Maybe it’s because I’ve been reading a lot of work by or about Willie Morris lately, I honestly don’t know. But there was something about sitting in Central Park’s Great Lawn on the Saturday of Memorial Day weekend, with the sun shining on us, completely alone in a city of twenty million. The Girl and I lay on our Ole Miss blanket, her snacking and people watching, my head in her lap as I read Larry L. King’s words about Willie, that helped me to understand even more the man’s motivation in his actions, his concern over the complications of being a southern expatriate, and his desire, and eventually his will, to go home again.

I think that the reasons that I’ve become so wrapped up with the works of Willie Morris over the past few years are the same reasons that most people follow the careers of great writers. Aside from the obvious entertainment value derived from reading quality works of literature, the work of certain great writers help us to define in a way who we are, by describing who they are; putting into words the emotions and realizations of shared circumstance, albeit decades apart. No one who has grown up in the south and eventually moved away can read from or about Willie Morris and not be struck by at least a passing familiarity to their own situations.

One difference between Willie and I stands out glaringly to me, however, and brings me to my eventual point. Willie Morris, for the majority of his adult life, struggled to find a loving soul to play counterpoint to his. Once he found his soul’s match in JoAnne Prichard Morris he was finally complete as a writer, and a man. The difference between Willie and I is that I have had the world’s luck in finding my counterpoint some two-odd decades earlier than he, and as I sat in Central Park on that sunny Saturday and contemplated such things, I was happy in the thoughts that the Good Old Boy would have loved The Girl.

Allison, you truly are my counterpoint. In much the same way that you allow me to be your advisor, you are my inspiration. I strive, every day, to become the man that I should be, for you. You keep me focused, and grounded, and still allow me to have my fun, as all boys will sometimes. You have saved my life, and I can no longer imagine it without you.

I love you.