A Cup of Conversation, May 2014 – by Michael Kell
I first met Old Jim back in the early nineties when commercial Jacksonville was struggling to survive. The only enterprise with consistent lines out the door throughout the year was Loaves and Fishes, the community food kitchen next door serving hundreds of seniors every week. Community kitchens are not unlike dining halls in freshman dorms or high-school lunch hours on the quad. Territory is quickly marked out and woe to anyone crossing the invisible lines. I had many occasions to lock horns with the old woman who ran the kitchen back in the day. The parking situation was every bit as bad as today, maybe worse. Eileen, a Jacksonville native and long since retired, patrolled the back lot like a junkyard dog and didn’t hesitate to bite if someone under seventy dared park on her turf. I can’t say for sure but I think Jim first noticed me during one of these turf wars.
What impressed upon me first was how much Jim looked like my mother’s father, Buck. Both had the same sturdy build undiminished by the years. He had tough, weathered paws still strong enough to crush the hand of a man not accustomed to hard physical work. Jim wore an old fedora pulled down just slightly to one side and his face was worn leather softened by an unmistakable presence of joy. I can’t ever recall Jim without the disarming grin which won me over. During the early years there wasn’t much time for anything or anyone not on my to-do list. Those days it seemed the proverbial wolf was always at the door and letting up even a little was inviting trouble. In retrospect, it was immaturity and lack of faith convincing me of such foolishness. I never asked but Old Jim probably recognized in me something of himself, something he wished time would allow him to go back and change but could not. Old Jim was trying to tell me something.
Whatever the reason, when Jim walked in the door, I always made time. I’d always offer Jim a cup or baked-good but he always declined. Never more than a week or so would pass before Old Jim would come in looking for me. I really loved talking to Jim and the fact that something of weight and significance always laced through the small talk. No wasted words with Jim and he knew when to gracefully end the visit. He’d say he didn’t want to get in the way of me paying the bills! That’s exactly something my grandfather would have said had he lived just a little longer to see his favorite grandson laboring to build a small town life from scratch. My time with Old Jim ended the day he didn’t walk through the door. A woman came in to tell me Jim had passed and there was a memorial the following day at the Veteran’s Cemetery in Eagle Point. She said Jim always talked about me and maybe I’d want to know.
Full military honors were on display for the family man and decorated soldier who fought in WWII. I sat on a knoll under an old oak tree away from the throngs of family and friends while honoring Jim in silence for taking the time to be my friend and teach me life was sorely wasted on the tyranny of the urgent.
Michael Kell
Michael Kell is co-owner of GoodBean Coffee in Jacksonville and has started a blog at www.wordperk.com featuring more stories about small town life.
Posted May 2, 2014
Michael is a coffee entrepreneur and sometimes author living with his wife and family in the Pacific Northwest. For more articles like this one, please visit