Sweet corn

There are certain foods that I associate strongly with Jerry.  I mean, we ate lunch and dinner together mostly every day for the past almost 11 years, and breakfast together most weekends of those years, so all foods were shared foods (almost - the man definitely did not like raisins), but some in particular he really loved.  Hot peppers, hot sauces, the black "Twizzles" I've mentioned before, licorice and anise flavors in general, Butterfinger candy bars, Coy's barbecue (ooh, reminds me of a foundational story, about which in a minute for those of you who haven't heard it, and because we've been telling this story for 12 years... I mean, we had been telling it...  and never got tired of it), barbecue in general, slaw... and sweet corn, definitely sweet corn.  I had my first ear of sweet corn this evening since Jerry died: big disappointment, mainly because a) I bought it at the grocery store and b) I bought it at the grocery store at least three days ago, I can't remember exactly.  Jerry would not have approved of it, and while I'm not that picky, even I could tell this wasn't anywhere near a representative of the Platonic ideal of sweet corn.

But on to the Coy's barbecue story.  Almost twelve years ago - going by singing dates, it'll be twelve years ago on Sunday at around noon - at Pine Grove Church, during the Lookout Mountain Convention, I was standing on line waiting to approach the 47-foot-long (or so says Paste Magazine) table at dinnertime, when a man standing behind me recommended the barbecue.  I told him I didn't eat meat - which, given that this had been Jerry Enright's well-thought-out pick-up line, might have discouraged a less confident man, but happily it didn't discourage Jerry.  And of course I didn't mean "Go away, you attractive bearded man with the sparkly blue eyes who for some reason I immediately am finding extremely easy to talk to, which is very unusual for shy me, how could you suggest meat to me???" - and we started chatting, ate dinner together leaning up against his well-traveled Camry (the only time I ever saw that fabled car before he traded it in on the Sienna I'm now so lonely in without him), spent some time talking to Buell, I recall - bet Buell doesn't know he was in on those first moments - and at some point in our conversation must have mentioned the distinctive traditional pronunciation of the first four words in the phrase "I a poor child and Thou so high," since Bill Windom's video of the singing after dinner, as we sang 168, shows me sitting in the alto, smiling as we get to those words - because Jerry, sitting in the tenor, has caught my eye as we've gotten to those words and winked at me.

Coy's barbecue.  I don't know if he'll be bringing it to the singing this weekend.  Jerry would have been looking forward to it, and to everything else about this weekend.

Everything is all wrong.