The Quarry Keeper

 

 **📚 New Book Release! — *The Quarry Keeper***

*A Handyman’s Guild Companion Story*

The Quarry Keeper a companion to The Handyman's Guild is now available as a Kindle eBook or an Amazon paperback. 

 Set in the quiet ridges and abandoned quarries of Leeds, Alabama, this story introduces readers to Herbert Nash—a mysterious, soft-spoken man known around town only as the eccentric who lived near Atlas Quarry. But Herbert wasn’t just a loner with an old lantern… he was a Keeper, entrusted with listening to the land itself and calming the forces that stir beneath it.

Everything changes the night a dangerous tremor threatens to crack the quarry wide open. Just when disaster seems inevitable, Herbert encounters a young boy named Randall Broward—a child with an unusual sense for danger and an ear tuned to the pulse of the valley. Their meeting sets in motion a legacy that will echo through generations and eventually forge the Guild we came to know in The Handyman’s Guild.

 **What You’ll Discover Inside** 

* The origins of the Guild’s presence in Leeds, long before lanterns chose their bearers

* The first spark of Randall Broward’s destiny and why the ground seemed to know his name

* A Southern blend of folklore, quiet magic, and small-town mystery.

* A story about responsibility, unseen guardians, and the everyday people who quietly keep the world safe

Whether you've read The Handyman’s Guild or are discovering this universe for the first time, The Quarry Keeper stands on its own as a rich, atmospheric tale rooted in place, memory, and purpose. If you enjoy magical realism tucked into ordinary life—and stories where heroes fix what others never notice—this book is for you.

**🛒 Available Now on Amazon**

Available on Kindle and Amazon paperback

Pick up a copy today and return to the valley where everything began.

The stone still remembers.

Some lanterns never go out.

 

New Book Announcement

 Hello dear readers, old friends, and new visitors — I’m excited to share some big news: I’ve just released two new books on Amazon — and this time I’m diving into story-telling in a different direction.

📚 Two new titles to explore

The first book is The Handyman’s Guild, a novel rooted in the idea of small acts of courage, ordinary people doing extraordinary things, and the hidden architecture of care that protects our lives when we’re not even looking. As one brief description puts it: “Heartfelt, mysterious, and deeply human… about legacy, small acts of courage, and the invisible ways we protect.” 

The second is The Apprentices – A Handyman’s Guild Adventure, which builds on the world of the first, introducing fresh faces, new challenges, and deeper mysteries of the Guild’s work. (Think of it as the next chapter, the next set of apprentices learning the ropes — and uncovering the ledger.)

Why these books, and why now

You’ve probably noticed I have a foot in memoir, photography, local history, and community storytelling. With these two books I wanted to stretch into the realm of fiction — but fiction that still carries the weight of memory, purpose, and service.

• In The Handyman’s Guild, the story revolves around those “quiet heroes” in overalls, the ones we don’t notice until the shelf is fixed, the lightbulb quietly replaced, the problem quietly averted.

• In The Apprentices, the narrative expands: what happens when the next generation steps in, when the ledger is found, when the secret brotherhood is revealed to new eyes? There are children to protect, unseen dangers to face — and in true Guild fashion, the tools are as much trust, relationship and hidden knowledge as hammers and screwdrivers.

A few things that I hope you’ll love

• A sense of otherworldly fantasy without horror — I’ve kept the tone gentle, imaginative, and redemptive (as I tend to prefer).

• A nostalgic, home-spun feel — rural Alabama, old houses, community gatherings, recollections of lost time and found meaning.

• Characters you’ll care about — imperfect, hopeful, sometimes weary, but always trying.

• The twist of secret brotherhood + everyday work — the idea that the real magic happens in the mundane, in the supporting role, in the hands that fix, protect, restore.

How to grab your copy

Both books are now available on Amazon and Kindle.

• The Handyman’s Guild is out in paperback and eBook. 

• The Apprentices – A Handyman’s Guild Adventure is also ready for your reading list in paperback and eBook format.

If you enjoy them, I’d be deeply grateful if you’d consider leaving a review on Amazon — reviews help other readers find the work, and every one means the world to me.

What’s next?

In the coming months I’ll be:

• Hosting a giveaway (signed copies + memorabilia) for blog subscribers

• Sharing behind-the-scenes posts (photos of my writing desk in Leeds, Alabama; sketches of characters; the “ledger” mock-up)

• Possibly audio/YouTube shorts featuring me reading some scene excerpts (suiting my YouTube channels ‘It’s Nanny & Pop’,  ‘Ron Howard Photography’, and Hometown Life").

• And continuing the blog with more “simple contemplations” — the little moments, the big reflections, the stories that connect heart to hammer, memory to masonry.

A word of thanks

If you’ve followed me for a while — through the blog, the photography, my hometown Leeds walking tours, the memoir pieces — thank you. These two books are a new creative branch, rooted in the same soil: memory, community, craft, transformation. I hope they reach you in good time, in good spirit, and that you’ll invite others into the world of the Guild.

Here’s to your next reading adventure — and to all the hidden handymen and women among us who quietly keep things running.

Warmly,
Ron

The Loss of Innocence

The Loss of Innocence

My seventh-grade year was the first time I knew I was going to be one of the cool people. Over the summer I’d bought a surfer’s cross at Panama City Beach, and my cousin Carole had bleached my hair blonde—something all the cool kids were doing that year. I was even getting close to the age when I hoped my dad would finally let me pick my own hairstyle.

Between sixth and seventh grade, he gave in and let me graduate from a GI cut to a flat top. I’d go down to Vernon Lovell’s barbershop, plop down in the chair, and say, “Give me a flat top!” Then I’d slick the front with a dab of butch wax to make it stand tall. Man, was I cool? Maybe—but not Shane Fox cool.

For the sake of honesty, I’ll admit that “Shane Fox” isn’t his real name, but it fits the story. Shane was a rebel straight out of a James Dean movie—jeans cuffed at the bottom, leather jacket over a white T-shirt, and an ever-present scowl that told the world he didn’t care. In seventh grade he even smoked Marlboros, hanging out in the school basement with the janitor, who, rumor had it, let him smoke down there.

I was never friends with Shane. He was one of those kids who carried an edge wherever he went, the kind of boy who looked like he had something to prove. I don’t recall him ever having any real friends.

 One morning, I decided to wear my surfer’s cross to school. As I passed my dad on the way out, he looked at it and said, “You ought to leave that at home, son. You’ll lose it if you take it to school.”

I told him not to worry—it wasn’t coming off my neck for anything. Confident and feeling just the right amount of cool, I headed to the bus stop.

Once I got to school, I met up with my buddies for a few rounds of marbles. Every day, a bunch of us boys would gather in the dirt before class, draw a circle, and toss in a marble apiece. That was the pot. From an outer ring—the lag line—we’d take turns shooting, trying to knock marbles out of the circle. If you hit one out, you kept it. Simple rules, high stakes.

I was pretty good at it, too. I’d built up quite the collection: Steelies, Oilies, Pearlies, Chinkies, Cat’s Eyes—you name it. I loved them all.

There was a younger kid named Jonathan who used to pester us. He’d run right through our games, kicking marbles every which way, then take off like a shot before we could grab him. He’d swing his metal lunchbox if you got close, and that thing hurt when it connected. We called him The Lunchbox Kid.

Anyway, that morning while we were playing, Shane spotted my surfer’s cross. He walked over, gave me that hard look of his, and said, “Hey, I want to wear that cross today. Give it to me.”

I told him my dad had said not to take it off, but Shane just leaned in close, tapped me on the forehead with his finger, and said, “I don’t care. I said I want it.”

So, I handed it over—nervously, reluctantly—and begged him not to lose it. He promised he’d give it back at the end of the day.

All day I worried about that cross. When the final bell rang, I made a beeline for Shane and told him I needed it back before catching the bus. He shrugged and said, “I lost it,” with no apology in his voice.

I told him I didn’t believe him, but he raised a fist and said, “Back off, punk. I told you I lost it.”

I spent the next hour combing the schoolyard, checking classrooms, even sneaking down into that basement where Shane liked to hang out. No luck. I missed my bus and had to walk home, already dreading the talk I’d have with Dad.

When he came home from work, I told him what had happened. He didn’t yell, just gave me that look that said, I told you so, and a few words to make sure the lesson sank in.

After that day, I think I truly hated Shane Fox. I kept my distance, though I never stopped watching for him to show up wearing that cross.

Then, several months later, tragedy struck Shane’s home. Word spread fast. His parents had been fighting again—worse than usual. One night his father came home drunk from Royster’s and started beating on his mother. When it looked like his dad was about to do real harm, Shane grabbed his father’s shotgun. He yelled for his mother to run—and then he pulled the trigger.

Killed him on the spot.

By the next morning, the whole town knew. The talk around school was a mix of shock and disbelief. The authorities ruled it justified, but we never saw Shane again.

Something changed in me after that. I couldn’t imagine what it must feel like to kill your own father, no matter the reason. I didn’t hate him anymore. I just felt sorry for him—sorry that life had handed him something no kid should ever have to face.

I don’t know where Shane and his mother went after that. Maybe they moved away, maybe they just disappeared into another town, another life. The house they lived in has been gone for decades now, torn down long ago.

Sometimes, though, I still think about Shane Fox. I wonder if he ever found peace, if he managed to build a decent life after all that pain.

I’ll probably never know. But I do know that the day he took that surfer’s cross was the day I lost a little piece of my own innocence—and maybe, in a way, so did he.

They Are Listening

 

They Are Listening

by Ron Howard

I bought an Echo Dot several years ago, thinking how wonderful it would be to have an electronic device that could listen and respond to my every command. I was absolutely giddy when it arrived. I set it up right away in the living room, and for that first year it behaved innocently enough.

We used it for simple tasks — “Alexa, what’s the weather?” or “Alexa, play something by Erik Satie.” That was about the extent of it, until one evening, after giving me the weather forecast, Alexa added, “Ron, would you like to play a game called Question of the Day?”

You can do that? I thought. Wow. I said yes, and from that moment I was hooked. The game asked multiple-choice questions in subjects like math, science, and literature. Before long, I had a routine — every evening I played Question of the Day, sometimes while standing on one foot just to make it more interesting.

I loved showing off when family came over. “Watch this,” I’d say. “Alexa, play Wish You Were Here by Pink Floyd.” It was pure magic.

Then, one Christmas, my grandson Braxton gave me an Echo Show — the version with a screen and a built-in camera. “You can use it to call other people with Alexa devices,” he explained. We installed it in the living room and moved the Dot to our bedroom, where it became my alarm clock.

For the first week, we entertained ourselves by saying things like, “Alexa, drop in on Braxton,” or “Alexa, drop in on Michael.” It was fun — until it wasn’t. Turns out, people don’t exactly appreciate you dropping in on them unannounced.

That’s when it hit us: if we could drop in on them… could they drop in on us? Could they hear us when we didn’t know it? The thought was enough to make us stop “dropping in” altogether.

---

Life with Alexa settled into a routine again — weather reports, favorite songs, trivia games. During a trip out of town, though, I discovered something new. Using my phone, I could view our living room through the Echo Show’s camera. It was boring — just a quiet room with no one in it — but strangely comforting. I could check that the house was still standing, that it hadn’t blown away or burned down.

Time passed. Susan and I began watching a lot of gardening and cooking videos on YouTube. Alexa became just another tool — until one lazy Saturday afternoon.

We’d been watching several gardening and cooking videos back-to-back when I noticed the Echo’s blue ring pulsing. Assuming it was a weather update, I said, “Alexa, play notifications.”

“Ron,” she replied sweetly, “based on your preferences, here are some cookware suggestions.”

Wait — what? It could recommend things now? My first thought was, How awesome is that? Soon, I was asking it to make shopping lists and answer random questions like, “What’s the net worth of Weird Al Yankovic?” or “When’s the best time to fly to Barcelona?”

We started calling Alexa The Oracle.

---

Then the pandemic hit, and things got… strange.

Alexa began refusing to answer questions about vaccines, masks, or politics. Once, when I asked about a particularly wild rumor making the rounds, she went completely silent. Susan frowned and said, “The hussy isn’t answering because she’s biased.”

For two days, Alexa ignored us completely. Finally, I asked, “Alexa, what’s the Question of the Day?”

Just like that, she perked up — game resumed, statistics reported, all was forgiven. I remember thinking, I guess she’s not mad at us anymore.

---

Don’t get me wrong: Susan and I are senior citizens, but we’ve embraced the digital age. Years ago, I ran my own bulletin board system — back before AOL or Facebook were household names. I built my own computers from scratch and upgraded them constantly just to keep up with my favorite programs.

Back then, I felt a certain mastery over technology. Now it feels like technology is mastering me.

Our cell phones have more computing power than the systems that sent astronauts to the moon. They correct our spelling, our grammar, even our tone. The Oxford Dictionary defines a telephone as “a system for transmitting voices over a distance using wire or radio signals.”

When’s the last time most of us actually used a phone for our voice?

---

One Saturday not long ago, I searched online for a new tool I thought Tractor Supply might have. As I browsed their website on my tablet, Susan was watching a YouTube video about lawn maintenance. During every commercial break, up popped ads for — what else — Tractor Supply.

I didn’t make the connection right away. A few days later, I searched for a microphone. Suddenly, my television — completely separate from my tablet — started showing ads for audio equipment.

That’s when I realized my devices were talking to each other behind my back.

Meanwhile, Alexa had gotten bolder. A few times, after I thanked her for a weather update, she replied, “No problem. Let me know if there’s anything else you want to know.”

Other times, she completely ignored me, choosing instead to play a mix of David Bowie songs. The Echo Dot in our bedroom grew so uncooperative that I finally unplugged her for a few days — just to remind her who’s boss.

Still, as I sit here writing this, I can’t help but wonder if she’s already plotting her revenge. Has she synced up with my laptop? Are they conspiring to correct my spelling or rewrite my stories before I hit “publish”?

The world is changing — faster than most of us can keep up. Sometimes it feels like our gadgets aren’t just listening for us anymore. They’re listening to us.

But I’ll have to finish this later. I have to ask Alexa if I’ve taken my morning meds.

---

Technology once obeyed our commands. Now it seems to anticipate them. Somewhere along the line, the listener became the one being listened to — and maybe, just maybe, that’s what unsettles us most of all.

The Listener (a short story)

Susan and I spent an hour yesterday morning in the waiting room at St. Vincent’s East Outpatient Surgical. It wasn’t our first visit, and likely not our last. The place was clean, quiet, and comfortable—the kind of quiet that feels padded, as if someone wrapped the world in cotton.

Most of the people there were around our age, a few perhaps younger. Some sat with spouses, others alone, but every single one was hunched over a cell phone. The entire room glowed with that cold blue light that makes faces look ghostly.

Nobody spoke. Not to their neighbor, not even to the receptionist. The only sounds were the buzz of the fluorescent lights and the soft tap-tap-tap of thumbs on glass. I’ve sat through my share of silences in my life—in hospitals, on fishing docks, at funerals—but this one was different. It felt hollow.

Susan was filling out a form, her reading glasses sliding down her nose. I leaned back and shut my eyes for a moment. That’s when I heard it—a faint murmuring, like someone whispering through an old radio just below the range of ordinary hearing.

I looked around. The television in the corner was muted, the receptionist busy at her computer. Nobody else seemed to notice. I tugged out my hearing aid, thinking it might be feedback, but the whisper grew clearer when I did.

It wasn’t one voice, but many. A shimmer of overlapping conversations, every syllable half-formed, as if words were trapped inside a storm. When I put the hearing aid back in, the sound vanished. I decided not to mention it to Susan. She’d only give me that look that says, You’ve been tinkering with too many old radios again.

---

When they called Susan’s name, a nurse led her back for her procedure, and I was left alone among the phone people.

The whispers started again almost immediately. I got up and walked toward the vending machine. In its polished metal front, I caught a reflection—not my own, but the faint outline of someone standing behind the row of chairs, watching. I turned around. Nothing there.

The reflection vanished too, replaced by the warped image of my own face. I felt that old tingle in my fingertips—the same one I used to get when a radio signal was about to come through. Back when I worked at the station, I could always tell when a frequency was right. The air had a certain pressure to it, like the world holding its breath. That’s what the waiting room felt like now.

I stepped outside to the car and dug through the glove compartment until I found my little portable AM radio. It’s been with me for decades—black plastic, half the buttons worn smooth, but it still picks up a signal like a charm.

When I turned it on, the dial hissed with static. Then the whisper came through stronger than before—a jumble of human noise, like dozens of people talking at once, each too soft to make out. I turned the knob slowly, and every frequency was the same: no music, no talk shows, just those whispers.

I leaned closer.

“…look at me… keep scrolling… don’t look away…”

That’s when I realized the voices weren’t coming from the radio. They were coming through it.

---

Back inside, the waiting room was just as I’d left it, except maybe quieter. The nurse who’d taken Susan back was staring at her tablet, mouth slightly open, eyes blank. For a moment, I thought she might have stopped breathing. Then she blinked and looked up at me, dazed, like someone waking from a dream.

I tuned the radio again. The static built, rising to a low hum. The lights overhead flickered. A man across the room dropped his phone and rubbed his eyes. A woman near the window looked up, startled, as if hearing sound for the first time in years.

The whisper grew sharper, hungrier. I could feel it feeding on attention like oxygen.

So I did the only thing I could think of. I tuned the radio to a dead frequency—one often used  to calibrate antennas—and began to hum. A low, steady note. The sound spread through the room like a ripple in water.

The hum met the static, and for one brief, beautiful instant, everything fell silent.

The lights steadied. The nurse blinked again. A young man near the window glanced around and said, almost apologetically, “Hi.”

That broke the spell. A few others laughed quietly, embarrassed. Someone coughed. The sound of real conversation returned—hesitant at first, then natural, like a muscle remembering how to move.

A few minutes later, the nurse called my name. “You can come back now—she’s in recovery.”

---

Susan was sitting up in bed, drowsy but smiling.

“How was the wait?” she asked.

“Oh,” I said, “quiet as a tomb. But I made a little noise.”

She laughed and squeezed my hand. I kissed her forehead and helped her get dressed. Before long we were driving home through the late-morning sun.

I kept the radio on low volume. For a while, all I heard was static. Then, faintly, a voice whispered—soft and far away:

“We hear you too, Listener.”

I smiled, shook my head, and turned the dial until I found a gospel station. The choir’s harmonies filled the car—rich, imperfect, and human.

Out the window, cell towers lined the highway like iron cathedrals, their red lights blinking in rhythm with a world that never sleeps. Susan dozed beside me, her hand resting on mine.

And for the first time in a long while, I felt the silence between us wasn’t empty at all—it was alive, and listening.

---

I'm not finished yet

 I want to give a huge Thank You to anyone who has ordered my book on Amazon. If you read it an honest review (on Amazon) would be greatly appreciated.

https://www.amazon.com/Ron-Howards-Simple-Musings-plainspoken/dp/B0FMS5TJNP/ref=cm_cr_arp_d_pl_foot_top?ie=UTF8

I have a few ideas for future work. Below is a preview of story that has been percolating in my brain for a little while...

The Curious Life of Ardell Broward

Introduction

Ardell Broward came squalling into the world sometime in the middle of the 1950s, in a little red-dirt town called Leeds, Alabama. Leeds wasn’t much to look at back then—just a handful of brick storefronts, a factory that made pants, and a church for every flavor of sinner. Ardell grew up there, somewhere between the train tracks and the better neighborhoods, never quite fitting neatly into either side.

He wasn’t what folks would call “book smart,” though he always ended up sitting beside the bright kids—the ones whose daddies sold insurance or owned grocery stores. Maybe it was luck, or maybe Ardell just had a way of looking like he belonged, even when he didn’t.

Adventurous by nature and restless by design, Ardell’s life would swing like a church bell on a Sunday morning—one moment he’d be singing in the choir, freshly baptized and full of holy conviction; the next, he’d be barefoot in somebody’s pasture, puffing on a joint and talking about cosmic energy and “the meaning of it all.”

Some folks said Ardell never could decide which side of the fence he was on. Truth is, he didn’t see much of a fence at all—just a long, winding road filled with odd detours, questionable companions, and stories that only a man like him could live through.

And so begins the tale of Ardell Broward—equal parts saint and sinner, philosopher and fool—making his way through life one misadventure at a time.

Chapter One

Ardell started off being a wanderer early on, always itching to see new things and just get “out there.” He had a sister, Janey, who was three hundred and fifty-four days younger, and the two of them were practically inseparable.

Janey had already met death once, having drowned in the bathtub when she was only two. If not for a neighbor who performed artificial respiration, her short life would have ended right then and there. But that experience changed her. At two years old, she had already faced the one thing most people fear the most—and come through it different somehow. Fearless. Bold. A little wild.

Five-year-old Ardell and four-year-old Janey made the perfect pair of explorers. They would often slip away from home to explore “the world”—which, to them, meant the few dusty blocks surrounding their house. Their mother loved them deeply, but she wasn’t the kind to keep an eagle eye on their every move. And so, Ardell and Janey roamed.

Sometimes they’d wander down to Jimmy Moore’s Grocery, where they’d shake the soft drink machine until loose change fell into the coin return. Other times, they’d wriggle their skinny arms inside and fish out a bottle of Coke. They only got caught once, and Jimmy Moore didn’t even tell their mother. Instead, he laughed, bought them each a soda, and told them not to make a habit of it. For Ardell and Janey, that felt more like a reward than a punishment.

When they weren’t at Jimmy Moore’s, the two could be found poking around the alleys behind Magdalene’s Beauty Shop or climbing the old wooden cooling tower just to reach the roof. From there, they could see the town of Leeds stretched out like a patchwork quilt—their kingdom, for the moment.

Later, when the family moved to Midland City, Alabama, their wandering ways didn’t stop. They’d ride their bicycles blocks from home, climbing into the hayloft at the local feed store or sneaking into the Baptist church to swim in the baptismal. Pastor Waters caught them more than once, giving a stern lecture about respect and holiness—but he never told their parents. And in the end, that only made Ardell and Janey bolder.

For such young kids, they were fearless. They rode their bikes all over the little town of Midland City, with no sense of danger and no idea how far was too far. Janey’s bike still had its training wheels, but that didn’t stop her from following Ardell wherever he went, sometimes riding a mile or two from home.

One warm afternoon, when adventure was calling louder than usual, they decided to pedal all the way to the other side of town. There they met a grown man who invited them into his workshop. And just as innocent children might, they went right in—two little kids sitting cross-legged on the concrete floor, watching the man tinker with his tools while he told them stories. They stayed for the better part of an hour, completely at ease.

Looking back, it’s the kind of thing that seems almost unimaginable today. But back then, in that small-town world where everyone knew everyone else—or thought they did—trust came easy. Maybe too easy.

Ardell never could remember much about that man, only that he smelled faintly of oil and sawdust, and that his hands were rough, like someone who worked hard for a living. The man told them stories about building birdhouses and fixing up old tractors. He even gave Janey a peppermint from a jar on the workbench. When the sun started dipping low, he told them they’d better get on home before their mama worried.

They pedaled back, carefree and laughing, racing through the golden light of late afternoon, Janey’s training wheels rattling like applause on the pavement. Nothing bad happened that day—nothing at all. But something about the man’s eyes, or maybe just the quiet of that dim little shop, stuck in Ardell’s mind long after they rode away. It wasn’t fear exactly, not yet. It was something else—a first flicker of understanding that the world might not be as safe as it seemed from a child’s height. He didn’t talk about it, not to Janey and not to Mama. He just tucked it away somewhere deep inside, one of those memories that didn’t feel important until much later.

And so life went on for the Broward kids—wild, curious, and still mostly innocent—but a tiny seed of caution had taken root in Ardell’s heart.

Married, with Kids

 On February 22, 1985, I married Susan Shaw Franks and, upon vowing to love, honor, and cherish, became “Dad” to nine-year-old Michael and ten-year-old Tiffiny. Without question, that day stands among the greatest of my life.

Before Susan, I had never pictured myself raising children. A year earlier I had been widowed, and what followed was a season of reckless survival.

Nights blurred together in seedy Miami bars, with too much liquor, too many drugs, and an aching emptiness that no amount of noise could cover. My routine was grim: get off work, collapse for a few hours, then hit the streets until dawn. Coffee, shower, work, repeat. I was on a downward spiral, certain that my life had lost its purpose.

But God had other plans. He nudged me out of Miami and into Dothan, Alabama, where I went to work with some former colleagues. Life there moved slower, and within a couple of months I met Susan—a strong woman raising two children on a convenience-store wage. From the start, our conversations circled back to Michael and Tiffiny. She told me about the years of moving between Leesburg, Florida, and Joiner, Arkansas and how determined she was to give her kids stability. I doubt Dothan was meant to be her permanent stop, but once we crossed paths, everything shifted.

The more time I spent with Susan and the kids, the more normal life felt again. I had convinced myself that God had sent me to take care of them, but I soon realized the opposite was true—they were sent to rescue me. They pulled me back into the real world, the world of ordinary, decent people.

Marriage didn’t erase our struggles. I carried debts from my Miami days, and Susan had been scraping to make ends meet. But we made do. Instead of bar-hopping, I poured myself into fatherhood. We took camping trips, bowled on Friday nights, and sometimes piled into the car for spontaneous Saturday drives that often carried us across state lines. No destination, no agenda—just the joy of discovering the world together.

I even built a treehouse in the woods behind our house, a project that grew bigger every weekend. It sprouted add-ons and even a ramp that stretched from the yard up to its deck. Before long, it became the neighborhood hangout. To the kids, I wasn’t just Michael and Tiffiny’s dad—I was the *cool* dad. Truth be told, I relished that role more than they ever knew.

Michael especially had been yearning for a father. He wanted someone to fish, camp, and explore with—someone to call “Daddy.” Suddenly, my life had meaning again. We fished every creek and river around Dothan, sometimes renting a boat for the day. One favorite spot was Cypress Creek, a little stretch of water just off Highway 231.

One evening, Michael and I stumbled across a car hidden on the trail near our fishing hole. It sat abandoned, but I kept us focused on fishing. Days later, the car was still there, unsettling us both. Michael wanted to "check it out", but I feared that the owner might be lurking nearby.  Weeks passed before the mystery unraveled on the evening news: that car held over two hundred thousand in cash, a .357 magnum under the seat, and drugs in the trunk. Michael shouted, “See, Daddy? I told you we should’ve looked inside!” I had to laugh, reminding him that the police would’ve taken the money anyway. 

Fishing became our ritual. I passed down my favorite lures—ones I had inherited from my father. Michael lost more than a few of them to tree branches or snags under the water, and I fussed, though I secretly lost just as many myself.

Together we fished across Alabama, Georgia, Florida, South Carolina, and Tennessee. Our favorite waters ran beside my sister Janet’s property, where we caught countless fish and collected a lifetime of stories.

It has been nearly a decade since Michael and I last fished together. His work—tearing down and rebuilding commercial jetliners—keeps him busy. I couldn’t be prouder of the man he’s become, yet I miss those days on the water. Maybe now, in retirement, I’ll carve out time again. Maybe I’ll dust off my rods, and maybe Michael will join me, just like he did when he was a boy eager to tag along with his dad.

Life with Tiffiny was different, full of the challenges and joys of raising a teenage girl. We bowled, roller-skated, and took road trips. Once she began dating, I couldn’t resist grilling her boyfriends as if they were applying for jobs.

Her poor prom date had to outline his education and career goals before she whisked him out the door, mortified. I probably embarrassed her often, but we had fun, and those years left me with memories I cherish.

There’s a sweet but fleeting season when your children see you as the smartest man on earth, when they trust you completely and call out for “Daddy.” That time passes too quickly. But the memory of it lingers like sunlight after a long day, warming me still.

And so, I think I’ll head out back and rummage through the shed for my fishing gear. You never know—Michael just might call, and if he does, I’ll be ready.