I was on the front porch when you drove by and I waved, regretting I did not attend the North Carolina State Fair this year and thus failed to put on extra weight for the long winter because nobody goes to the fair to eat Tofu On A Stick, you go for the funnel cake, corn dogs, and 900-calorie fried apple pies, so that in February if your car skids off the icy back road and lands upside down in a shallow creek bed and leaves you hanging from the seat belt unable to reach your

I was on the front porch when you drove by and I waved having been chased all week by small joys, like the wonderful singing of “Come Thou Fount of Every Blessing” at church Sunday, the happiness at 7:30 a.m. of little children in a school bus on Davie Avenue, the euphoria of a baby given his milk bottle in the waiting room of my ophthalmologist, and lunch with a friend, a brother by another mother, as we reminisced about growing up on a farm.