Suddenly Tom heard a tapping on his window. He rose up and there was a deputy sheriff. He asked if he was all right. He said “yeh, sure.” “Well I felt like you were just asleep, but I wanted to check.”

Tom shaking his head to get the sleep out of it noticed that he was facing south; the opposite way than he had been facing when he parked on the side of the road to catch a nap. He said, “Deputy isn’t Goodshoe right back up the road about 5 miles?” “It was, but all but one of the residents have either died or moved away. The guy that ran the café, his son still lives somewhere around there.” The Deputy continued, “Well if you are okay, then I will be going.” Tom said, “Yeh, thanks for stopping. I need to get a move on.”

Tom sat there for a minute, very puzzled. He decided to do another u-turn and drive back to Goodshoe. In about ten minutes, he caught a glimpse of a sign, hidden in the bushes saying Goodshoe. It was not standing out, as it was earlier. This time there seems to be overgrowth and kudzu hiding it. He rounded the curve and there was a row of buildings, with roofs fallen in, signs swinging in the breeze and shop windows broken.

About that time, he saw a car heading his way. He slowed down and stuck his arm out, indicating he wanted the driver to stop. He said, “I’m Tom Jenkins.” The other driver said “I’m Ralph Thompson. What can I do for you?” “This town, how long has it been like this?” “Oh, about 25 years.” Then he looked at the driver, he was the spitten image of the Ralph Thompson he had met just yesterday. Well at least he thought it was yesterday. “My dad died about that time and Mayor Perkins went to a Nursing Home in Montgomery.” Ralph Continued. “It’s too bad some of the others could not of held out. I am going to the Hyundai plant to work. It just did not get here soon enough to save Goodshoe. Well if there is nothing else, I gotta go, or I will be late.”

As Ralph drove off, Tom sat in stunned silence. Had he not just been there? Tom checked his watch, (the time was correct, and one day had lapsed) everything had been alive and people were in the streets. Now Miss Clara’s street is grown over and barely passable. On a hunch, he got out of the car and raised the hood to his 1957 Chevy. Yep, just as he suspected, somebody has been under the hood working. In addition, yes that is a new starter. It did not even have any road dust or grease on it yet.

As he straightened up, something started to fall out his pocket. It was the picture Miss Clara had given him, along with a napkin saying Goodshoe Café. It had been real. But how? Had he run into a local version of “Shangri-La”?

But what he did know was that he had found what he had been looking far. There is more to life than “hustle and bustle”. There is more than wheeling and dealing; and trying to get “one up” on people. There is still good in people. Moreover, whether you are a southerner or not, the principles of hospitality and being a Good Samaritan are alive in each one of us. We just have to reach down (sometimes it is way down) deep to find it.