I truly appreciate all the kind gifts I receive at Christmas.  It's wonderful to be remembered, and we really got to know the UPS man as he brought one box after another to the house.  But it seems like everything I got was edible.  Deliciously, so.
 
From a friend in Baltimore I received a tin of cookies from a famous old bakery up there...they tasted more like candy...chocolate covered morsels that melt into your mouth and send ten pounds to your belly.  And from a woman who used to work for me, I got three different kinds of cookies from another Baltimore bakery.  (Baking is big in Baltimore; all those German immigrants brought their best recipes when they came.)
 
One of my granddaughters got me some fancy blackberry jam and a jar of Carmel sauce.  I love blackberries...and fight with the birds to get the ones that grow by the road near my house.  Last season I decided to share with the birds.  Actually they get up earlier than I do and you know the saying, "The early bird gets the blackberries."
 
I got a coconut pound cake from an old friend in Maryland whom I have known since 8th grade.  Her husband died two years ago so last Christmas she didn't feel in the mood to cook and send
gifts.  But thank goodness she's back in the kitchen rattling those pots and pans.
 
I also got three pound cakes from one of my grandsons...one is chocolate, another is key lime, and the other one is cappuccino. They each feel like they weigh ten pounds.  These are real pound cakes.
 
We also had a Yule Log cake for Christmas Eve...a cake made in a jelly roll pan...filled with thick whipped cream...covered in thick chocolate and made to resemble a log.  It even had little mushrooms (made from meringue) on it.  Beautiful and tasty.
 
A friend of mine who is a blacksmith gave me a loaf of bread and a jar of peanut butter and jelly..."to remember all those times when we were on the road together and ate nothing but peanut butter and jelly sandwiches."  I say it's the thought that counts because we also ate a lot of bar-b-que.
 
I got a box of Bissinger's chocolates...they are apricots covered part way with chocolate.  They are almost too beautiful to eat.  But I'll try.
 
My friend Charlie who has been my friend for sixty years always sends me a fruitcake which he makes using his mother's recipe.  Even though he has a big family, one by one they have told him to hold off on the fruitcakes.  Of course it broke his heart because he was hoping they would ask for the recipe before he dies.  I'm the only person that thanks him and eats the cake.  This year he was back in business in a big way because he had remarried after sixteen years of living alone.  His new wife has a big family so he was able to make fruitcakes for a whole new group.
 
I got some venison from one of my granddaughters...it's not fattening unless you make country fried steaks out of it, which I do.  My sweet granddaughter shot this one.  She's quite a hunter and a good shot.
 
My children used to give me a box of chocolate covered cherries every year at Christmas.  The oldest one will soon be fifty and I was thinking that they had grown out of the chocolate covered cherry habit.  But, alas, there was a box of them.  From my wife.
 
I feel blessed with all these goodies and hopeful I'll get some visitors who will help me eat some of this stuff.  Otherwise I'll have to spend a bunch of money on new and bigger clothes.

Joe Adams
  
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BUTTER BEANS FOR THE SOUL, a funny book by Joe Adams about growing up in the South is available at the Pace General Store in Saluda.
 

If you enjoy Joe's column in Saluda Lifestyles, please let him know. You can email him at americaohyes@gmail.com.