Southern Stories

If you learned to drive in the Mississippi Delta before 1960 you learned on gravel roads.  Mississippi had a very good system of concrete highways that connected all parts of the State.  No responsible parent would allow their twelve year … Continue reading →

Rice farming came to the Mississippi Delta in the early 1950’s.  There are basically two kinds of soil in the Delta; fine grained river silt that has been deposited by eons of spring flooding along the Mississippi River, known as … Continue reading →

I love the beach early in the morning and late in the afternoon, not so much around mid-day.  Probably this is a result of being a red head and having the complexion of the Pillsbury Doughboy.  At any rate, we … Continue reading →

Ah, the joy of sitting on the beach soaking up the sun, listening to the surf, enjoying the warm breeze, while reading a good book. For now however, I’ll have to settle for enjoying one in my own garden.  In … Continue reading →

It seems too hot to be considering the end of summer, but the theme for August is officially “Summer’s End”, so consider we will.  I can remember when August was smack in the middle of summer as defined by summer … Continue reading →

Summer break is the most wonderful 3 months out of the year. It is the time when people focus on fun, go on adventures and face their fears. The warm weather, planned vacations and no school is what makes summer … Continue reading →

It was the football season of 1955 and I was starting at defensive guard on the Cumberland Bulldogs.  I was a sophomore that year and had lettered the year before, but this was my first year to be a starter.  … Continue reading →

I rode the range with Gene Autry, Hop along Cassidy and Roy Rogers when I was a child.  I was invisible to them, but they were ever-so-visible to me.  We had many brushes with outlaws and some very narrow escapes.  … Continue reading →

(Editor’s Note: We are posting this story in two parts. Part 2 will be our feature post on Wednesday, October 30) My Dad’s service in WWII ended with the surrender of Japan in August of 1945. After four years of … Continue reading →

It took another two days to cross the Florida Panhandle and finally we arrived in Pensacola.  Escambia County Florida teemed with my Dad’s family, including his mother and father and we spent two wonderfully restful nights at their home. Because I … Continue reading →

(Editor’s Note: We will be posting this short story in two parts. Part two will post on Friday, November 29) The alarm clock taped to the headboard started to clang just after five am. The November 21 edition of the … Continue reading →

(Editor’s Note: This is the second part to Tom Lawrence’s “Thanksgiving 1951” short story. The first part was posted Wednesday November, 27th, and can be found in our November 2013 archives) There was also a dish of oyster dressing, ala … Continue reading →

I search out antique stores with such passion until I think my spirit remains there overnight and converses with the ancient photos I saw that day. I picked up each one and gazed at it longingly, searching for my face … Continue reading →

On a hot summer day in 1945 I was informed by my maternal grandmother, a devoted Christian Scientist, that I was about to become a “Sunbeam”.  At five years old I had no idea what she was talking about, but … Continue reading →

“Alabama, they say, is like one big front porch where people gather on summer nights to tell tales and to talk family. Everybody, they say, is kin to everybody else – or knows someone who is. It’s a sprawling porch, … Continue reading →

    A sweet welcome to Spring in poems by PorchScene contributor, Patricia Neely-Dorsey.    

  Nancy and I lived in an area of Jackson, Mississippi known as “Belhaven,” an older neighborhood that had been developed in the 1920s.  At one time it had been the place to live in Jackson, but had since been … Continue reading →

…“We’ll be back in a little bit,” I said, and Nancy and I went in the front doorway.  The foyer was a large area with gleaming heart-pine floors, elegant oriental rugs, and rich fabrics.  The living room was to the … Continue reading →

About Mona We’re excited to bring a little prickly wit to our readers with the musings of a new contributor. With sardonic humor, our friend and writer Mona Sides Smith will take an irreverent look at the joys and woes … Continue reading →

Image Courtesy of Patricia Neely-Dorsey

I did not want to be an Auburn fan. Instead, I wanted to pull for Ole Miss. At my grammar school, located in the northeastern corner of Mississippi, the supply cart lady sold single subject notebooks: some with the Mississippi … Continue reading →

“The Sale” The old truck sputtered into the empty lot and came to a stop in the gravel next to the store’s dumpster. From the look of it, the truck wouldn’t make many more trips anywhere, but Sue knew looks … Continue reading →

I don’t know why I keep getting married. I got married in my twenties. I got married when I was pushing seventy. And I got married several times in between.  You’d think a person would learn not to keep doing … Continue reading →

Every morning when I go walking, I see them: the mummified remains of hundreds of earthworms littering the sidewalks and roadways of my route. Many of the carcasses are straight as if the worms were extending themselves as far as … Continue reading →

Be sure you’re right, then go ahead – David Crockett While it is true that you should never underestimate the actions of a woman scorned, neither should you miscalculate the thought process of a Redneck who has been wronged. Old … Continue reading →

will d…a life in science, is the recent publication release from our parent company, Front Porch Press, LLC, and was written by our very own Tom Lawrence. As a scientist, Dr. Carpenter participated in many significant scientific events of the twentieth … Continue reading →

It is somewhat less painful to document the metamorphosis of “the performing child,” when you are a generation or so removed by the title of grand “anything” to the little creature. When you’re the mother of this unique and gifted … Continue reading →

Relatives? I don’t much get involved with what most of my relatives do, and vice-versa. I seldom see most of my family of origin and, when we do get together, we say how nice it is to see each other, … Continue reading →

Thanksgiving is my favorite holiday, but it is also one that brings me some consternation. Why? There’s no purchasing of gifts to have to contend with, or the fear that one’s gift won’t be liked or appreciated by the receiver. … Continue reading →

Mind you, I’m not ungrateful for store-bought body parts; it’s just that they are such a drag on my mind. It’s been going on for years and I’m about to put an end to it. My boobs are hanging down … Continue reading →

Once a long time ago, back in the days when our state was more farmland and cotton fields than highway and industry, there was a beautiful young girl named Abigail who loved to dance. This young lady loved a jaunty … Continue reading →

  My Dad, Tom Lawrence, took me to my first Mississippi State football game in 1968. I was four years old, and I don’t remember much about it—only that State lost. Today, I know it was our season opener against … Continue reading →

  IT’S ABOUT THANKSGIVING By Mona Sides-Smith Over the gravel and through the weeds, to Grandmother’s house we went. It was Thanksgiving. It could have been any holiday. Or any Sunday. Or any day, for that matter. It was where … Continue reading →

Barren Alley  By Chip Burson Why, pray tell, did they call it barren? Cloudless and just warming with the pent up energy of an oddly Spring-like November morning, this lovely bower walk hid all the history; every spilled drop of … Continue reading →

Scars Are Tattoos with Better Stories By Mollie Smith Waters I collect magnets. I have a wall in my house that has a magnetic board where I display them. Most of the magnets are from places I’ve visited, and over … Continue reading →

CLAUDETTE COLVIN A work of fiction, based in fact By Tom Lawrence   Fred Gray sat in his law office in downtown Montgomery, listening to the March rain pelting against his window. He was expecting visitors, and had a fresh … Continue reading →

FLASH FICTION KLUG’S AWAKENING   By Tom Lawrence Klug stood in the opening of his cave, and stared at the stack of smoldering wood he had covered with muddy dirt just before sundown last night. There were still wisps of … Continue reading →