Burnt Sage & Blunt Truths

 From my house, I can see the cotton gin behind the Subway across the street. For weeks now, it’s been running nonstop, like most of the gins in this part of the world at this time of year. The cotton fields have been picked bare, and enormous bales sit waiting in the fields and crowding the gin lots. Harvest doesn’t punch a clock. It’s an all-day, every-day operation. And the dust? Incredible. Especially this year, when the rain just hasn’t come. Everything already feels dry and coated, and the gins keep right on running. Even the trees look worn out. Those changing leaves might pass for autumn color at a glance, but around here, drought is doing its share of the decorating. And the farmers around here are hurting. From where I’m sitting, the economy is in the tank. But seed still has to be bought. Fuel still has to go into the equipment. Machinery still breaks, and somebody has to pay to fix it. Where the gins own the land, the men and women farming it can still be the ones footi...

Somewhere between “In Transit” and “Good Luck” There is a special kind of modern frustration that comes from watching a piece of mail disappear while your tracking number continues to insist that everything is perfectly normal. You know the routine. You hand something to the United States Postal Service. It gets a tracking number. You watch it move. Then it arrives in Memphis. And apparently, Memphis is where time and mail go to die. I personally know someone who waited 34 days for a certified letter with tracking to reach its destination. Thirty-four. Days. A certified letter is not supposed to require an archaeological expedition. And yet here we are. Now, before somebody starts screaming that one person's experience doesn't prove the entire Memphis postal system is broken, you're right. It doesn't. And I have receipts for hundreds of people who have experienced the same exact thing.  But it does raise an interesting question when that experience exists alongside year...