I told a story at dinner tonight that I had completely forgotten until I heard myself telling it. There was a girl where I lived years ago who was fifteen or sixteen and had frizzy red/blond hair. She was so pretty that I had trouble talking to her. I think my mouth wanted to hang open. It was embarrassing. It sounds like I’m exaggerating, and the fact is that I was way too old for her, but the strength ran out of all my muscles when she stood before me. She was not just pretty.

I ran a country market some distance from town. Everyone pretty much knew everyone else. She had recently come to live with her mother, who told me I would find it difficult to discuss anything with her. She said God gave her lots and lots of the same thing, but when He was done, He had nothing left. It sounded cryptic to me, so I smiled and let it pass.

A few weeks later she came to the store looking for walnuts. The owner of the store liked to run things down to nothing before reordering. We did not have walnuts. So I gathered my strength and asked why she needed them. She made a face and said, “For cookies.” “Well, I never liked walnuts in cookies,” I said. “But you know what’s really good? Pecans.” I handed her a small package of chopped pecans.

She looked at the package for a moment and said, “What?” I said, “Pecans taste a lot better than walnuts.” “Ah,” she said, cautiously, still staring at the package. “You mean pecans.” She said pēˌkanz, what I consider to be a southern pronunciation, while I said pəˈkänz. “Hnnn,” she said, finally. “You have to be careful with pecans.” “Why is that?” I asked. “Because there are two kinds of pecans," she said, "the kind you pee in, and the kind you use when you ain't got no walnuts.”

After that I had a lot less trouble talking to her.