb goes, “A book in the hand is worth two in your library queue.” Or something like that.

Window on the Past

Though much of Greensboro has changed over the years, the charming facade of this Irving Park Dutch Colonial, the historic R.J. Mebane House, remains very much the same since its circa 1912–13 construction. Wondering about the interiors? See for yourself as this and many other Irving Park abodes throw open their doors, welcoming guests of Preservation Greensboro’s Historic Tour of Homes, May 17 and 18. History, architecture and design come together to help you reach your step goal. What more could you want? Tickets and info: preservationgreensbo.org/events.

Must Love Books

Reading, writing and arithmetic? No, thanks on that last part of the equation. The Greensboro Bound Festival is where reading, writing and book fanatics create a buzz of all-day literary activity descending upon the cultural epicenter of downtown Greensboro.

But first, at 7 p.m. on May 15, how ’bout a little pre-fest fun with . . . (if this were an audiobook, you’d hear a drumroll right now) . . . Percival Everett, The New York Times-bestselling author of several novels, including the 2024 National Book Award for Fiction winner, James? A reimagining of Mark Twain’s The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn, James is told through the eyes of the runaway, enslaved Jim. Everett is sure to draw a huge crowd, filling up UNCG’s Elliott University Center Auditorium. Registration is required — and is now waitlist only — by May 12 and can be found via the Greensboro Bound website.

Now, hold onto your pen caps and block out May 17 in your planner because this year’s one-day festival is, well, one for the books.

Dreaming up your own manuscript? Learn every trick in the book at the Greensboro Public Library. Three O.Henry magazine contributors, plus a few local notables, help you sharpen your skills — and pencils. Our founding editor, Jim Dodson, teaches “The Art of Memoir” — something he knows a little something about after writing Final Rounds, a New York Times-bestselling memoir. Maria Johnson hones your humor and Ross Howell Jr. shows you how to easily slip between fiction and nonfiction writing. Poets Ashley Lumpkin and Elly Bookman, plus Chapel Hill-based cookbook author Sheri Castle know how to measure for success.

In the Greensboro Cultural Center’s Van Dyke Performance Space, take a page from several authors in conversation. O.Henry editor Cassie Bustamante, yours truly, interviews Winston-Salem’s New York Times-bestselling author, Sarah McCoy, and Reidsville’s Sir Walter Raleigh Award winner, Valerie Nieman, about making herstory with historical fiction. Former Wall Street Journal writer Lee Hawkins, whose 2022 nonfiction book, I Am Nobody’s Slave: How Uncovering My Family’s History Set Me Free, was a Pulitzer Prize finalist, chats with Aran Shetterly, author of the harrowing account of the KKK vs. Civil-Rights demonstrators, Morningside: The 1979 Greensboro Massacre and the Struggle for an American City’s Soul. Andy Corren, whose Dirtbag Queen: A Memoir of My Mother was born out of the obituary he wrote for her that went viral, chats with Cassie. Finally, wrap up your evening with a conversation between Christopher A. Cooper, author of Anatomy of a Purple State, and spiritual writer, preacher and community cultivator Jonathan Wilson-Hartgrove, moderated by Raw Story investigative reporter Jordan Green.

Beyond the Greensboro History Museum’s doors, Kristie Frederick Daugherty, known for her book of Taylor Swift-inspired poetry, and UNCG M.F.A. alum Elly Bookman, plus local high school poet laureates read and discuss their modern take on the ancient art form. Known for her New York Times bestsellers Wench and Take My Hand, NAACP Image Award-winning author Dolen Perkins-Valdez chats about her latest book, Happy Land, which hit the shelves last month.

And what’s a festival without something for the littlest readers and aspiring writers? The second floor of the cultural center is chock full of children’s authors including Kamal Eugene Bell, Natasha Tarpley and Patrice Gopo.

Sage Gardener

“Wait,” says our hiking companion at the head of our group. “You’re saying that bees are not native?”

“Honey bees,” our citizen-scientist hiker responds. “It’s honey bees that are not native to the Americas. But there are hundreds of species of native bees.” (More than 500 in North Carolina alone, in fact.)

“How about honey,” the disbeliever shoots back. “Are you telling me that the honey I put on my toast in the morning is a non-native species?”

“The bees that gathered and regurgitated it are originally from Europe, brought over here to pollinate the Colonists’ crops in the 1600s,” says our apiculturist.

“Yeah, I read that the Virginia Company brought hives over when they established Jamestown,” pipes up the group’s historian. “So, yes,” says our honey bee detractor, “the honey comes from the U.S.A. — unless it’s imported from India, Argentina or Brazil, like a lot of cheap honey is.”

To say that our trail discussions are often lively is a gross understatement. At least it’s not politics this time around, I think to myself.

“I’m going to look that up,” our lead hiker says, an all too common refrain on these hikes. Moments later, Siri chirps, “Here’s an answer from gardenmyths.com: ‘The honey bee is a non-native import into North America and most other countries.”

“But honey bees pollinate our crops,” our dissenter insists. “Without them we would starve!”

Citizen scientist says, “A lot of crops are now engineered to be self-pollinating or even wind-pollinated. I’ve grown tomatoes in my living room with no bees and I still had tomatoes,” she counters. “Besides, a big hive of honey bees can outcompete native bees, sometimes the sole pollinators for certain native plants. Without that bee, the plant can go extinct.”

You can read all about it in our Raleigh sister publication, Walter (waltermagazine.com/home/the-buzz-north-carolina-coolest-native-bees) in a piece by Mike Dunn, a Chapel Hill naturalist and educator. “Our native bees are truly bee-autiful and bee-zarre,” he writes. Plus, he points out, practically no one ever gets stung by native bees.

Or dive into the N.C. State Extension Service’s The Bees of North Carolina: An Identification Guide, available online (content.ces.ncsu.edu/the-bees-of-north-carolina-identification-guide), where you can see stunning photos of wood carder bees, rotund resin bees, cuckoo leaf cutter bees, zebra cuckoo bees, along with scintillating anatomical diagrams.

A whole ’nother subject is plants that nurture and support native pollinators. In March of last year, the Greensboro City Council adopted an official policy to promote native plants and eliminate invasive plants at city-owned facilities.

“Native plants help maintain, restore and protect the health and biodiversity of local ecosystems, supporting native pollinators, birds and other wildlife,” the City proclaimed. The Guilford County Extension Master Gardener volunteers couldn’t be more enthusiastic about those plants our native bees love, sponsoring periodic workshops on them. On Saturday, August 23, from 10 a.m. until 1 p.m. (guilford.ces.ncsu.edu/2025/02/2025-great-southeast-pollinator-census), they plan a count’em-if-you-got-them session as part of the the Great Southeast Pollinator Census.

Meanwhile, detractors of honey bees — especially lovers of native wildflowers like our citizen-scientist hiker — continue to blast Apis mellifera, that European intruder to our shores. One enthusiast at ncwildflower.org/honey-bees-friend-or-foe suggests, “Do not buy honey. Kill any wild hives you encounter. And discourage the use of domesticated hives transported to pollinate crops.”

Y’all bee careful out there, now. — David Claude Bailey

2025 Department Sazerac

Birdwatch

BIRDWATCH

Big Blue

The majesty of great blue herons

By Susan Campbell

The great blue heron is a bird that will get anyone’s attention, bird lover or not. It is the largest of all the species found in the Piedmont and Sandhills and is second in wingspan only to the bald eagle. Also, the way it ever so slowly stalks its prey in the open is unique. Great blues are colonial nesters often gathering very close together in trees in wet environments where terrestrial predators are not a threat.

Great blues can be found across North Carolina year-round foraging in a variety of wet areas. However, nesting habitat can be harder to find. Many wet areas are too shallow to preclude raccoons, opossums and other climbing animals. Sizeable beaver ponds or islands in the middle of sizeable lakes with mature trees or large snags are attractive. And if a pair or two are successful in raising a brood high above the water, it is likely that the numbers of nests will grow in subsequent years to form a “heronry.” The female will weave a cup nest from the branches and then smaller, softer material (such as twigs, grasses, moss, etc.) that her mate delivers.

The bond between a pair of great blues is very strong during the breeding season. Male and female are both involved with rearing the nest generation. The large nest can accommodate up to five eggs. Both adults incubate and then brood the young. The male spends most of the daylight hours at the nest while the female is there overnight. Herons are very good parents, able to defend their young with not only their heavy, sharp bills but with very powerful wings.

It will take a year or more for the young to reach maturity. During the first several weeks they are fed mainly fish by their parents. As they begin to forage for themselves, they will become opportunistic, eating everything from large, aquatic invertebrates (such as crayfish) to frogs and even the eggs of other bird species. Some individuals will not breed until their third summer. Sexually mature birds will sport long plumes on their neck and back. They may be seen displaying to their mates by raising their crests and clapping bills together at or near the nest site.

The loud raspy croaking of herons is territorial and can be heard day or night at any time of the year. They will defend rich feeding areas as well as their nest from competitors. Great blues also call when in flight, perhaps to maintain contact with family members. In the air, these big birds have a very characteristic profile with slow, deep wingbeats, their necks coiled, and legs trailing out behind them.

These huge birds are amazingly unafraid of humans. Although they seldom tolerate a close approach, they are frequently found feeding from bulkheads, farm ponds and even small backyard water features. Many great blue herons have learned that people may provide an easy meal — even if it is in the form of fish remains or table scraps. So, keep an eye out; you may find one of these large birds closer than you think.

2025 Birdwatch Department

Almanac May 2025

ALMANAC

Almanac May

By Ashley Walshe

Come with me into the woods where spring is advancing, as it does, no matter what, not being singular or particular, but one of the forever gifts, and certainly visible.

— Mary Oliver, from “Bazougey” (Dog Songs, 2013)

May is the dreamer and the dream, the artist and the muse, a wish both made and granted.

Daisies are sweet, she must think to herself, giggling as she scatters them across green spaces and rolling meadows, weaving them among butterfly weed and purple coneflower; gently tucking them alongside bluebells and Indian blanket.

A dusting of iris for the pine forest. Jack-in-the-pulpit for the wet and shady woodlands. And for the garden? Peonies, poppies, sweet peas, gardenias and roses.

“Come to me,” says flower to bee.

“Only you,” bee purrs to blossom after fragrant blossom.

And so it goes with milkweed and monarch, yarrow and ladybug, foxglove and hummingbird.

“I’ve been aching for you,” murmurs snake to sun-warmed stone.

“Ditto,” stone whispers back.

Listen to the queenking of treefrog, the whistling of robin, the moonlit chanting of whippoorwill. All of life is a call and response, even if we can’t perceive it.

Magnolia flowers titter at the touch of beetle feet. Phlox swoons at the kiss of eastern swallowtail. Cottontail quivers at the nip of wild strawberry.

New leaves reach for the generous sun. Earthworms pray for rain. Dandelions wish for children.

“Pick me,” a puffball whispers on a gentle breeze. A little boy answers, lifts the downy orb to the light, closes his eyes, and sends one hundred wishes soaring — ninety-nine of them dreams for the gift of an endless spring.

Legendary Sweetness

The Cherokee legend of the first strawberries tells of a quarrel between the earliest man and woman, and the sun’s role in their reconciliation.

“I shall live with you no more,” says the woman, storming away in anger. Seeing that the man is sorry for his harsh words, the sun intervenes. Casting his golden rays upon the earth, he sends plump raspberries, glistening blueberries, then luscious blackberries. The woman blasts past all of them. Finally, when sun-warmed strawberries appear gleaming at her feet, she stops in her tracks. One bite and the sweetness washes over her. Filled with the joy she shared with her husband before their fight, she gathers the strawberries to share with him.

“To this day,” writes Joseph Bruchac in The First Strawberries, a retelling of the Cherokee story, “when Cherokee people eat strawberries, they are reminded to always be kind to each other; to remember that friendship and respect are as sweet as the taste of ripe red berries.”

Want to pick your own strawberries this month? Find PYO farms across the state at pickyourown.org.

Mama Loves You

Mother’s Day is observed on Sunday, May 11. As you celebrate all the mamas you hold dear — mother comes in many forms — don’t forget the one who holds us all. We love you, Mother Earth. Thank you for all that you give. May we learn to honor you through our choices, our actions and our grateful hearts.

2025 Almanac Department

O.Henry Ending

O.HENRY ENDING

A Visitation on Epiphany

Walking Kiki home

By Woodson E. Faulkner

Lingering after the resounding organ postlude, I pause to take in the Cathedral of St. John the Divine in New York. Stepping through its arched entrance is like walking into a portal of a distant time when things happened slowly, deliberately. Being one of the last to exit after the Feast of the Epiphany service, I catch a glimpse of the vicar and compliment his homily, which asked the question, “Why are we here?” In his sermon, he suggested that those of us who were present were seeking to build a community not just of believers, but of members of a “peaceable kingdom,” where common respect, kindness, and desire for truth and beauty might come together. He accepts my compliments graciously, bidding me “Happy New Year.”

As I step outside into the night, assaulted by a cold, bracing wind that New York is famous for, I begin the journey back to my Westside Avenue apartment when suddenly, gently, a hand reaches out to my left arm. A little voice breaks my stride: “Would you please help me home? I’m blind, you see, and can’t navigate the steps and curbs very well anymore.” I extend my arm and graciously agree to guide her the two blocks to her apartment.

I finally get a good look at this tiny woman wearing a broad-brimmed hat that flops up and down in the wind, obscuring her face. She is no more than 5 feet tall, wearing an elegant overcoat and dainty shoes. She speaks to me in short, fast sentences, giving me tips on how to help someone who’s blind. “Now, you have to walk slowly and time your footsteps with mine so I can follow you.” At the first intersection, she tells me she’s a jaywalker “because they don’t see you when you’re using the zebra stripes,” aka the designated crosswalk. “They’re just looking at the light. So, you have to make them see you by walking in a way that they are not expecting.” While this seems like a risky idea, I take her advice and guide her kitty-cornered across the street.

I’m fascinated by this lady’s spunk and determination to get around, relying on the kindness of strangers. As we time our footsteps together, I find the slower pace relaxing, devoid of the anxiety that the typical, brisk-walking New Yorker seems to exhibit.

“Just one more block,” she says. She slides her hand up, taking hold of my shoulder as we make our way down the final terminus. “You know, I hitchhiked my way around the world when I was younger,” she exclaims. “I’ve been blind all my life, but that didn’t stop me. People expected me to shut up in my room and just wither away! I wasn’t going to do it!”

“Wow,” I say, gasping in amazement at what this little lady must have experienced. “That’s incredible. Were you afraid?” I ask.

“Well, at times, maybe a little, but most people were good to me and helped me get right along.”

As the Cathedral bells sound their hourly peel, we arrive at her apartment. Just then, tiny, drifting snowflakes begin falling like fairy dust. “Here we are. I’m in the one way up there — you see it?” she asks, pointing with her cane to a place in the dark.

“Oh yes, it’s lovely,” I respond. Just then, the doorman opens the door. As she releases her grasp on my shoulder, I ask, “What’s your name?”

“Kiki,” she says. I stop in my tracks, jolted by suddenly remembering that tonight is the 10th anniversary of my mother’s passing. Her nickname was also Kiki.

Passing Kiki off to the doorman, I turn and look up at the gentle snow, falling more and more fully as it caresses my face. As the door closes, I catch a faint scent of gardenia coming from the apartment building’s lobby. That was my mother’s favorite flower.

“Goodnight, Kiki!” I say as the snow begins to melt down my cheeks.

2025 Department O.Henry Ending

Simple Life

SIMPLE LIFE

Gone But Not Forgotten

The legendary newspaper woman who changed my life

By Jim Dodson

According to latest government projections, a record 3.7 million high school kids and 4.11 million college students will graduate this spring. In a world turned upside down by partisan politics and unpredictable economics, worries about the future are understandable.

Once upon a time, I was there myself, waiting for the direction of my life to present itself.

In late spring 1976, America’s Bicentennial year, I was enrolled in a new M.F.A. writing program at UNCG and working part-time for my dad in advertising until I could figure out what to do with my life. America was slowly coming out of a powerful recession and job prospects were thin on the ground.

Sadly — or maybe not — I turned out to be a lousy ad salesman. I could talk up a storm with my old man’s clients but never quite close the deal.

I also had an alternative plan of caddying for a year on the PGA tour, which proved to be a bust when I was assigned a tubby, wisecracking CBS TV star for the Wednesday Celebrity Pro-Am who’d never played the game. He told vulgar jokes to young women in the crowd and roguishly passed gas loudly to amuse the gallery. After a long and humiliating afternoon fetching my client’s lost golf balls from creeks, backyards and thorny bushes, he handed me a $2 tip and advised with a wink, “Don’t spend all that in one place, Sonny.”

I hurried straight to the Sedgefield Country Club bar with just that in mind.

At that early hour of the evening, the bar was empty save for an elderly gentleman sitting around the corner of the bar, nursing a cocktail.

As I drank my beer, to my shock and delight, I realized the gentleman at the end of the bar was none other than Henry Longhurst, the celebrated Sunday Times golf writer and CBS commentator — one of my literary heroes.

“Young man,” he spoke up with his charming grumble, “you look like I feel most mornings when confronting myself in the bathroom mirror.”

When I mentioned my horrible afternoon of caddying for a farting buffoon who killed my dream of caddying on the Tour, Henry “Longthirst” simply smiled. He asked what other options I had in mind. Confessing that my heart wasn’t into my graduate studies, I boldly commented that my real goal was to someday become a golf writer.

The great man nodded and slowly rose, placing a fiver on the counter. As he headed to the door, he placed his hand on my shoulder and said quietly, “Well, young man, if you do decide to write about this ancient game, you will find no shortage of rogues, bounders and peculiar characters, but also inspiring champions and some of the finest people on Earth. Good luck to you, then!”

I was thrilled by this encounter, taking it as a sign that the universe would deliver something good down the fairway of life.

A few days later, I received a phone call from Juanita Weekley, the managing editor of the city’s beloved afternoon newspaper, where I’d interned for two summers. She invited me to drop by for an interview.

“Be here at 5:30 sharp,” she said. “But don’t get your hopes up. You have lots of competition.”

I found her alone in her office the next afternoon. “Come in and close the door,” she said in her famous no-nonsense way.

Mrs. Weekley was a newspaper pioneer, the first woman to edit a major newspaper in the state, a tough, plain-spoken redhead who reminded me of Lou Grant, the crusty editor from The Mary Tyler Moore Show.

As I sat down, she pointed to a stack of folders on her desk. “These are applications from half a dozen outstanding candidates for this job. They are all female from top journalism schools. I’ve been instructed by personnel to hire a female. My question to you is, why should I even consider a skinny white kid from the west side of Greensboro?”

I understood her point. But I also had nothing to lose. I was still buzzing from meeting one of my sports journalism heroes.

Brazenly, I replied, “Because I’ll write circles around them all.”

Madam Weekley did not appear amused. Instead, she reached over her desk, picked up the wickedest-looking letter opener I’d ever seen and tapped it slowly on her desk.

“OK,” she said after a long pause. “I’m going to take a chance on you. But listen closely. If you’re not the best damn writer in this newspaper in a year, I’ll chase you out of the building with this thing.”

I spent the next year writing like mad to avoid being run off by her evil, sharp tongue and even sharper letter opener. At one point, however, Mrs. Weekley called me into her office and handed me the keys to a wheezing, 1970 day-glow orange AMC Pacer staff car and instructed me to drive a 75-mile circumference around the Gate City, searching for “good stories about country life” for the Sunday paper’s Tar Heel Living section.

“Think of it this way,” she said. “You’ll be our version of Charles Kuralt, writing about rural life and colorful characters you meet along the way. It’s right up your alley.”

She wasn’t wrong.

Over the next six weeks, roaming the backroads of the western Piedmont and the Blue Ridge foothill country, I found an assortment of fascinating small-town stories and colorful folks to write about, including several homegrown artists, a brilliant Yale-educated physician running a clinic in an impoverished mountain town, an award-winning poet, a famous moonshiner, the biggest Bluegrass festival in history, and the winner of a Bear Creek talent show, whose mom invited me to marry her daughter after she graduated from high school. I politely declined.

Looking back, it was the best job any rookie reporter ever had — one that shaped my life.

My “country” tales won a major newspaper award and landed me a staff job at the Sunday Magazine of the Atlanta Journal-Constitution, where I was the youngest writer of the oldest Sunday magazine in the South.

Two decades later, I was back in my hometown on a national book tour for my bestselling memoir, Final Rounds.

I stopped off to say hello to Juanita Weekley, the pioneering woman who took a chance on me way back when, and bring her a signed copy of my book.

She was in declining health. But her face lit up when she opened the door. We hugged and sat for an hour, and I thanked her for not running me off with her letter opener.

As she walked me to the door, she took my hand. “I knew you were going to be a superb writer,” she said, holding back tears. “I just didn’t want you to know that! I couldn’t be prouder of you, dear. Hiring you was one of the best things I ever did in my career.”

I kissed her cheek and thanked her. “It would never have happened,” I said, “without you.”

Juanita Weekley passed away in 2003.

Gone but never forgotten.

2025 Department Simple Life

Life’s Funny

LIFE'S FUNNY

Type Cast

How Greensboro’s Nich Graham rocks his Royal Safari

By Maria Johnson

Tangerine, soul, gossip, smoke.

It’s an odd foursome of words, but Nich Graham has invited me to bring prompts to our coffee-shop interview to spark the free verse that he pounds out on his old-school mechanical keyboard.

It’s his schtick and his bliss. Back for the second year in a row, Nich will bring his Typewriter Poetry, a form of performance art, to the Greensboro Bound book festival this month.

Clack-clack, clack-clack.

He’s a forefinger typist, even though his 1960s manual typewriter — Royal brand, beige Safari model, complete with Williamsburg-blue, hard-shell case — harks to an era when legions of students, mostly women, learned touch-typing to prepare them for futures as secretaries.

At 31, Nich knows nothing about quick brown foxes jumping over lazy dogs. Sporting a smattering of tattoos and a cotton tee repping Osees, a psych-rock band formed in San Francisco, he’s a lank and bright-eyed creature of his time. He recalls a brush with keyboarding instruction in fifth grade.

“We didn’t do it, so the teacher gave up,” he says.

He jabs the chunky keys with his index fingers.

Clack-clack, clack-clack.

He hammers out the four words, which appear at the top of a notecard curled around the typewriter’s heavy roller. He closes his eyes to find the flow. His verse shows up in jagged lines.

Her soul glowed

a citrus petrichor that

billowed out

in smoke

A perfume scented in

the same color

* tangerine

*

Just for the record, I’m not wearing perfume; neither one of us is smoking; the asterisks are a part of the poem; and petrichor means the earthy smell that arises when rain hits the ground.

I mean, he never said he was writing about me, but still.

I discreetly sniff my pits while taking notes.

Wait. Is citrus petrichor a candle scent? Do I smell like a candle?

Clack-clack, clack-clack

He uses the word “trouble” to describe himself as a young man growing up in Newark, California, on the lower lip of San Francisco Bay.

His mom, a single parent whom Nich describes as loving and tough, laid down the law when he dropped out of high school.

“You gotta figure something else out, kid, because this isn’t working,” she said.

With her blessing, Nich, who pronounces his name “Nick,” moved to the High Sierra mountains where he lived with his maternal grandmother, a “mestiza” of mixed Native American and Spanish heritage.

Together, they tended her flowers, vegetables, trees and cacti. Pulling a red wagon loaded with his grandmother’s gardening supplies, Nich absorbed lessons about time, patience and setting the right conditions for growth. He also discovered that he learned best when he was outdoors and when he worked with his hands.

A seed rooted in his teenage brain. He still hung with trouble, but, after a near-death experience, the seed sprouted.

He enrolled in a community college, where he excelled at horticulture and art. An associate’s degree later, he headed to Humboldt State College. Outside of class, he worked odd jobs and busked spoken-word poetry for donations.

A descendant of storytellers on his mother’s Southwestern side and his father’s Iranian side, Nich was a veteran of open mic competitions and poetry slams.

Spitting words came easily. The sidewalk crowds did not.

“I couldn’t compete by yelling poetry,” he says.

A friend suggested that Nich get an old typewriter as a prop and start channeling his verse via keys.

He did and added a sign: “Free-Range, Organic, Non-GMO Poetry.”

Onlookers, many of whom were too young to remember the days before computer keyboards, stepped closer, curious about the chattering machine.

If they wanted to try it, Nich let them take the beast for a spin so they could feel the bouncing action of keys under their fingertips, see the thin metal arms embossed with backwards letters striking the ribbon before dropping back into line, and hear magical rat-a-tat-tat of letters turning into words turning into thoughts.

The general reaction?

“Stoked,” Nich says. “Just stoked.”

Clack-clack, clack-clack.

Nich’s poem takes shape. Citrus petrichor wafts into another idea.

Where chisma was brought around

professional gossip

too

obtuse a term

I have to look it up. “Chisma” means rumor in Spanish.

Is “professional gossip” an obtuse term? I think not. But let me tell you who in this business is obtuse. Later.

Did Nich and I dish on work? Not really, unless you count a conversation about how writers absorb, digest and express their experiences differently.

Hmm. Maybe I don’t smell like a candle.

Clack-clack, clack-clack

Nich came to Greensboro in early 2019, intending to do a residency at Elsewhere, Greensboro’s museum of offbeat collections.

Then came a virus. And cancellations.

With no money and no way to get home, Nich repaired to the mountains of Southwest Virginia to help a woman start a goat farm. Word of mouth brought more agri-gigs, eventually leading to Greensboro’s private Canterbury School, where he still works as a garden educator, tilling, planting, weeding, watering, mulching, harvesting and composting with K-8 students.

Recently, he guided two eighth-grade girls in fixing a broken tiller.

“We sat down without YouTube and figured out how to get that thing running again,” says Nich. “It was literally the proudest moment of my teaching career. Anytime I see them I’m like, ‘Yeah!’ ”

The younger students call him Mr. Diggy.

“I’m like, ‘Whatever you want to call me is OK, little humans,’” he says. “I like seeing them grow and develop, too.”

Now working toward a master’s degree in experiential and outdoor education at Western Carolina University, Nich also does permaculture projects for private clients. In June and July, he will be working for the Creative Aging Network of Greensboro, leading gardening sessions for grandparents and their grandchildren, as well as caregivers and their charges.

He’s stuck on growth.

Swiss chard.

Lettuce.

Watermelon.

Understanding.

Connections.

He hopes to move his mother and grandmother here from California.

“I said, ‘Just come out here. I’ll take care of you,’” he says.

He sees a home, a few acres, a family-run orchard, maybe a cider press.

Clack-clack, clack-clack.

A dozen times a year, he gets paid for doing Typewriter Poetry at literary events, parties and fundraisers. On May 17, the day of the book festival, he will pop up his word shop from 1–5 p.m in the Greensboro Cultural Center.

People will feed him a few words at a time. He will type them at the top of a note card printed with his artwork, close his eyes, sway like a musician until he catches a melody of meaning, then start typing.

He can tell a lot about people, he says, by the words they toss him.

About a half give him greeting-card words: love, hope, promise — what they think they should say.

Another quarter supply words borne of turmoil. One woman started crying when she read Nich’s interpretation. “I get the privilege of helping them process whatever they’re going through,” he says.

Another quarter hand him playthings.

Nich slaps the carriage return, a chrome lever, with confidence. His poem is coming in for a soft landing.

aspiring to

share stories that

captured more than

essence

seeping down

in a river formation

a journey around

ink

&

noise

&

heart

2025 Department Life's Funny

Omnivorous Reader

OMNIVOROUS READER

Duck and Cover

How to keep your personal information safe

By Stephen E. Smith

When my mother was a teenager, she was the only all-night operator in a town of about 2,000 souls. The hours were long, so she eavesdropped on private conversations. When she got home, she shared the latest gossip with my grandmother, and within a few hours, everyone in town knew everyone else’s business.

In theory, it still works that way, except, of course, that our personal data is managed by computers — our iPhones, laptops, tablets and the clandestine eavesdropping monsters that lurk in the mystical ether — which speed up and amplify the collection process while disseminating our confidential information globally. The result, however, is the same: There are no secrets, finally or ever.

This is why Lawrence Cappello’s On Privacy: Twenty Lessons to Live By is a timely little book (151 pages) that’s surely worth the few minutes it takes to read it. It won’t be the most exciting book you’ve read, but it might be one of the most important.

Cappello is a professor of U.S. legal and constitutional history at the University of Alabama. He’s the author of None of Your Damn Business: Privacy in the United States from the Gilded Age to the Digital Age, and he’s a certified information privacy professional. He’s on top of this data collection stuff, and his advice might help you sleep a little more soundly.

We’re hammered daily by claims that the equity in our homes is being stolen, our bank accounts plundered, our reputations besmirched, and our children driven to suicide. And then there are the endless scams that pop up on our screens (I consider everything a scam until it proves itself otherwise, and then I know for sure it is a scam). And now the government — who should be protecting us — has gotten into the info-distribution game via the unsupervised plundering of heretofore confidential databases.

On Privacy is written for those who are fearful about the disclosure of their personal data but who are reluctant to toss out their electronic devices. Cappello cuts through the noise and confusion and enumerates in short, sensible steps the necessary safeguards we need to adopt to be secure in the digital age. He offers practical insights into why privacy matters, how it shapes free societies, and how it rules our lives in an increasingly interconnected electronic world.

What Cappello doesn’t do is bombard his readers with terrifying stories about unfortunate fellow citizens who’ve suffered life-altering internet crimes. Horrifying examples only encourage despair. Instead, Cappello begins by addressing the requisite rationalization, “The Nothing-to-Hide Trap,” in which we maintain that if we are full-time do-gooders, we have nothing to fear from those who’d access our personal data. “Our personal information exists in snippets,” he writes. “When taken out of context, the private details of our lives . . . too often paint a picture of us that is skewed and not entirely true,” and thus we are often misrepresented. Since first impressions matter, we should focus on what computers collect and, more importantly, the distribution of our personal data.

Cappello breaks down the threats to our privacy into easy-to-read chapters that present the problems and suggest solutions. After a brief discussion of “Privacy Is Essential to Mental Health,” he appends suggestions on “How to Talk About Privacy’s Mental Health Benefits,” followed by “How to Protect Your Mental Health Through Privacy.” It’s all very straightforward.

He claims, for example, that we have the right to be forgiven our youthful transgressions. We make mistakes. “Unfortunately, the mistakes we make in life will remain instantly accessible,” he writes, “to any stranger inclined to take thirty seconds for a quick online search.”

Moreover, we are constantly under surveillance; our movements are tracked by our phones, computers and cameras on the street. If that’s not intrusive enough, outside sources can read your private electronic communications. He offers a solution: Secure your email with PGP encryption, a popular tool that scrambles your writing so that only the intended recipient can read it. The same is true for texts; encrypted text messaging apps are readily available and require only a quick download to your phone. These email and text apps also have an automatic delete option. And he recommends you buy a Faraday bag, a small pouch that blocks all signals; otherwise, you can be tracked by your phone even if you turn off your GPS.

Not only are we surveilled by private entities, but the government has, for many years, been poking into our business. Surveillance is the enemy of free expression: It discourages people from participating in political movements by instilling the fear they’ll be arrested for speaking out against the powerful, which inhibits the right of free assemblage as guaranteed by the First Amendment. Cappello reminds us that the “belief that the surveillance powers of the state must be constantly kept in check is a cornerstone of what it means to live in a free country.”

Most of Cappello’s recommendations are simple and easily implemented: “When in doubt, log out,” delete apps you aren’t using and any accounts associated with them, tape off the camera on your computer, clear your browser history, get rid of caches and cookies, turn off and lock your computer when not in use, and purchase your own Virtual Private Networks (VPNs), which makes it difficult to track your online activity. And those are just a few of the suggestions that might save you money and safeguard your reputation.

Of course, the obvious way to protect your future information — there’s little you can do about the past — is to disappear or “go dark,” as folks are wont to say. This would necessitate the destruction of all your electronics — computers, streaming devices, tablets, phones, smartwatches, etc., and all storage systems — thumbnail drives, hard drives, data stored in the cloud (the global network of remote servers that functions as a single ecosystem), old floppy disks, credit cards, etc. Everything. All of it. Then disappear. Forever.

2025 Department Omnivorous Reader

In Good Taste

IN GOOD TASTE

Look, Ma! No Buns!

In a pickle? This burger bowl is the answer

Story and Photograph by Jasmine Comer

About 16 years ago when I was 14, I had a memorable cooking mishap involving an excessive amount of salt. My mom was making her famous burgers and fries one Friday when a too-close encounter with with the mandolin sent her to the emergency room. Left in charge of cooking supper while my dad took Mom to the hospital, I was determined to finish the burgers that she’d started. Having only prepared very basic meals before — think eggs and bacon — I unknowingly created the world’s saltiest burgers. That evening, my teenage enthusiasm embraced the motto on the Morton salt box: “When it rains, it pours.”

That night was a pivotal moment where I learned a hard truth: Over-salting food is almost always an irreversible error. And it’s so easy to do it. Just as quickly as a pinch can enhance a dish, too much can ruin it entirely. This experience is why many of my recipes suggest seasoning with salt and pepper to taste, acknowledging individual preferences and needs. There’s a lesson in biochemistry here, but I’ll leave that to Alton Brown.

As for these burger bowls, rest assured . . . they are not overly seasoned. This is one of those meals that you can easily customize with protein and veggies of your choice. The magic is in the sauce. As a sauce enthusiast, I’ve always leaned toward homemade — dressings, too. They can completely transform a meal. This burger sauce is sweet and tangy, and it perfectly complements the heartiness of the beef and the crunchiness of the fresh vegetables. Do me a favor and learn from my mistakes — go easy on the salt?

Burger Bowls

Makes 4 servings

Ingredients

For the beef

1 pound ground beef

1/2 small yellow onion, diced

1/2 teaspoon garlic powder

2 teaspoons Worcestershire sauce

Salt and pepper to taste

Burger sauce

1/2 cup mayo

1/2 tablespoon yellow mustard

2 tablespoons ketchup

2 tablespoons sweet or dill relish

1 teaspoon white vinegar

1/2 teaspoon sugar

For the salad

1 large head romaine, chopped

1 cup cherry tomatoes, halved

1/2 red onion, diced

1 cup cheddar cheese, shredded

½ cup pickle slices, chopped

1. Heat a large skillet over medium heat. Add the ground beef, onions, garlic powder, Worcestershire, salt and pepper. Cook for 6–8 minutes or until beef is no longer pink, stirring occasionally.

2. While the beef is cooking, prepare the sauce: Whisk all the ingredients together. Place in the fridge until it is time to serve the salad.

3. Assemble the salad starting with the romaine, followed by the other toppings and the ground beef. Drizzle with burger sauce. OH

Jasmine Comer is the creator of Lively Meals, a food blog where she shares delicious, everyday recipes. You can find her on Instagram @livelymeals.

2025 Department In Good Taste

Author: matt_ADMIN

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Look, Ma! No Buns!

In a pickle? This burger bowl is the answer