RICH: Dill and Me

Published 9:43 am Sunday, July 20, 2025

It was in the Springtime, some 20-odd years ago, that I was headed to the Georgia coast for a speaking engagement. My phone rang. This was in the glorious days before texting had rudely invaded our lives.

The most beautiful, lilting voice replied to my “Hello?” He introduced himself and told me that he lived on the island where I would be speaking the next day.

“May I call you darlin’? I have long admired your writing. It’s the way I grew up.” He sighed. “I was horrified, simply horrified, to discover that no one is taking you to dinner tonight. We cannot have that. May I have the pleasure of escorting you? I know the most marvelous place. It’s divine.”

I’m always drawn to a sense of humor, especially when it belongs to a man. Most men deal with life seriously. That is the night when my husband declares that the grown-up version of Scout and Dill was born.

“Had you two known each as children, you would’ve been the spitting image of Scout and Dill. Harper Lee could have used you two as the models for the children in ‘To Kill A Mockingbird.’”

No doubt. 

“I can see his white linen shorts and matching jacket,” Tink continued.

“And a white shirt with a Peter Pan collar,” I added.

“Dill,” whose real name is Edward, has brought much laughter into my life. And aggravation. He hates to text, hates voicemail, and refuses to email. In other words, he has clung to his civility while the rest of us have tossed caution to the wind. Just like me, he grew up in a small, rural town where everyone knew each other. His town was more like Truman Capote’s hometown than mine. There were weekly teas and socials with women in their finery while Edward’s father and the other men hunted and fished. Edward preferred to follow his mother around and intently watch his grandmother, Mrs. Pughsley, as she arranged beautiful bouquets of flowers. In those days, there weren’t any Holiday Inns so she ran a stopover for tourists in a large Victorian house for those traveling to Savannah or Florida.

I can never remember the exact name so I call it “Mrs. Pughsley Home For Wayward Tourists.’” Dill’s eyes flair and he gives me a look that dares one more word to leave my mouth.

“THAT,” he says imperiously, “was not the name.” Then, he corrects me.

I laugh every time I think of Edward, in his little shorts and fancy shoes with socks, running into the hardware store to see his father. Since the moment he took my fingers and gently bowed, beginning an enduring friendship, he has told grand stories — like Dill — of the people who passed through Lyons, Georgia, and all who were kinfolk.

“You know, Edward, that was kinda’ like growing up on Walton’s Mountain,” I said one night. “Y’all never went anywhere but the whole world came to y’all.”

Edward forever corrects me — grammar, etiquette, fashion. One night, Tink and I met him for dinner. He sat my purse on the chair next to his and remarked, “Darlin’, this is a bag, not a purse.”

That was the moment that Chatham Balsam Colquitt IV was born. In a new mystery series, built around disgraced socialite Stella Bankwell, Chatty is her best friend. I can’t believe I’ve created a character with so much punch that readers adore him. In a rare text, Edward wrote, explaining that they were planning a class reunion. It soon spread through town that Edward had inspired the delightful Chatty. “So many have called and said it was wonderful that someone saw the potential in me. They’re begging me to come. I’ve never been to one. Thank you. It means so much because I thought none of them cared for me. I love you so much.”

Aw, the power of the written word.

—Ronda Rich is the best-selling of the Stella Bankwell mystery series. Visit www.rondarich.com to sign up for her free newsletter.