Halloween is always just around the corner at my house, but especially at the time of the pig pickin', and Corrine wanted to be in on the fun. I'd have loved for everyone to see her in her mask, but she didn't make her fireside debut until well after dark. And given the temperature that night (in the 70s) we couldn't chance taking her out of the cooler any sooner than we did. But I think she had a good time playing "Guess Who" while it lasted.

With the promise of sparklers and toasting marshmellows just a few hours away our little piglets couldn't wait for the fun to begin. These guys work hard for the pig pickin' too. Katie Mae works right alongside of me for weeks helping to decorate the house, and Gentry and Justin spend many afternoons after school hauling firewood, cleaning the yard and fetching tools for their forgetful parents. My children aren't allowed to register for the door prize we give away, but Tracy's children are. And after three years of working as hard as any of us, I can't think of anyone more deserving of the coveted title of "Pig Killer" than Justin.

The Kudzu Man. Botonist Extrordinaire. This guy's a trip. Back in the spring he caught me in Lowes with a shamrock in my buggy. "Oh," he says when he sees it. "Oxalis Maritana." Then he leans over and takes a bite out of it! Can you believe it? I haven't even paid for my new houseplant yet, and he's making a snack out of it right there in the store. But Ed will always hold a special place in my heart--ever since that very first pig pickin' when he and Connie refused to let a little downpour stop them from joining us around the fire. Now that's friendship, and lust for life. Ed has been pallbearer at our pickin's since Alice, and I reckon he always will be. He and Connie have a wonderful way of making themselves right at home, so you'd think they'd always been family. I know I find it hard to think of them as anything less.

Well, there it is friends, all decked out for Halloween. And just as soon as we win the lottery we're gonna fix it up right. It really is a beautiful home though, and made to be filled with people--lots and lots of people. The B.B. White family, who lived here forever before we moved in, had eight children! This house lives to be loved, and loves to be lived in, and I tell you, it's never more truly alive than on that one day a year when it's filled with the conversation and laughter of people caught up in fellowship with one another.

That's Alex Henderson over there on the left. He and Margaret come to our pickins every year; their daughter, Beth is a good friend of our daughter, and all of them are distant kin to the J.J. Hill family who lived in our old house when it was still new. Mr. Hill was Mayor and president of the bank here in Cartersville for a time. And that's Kristen Engles dancing on the step, and her brother.

A small town is a wonderful thing. Everybody knows everybody, and there's no such thing as a stranger. We've lived here in Cartersville for three years now, but we hadn't been in this house a week before we felt as if we'd lived here all our lives. Jerry and J.B. there are a couple of good examples why. Folks here are friendly, and even when you meet someone for the first time, they make you feel like an old friend they simply haven't seen in a while. That's Jerry's son, Jonathon with his arm around his Daddy. He and our son have been friends ever since they met in second grade, and I guess they always will be.

Mon Petite Swine L'Amore
(My Little Pig of Love)

Do you know of any other man in this world, with a PhD or otherwise, who would put on a pig hat to greet a hundred guests in his home just to please his wife? David's always lived life on the conservative side, proudly wearing his tweed herringbone with the suede patches on the elbow like a badge of honor. He might not stand out in a crowd of conventioneers (every historian owns one), but he sure does look sharp in it. And I guess somewhere between his stopping to think and my jumping right in, we manage to keep hand-in-hand through this life. It isn't always easy; sometimes I think our fingers are barely touching. That's when we fall back into each others arms and start all over again.