The Pour House Café is your typical small town café you find in most every little town in the U.S. The once white frame building sits on the corner of highway 41A and Slipknot Road. It is the place where problems are solved, gossip is started and grease is consumed.
Square foot for square foot more characters eat here than most any place south of Mayberry.
Things were busy at the Cafe Sunday.
I was sitting with my wife when Leonard and his new wife walked in. Leonard has been married about seven times if you count the times he married the same woman more than once. He is about 130 pounds of rotating conspiracy theory. He never met one he didn’t like.
“How you doin’, Preacher,” he asked. “You mind if me and my ol lady sit with you all?”
“Why, no, Leonard,” I replied. “I don’t mind if this young lady you have with you sits with us either.”
He ignored my remark, but I noticed his wife smiled and shook her head.
“Preacher, you’re a smart fella. Been to school and all.”
Now my wife smiled.
“You think the world is gonna end soon?” he continued.
“Well, first of all, I’m glad to see you taking an interest in eschatology. But, what exactly are you asking?”
“No, Preacher, I’m not asking about beauticians. Do you think the world is coming to an end soon?”
My wife’s allergies must have acted up at this point . She muffled a fit of coughing in her napkin.
“If you’re asking if the world will be destroyed soon, no, not soon. If you mean the rapture taking place, then yes, I think it will be soon. But , what are you getting at, Leonard?”
“Signs, Preacher, signs! The world is going to hell in a wheelbarrow.”
At this point Leonards wife spoke up. “He saw a boy outside with his pants hanging way down.”
“Way down, nothing! He was running across the parking lot and they fell down to his ankles.”
He slapped his hand on the table as he continued, “Ain’t that a sign things are getting bad, Preacher?”
“Well, yea, Leonard, getting strange at the very least. But, I don’t think that’s one of the specific signs Jesus told us to watch for.”
Well, I’ll tell you one thing for sure, Preacher.”
“What’s that?”
“If I’d tried to wear my pants like that when I was a kid my daddy woulda made my world come to an end.”
“Amen, Leonard, amen!”