Believe Me or Not, It's True

There has been some concern over the years as to the integrity of the columns I write each week. “Surely that didn’t happen,” I’ve been told by loyal readers, “You made that up, didn’t you?” Fair question. First let me point out that writers are prone to the use of “colorful” expressions to describe events and I am no exception. And sometimes quotes and comments are contextual instead of verbatim. Guilty I am. But the events of which I write are non-fiction, unusual though they may be. So I have decided to take a look back at some columns of the past and verify their authenticity so as to squash any rumors of fictional fantasies on my part. In no particular order, I verify the following stories from previous columns as true. A man in my church really did think I was near death due to a misunderstanding about a fellow church member’s dog named Rusty. He walked up and heard the part about Rusty lying in the front yard “listless and unresponsive” and immediately he assumed it was me they were talking about. We all got a good laugh out of it later. I really did ride the Vortex at Carowinds in a driving rainstorm with my kids and it truly was one of the most thrilling things I’ve ever experienced in my life. My favorite pair of winter shoes were indeed purchased at a yard sale for 25 cents and my current favorite pair of jeans came from a thrift shop. Many of my least believable stories involve my 17-year-old but trust me, I do have a pair of underwear in my drawer that he handed down to me and yes, I like them. And I did chase him around the yard after he cut my hair too short last summer. (The part about me being faster than him was true at the time, but is probably not factual anymore.) When this same son’s cellphone was stolen at school, I texted his phone asking the culprit to return it. And the verbatim reply I got was, “Sorry, not happening, dude.” (minus the commas). My youngest son and I actually did have one of our most meaningful conversations while we sat on top of the roof one afternoon. It is a memory I will cherish forever. The Stroupe family’s recent defective microwave really did make a firecracker popping noise each time we pressed the Surface Light button. And it did produce a sizeable spark each time as well. If you don’t believe us, ask our neighbors. We demonstrated for them one time. While on vacation at the beach, I did get pulled over by a policeman while transporting my wife and youngest son in a golf cart. And I really was wearing a paper Krispy Kreme hat at the time. And yes, it’s true I got whacked in the head by a chairlift on our winter ski trip in January. There’s more but that pretty much covers it for now. The thing most people have the hardest time believing is that my family doesn’t know what I’m writing about until they read it in the paper. That’s true 95% of the time. And the kids have never read or cared much about Dad’s column anyway. True story.