Mud Pie

Present Day.

When I wake up in the morning, after a few moments I realize that I am in the town of Live Oak, out on Florida’s Panhandle.

This time last week, I was waking up in Miami, where I just spent the previous year of my life.

Moving is exhausting, and I have done more than my fair share of it over the previous ten years or so. Circumstances necessitated this particular move, though.

I think I am going to like Live Oak. I hope to build a career here, become involved with the community, work on my craft of criminal trial law, and in my spare time write novels.

While Miami was great, I am most likely finished residing in large cities. I have lived in Las Vegas, Washington, DC, and now The Magic City. Vegas I could do again, but I have dwelled in enough places to realize that unless you are a multi-millionaire, the quality of life is probably going to be better in Small Town, USA. Vacations in big cities are nice, but the daily grind of traffic, masses of people always trying to do the exact same thing that you are doing, not being able to get into restaurants and clubs- those are not problems I will encounter in Live Oak.

I have gone for two runs through Live Oak already, and my location is great. My house is just two blocks from the office where I will start work on Monday, one block from the Post Office, one block from the bank that I use, one block from City Hall, two blocks from a great restaurant called the Dixie Grill. At night, I hear trains from the nearby tracks, and the chimes from the big courthouse clock.

My family has been very supportive through all this. I moved to the rural Panhandle in part to be closer to my parents in North Carolina. The traffic in Miami and the distance they had to travel was just too much for them to feel comfortable even trying to visit, and I cannot blame them.

Dad, my brother, Adam, and my Dad’s brother, Uncle Ken, all came down to help me move. After we got my things into the house in Live Oak, we went to the local McDonalds for a late meal. Adam and Dad ordered some apple pie, but Uncle Ken said he was not the biggest fan of it.

“I’ll bet Adam can guess what my favorite pie of all time is,” I said.

Adam went through two or three guesses before he said, “Mud pie.”

“That’s right,” I responded. “Grandma Marshburn’s chocolate pie, which we grandkids called mud pie.”

Dad and Uncle Ken nodded in memory of this.

Grandma Marshburn, the mother of Dad and Uncle Ken, passed away in 2004.

“I suppose it has been 15, maybe 20 years since I had one of her pies,” I said.

I looked at Uncle Ken, and I could tell this made him a little sad as he reflected back on life on the farm in Maple Hill, growing up with her cooking.

The next day, before Adam, Dad and Uncle Ken all headed back to North Carolina, I treated them to lunch at the Dixie Grill, a restaurant in Live Oak that serves good Southern Country food like we enjoyed growing up.

Uncle Ken noticed that pies were on the dessert menu, including a chocolate pie.

He told me that probably because of the conversation we had the previous night, he had a desire for some chocolate pie.

Uncle Ken is a politician, though, and he likes to talk to people. Before he ordered, he had to make some inquiries with the waitress as to the quality of the pies.

The waitress told us that the lemon meringue, the coconut pie, and the chocolate pie were all made from scratch in the restaurant. The other pies were good as well, she said, but they were sent from the manufacturer and then baked at the restaurant.

This sold Uncle Ken on the chocolate pie, and all of us with the exception of Dad (who was too stuffed from the main course) ordered a slice.

We were all pleased to find that the pie was cooked in the style that Grandma used to make- a cream chocolate pudding sort of center, with a sweet, thick crust and a white foamy meringue top.

As we savored it, Adam made the right assessment. “It’s not as good as Grandma’s, but it’s close.”

Uncle Ken nodded in agreement.

It is nice to live two blocks away from a restaurant that serves such a chocolate pie, and to not have to call ahead to see if I will be able to get a table.