We’ve just discovered something amazing that’s been around almost forever, and I can’t believe we never realized what we were missing.

Maybe everybody else already knows about it, but just in case you don’t, let me tell you.

Last Saturday, we drove up to Soapstone Baptist Church on Liberia Road near Pumpkintown. We could smell the food before we got out of the truck. And we walked into the church’s dining area and saw stretched out before us a feast.

Mabel Owens Clark, a longtime church member and resident of Little Liberia, is the chef who turns out some of the best food we’ve eaten.

There were smoked ribs, baked chicken, fried chicken, fried fish, fresh green beans, baked beans, fresh cream corn, steamed cabbage, squash casserole, turnip greens, candied sweet potatoes, potato salad, slaw, cornbread, rolls, iced tea, peach and cherry cobbler and if I’ve left anything out, please forgive me.

We feasted, as did many others sitting at the tables.

Soapstone Baptist Church has a small congregation now, and the monthly buffet is the primary support of the church.

Mabel cooks all the food herself, and on the third Saturday of each month, dinner is served at $10 a plate.

Not since I sat at my Grandmama’s table have I eaten real Southern cooking so perfectly seasoned.

In addition to an excellent meal, we were treated to an incredible view of the mountains. The church is built on a huge outcropping of soapstone and was established after the Civil War by freed slaves who settled on land bought from or received from former masters. Following the war, many landowners had land but no money to pay wages with. So former slaves worked in exchange for land.

They named the community Little Liberia.

Soapstone Baptist Church is the oldest African-American church in the Upstate. There was a school located next to the church, and although the original building is gone, the structure that replaced it still stands.

Nearby is located the slave cemetery, part of the Heritage Corridor tour. Those who rest there were born into slavery but died as free citizens.

Old tombstones can still be seen there, although the engravings on some have faded over the years until they appear as faint tracings.

But they are still there, as is the church. They stand as a testament to remarkable people who not only survived, but thrived. Many of the great-great-grandchildren of the first residents have spread out over the country, completing college and relocating to areas offering more diverse opportunities.

Clark is a wonderful resource for all kinds of information about the area and well worth talking to.

The only Saturday when no meal is served is the third Saturday in December, because the kitchen is closed for the holidays.

This year the meal will be served in November, and the wise among us will get in line for the last buffet of the year.

Well, it took me long enough, but I feel I am finally getting over the cold that I have been in the process of catching for a month now.

Most people are around somebody who has a cold, catch the disease, then are over it. But me, I seem to be able to hang around with somebody who has a cold for several weeks before actually catching the virus. When I finally catch it, I take just as long to recover.

This cold was one which I measured in how bad it could get. I caught it from my father, who was over his version of the virus the next day. But me, I just started sneezing often for a few days, and gradually it got worse. Some nights I could hardly get to sleep because of sneezing at night.

Finally, I guess last Friday I caught the disease full-fledged. It started acting up as soon as I got to the Easley-Greenwood high school football game. My nose started running as if it were an Olympic athlete. I simply found a seat on the visitors’ side of the field and let my nose run through the game. I even left before the Green Wave scored their last touchdown because I was so miserable. I meant to stay behind and get comments from Easley coach John Windham, but I couldn’t imagine anyone having anything to say to me but “Please don’t breathe your disease onto me.”

So to keep my quotes from being about snot, I went ahead and left early.

I got home and did not get much sleep that night due to my cold. I awoke the next day for the Clemson-Miami game, which started at noon. I fell asleep around halftime, then dozed through the rest of that game, and later the Florida State-Georgia Tech game.

Sunday we had lunch served at our church. I stayed at home being miserable. My mother brought me home a piece of chicken for lunch, and I enjoyed it as if it were a full meal.

Finally I went to bed during the first quarter of Sunday night’s Carolina Panthers game. After sleeping a few hours, I woke up in the middle of the night and my nose actually was not running. I tried this new process that people are calling breathing. It felt good, and I worked a few word-find puzzles and got my first decent night’s worth of sleep.

I woke up Monday morning and was ready to take on the world again.

My birthday is Halloween, and for a while I was afraid that the newspaper would read “Ben Robinson would have been” today.

So I am back. I’ve decided not to get sick anymore, because quite frankly I do not enjoy it. I’m ready to take on the world again.

Time for new leadership?

[cointent_lockedcontent]Dear Editor,

The people of Pickens County can be proud of their combined efforts to question and hold accountable the six county council members for their overreach on the fire fees. The council members were forced by the outcry to “suspend” the fire fee and remove it from 2015 tax bills. But all should be aware, this is only a temporary stoppage. They have said that it will be handled in some other manner. So hold on to your pocketbooks, taxpayers!

It was apparent at the Oct. 19 meeting that the council attempted to avoid the citizens by changing the meeting time from 6:30 pm to 5 pm. But even with the time change, the auditorium was overflowing into the hallway with questioning taxpayers. The repeated answer that came from the council members to the many issues put to them was, “We messed up and didn’t think this through.” If the multitude of people had not contacted and questioned these council members, the taxpayers would have had this fee applied to be owed and paid forever. And now we, the taxpayers, must pay for the cost of recalculating, reprinting, re-mailing and refunding payments for this incredible and unexplainable blunder.

One council member claimed pride in having been on the council for 12 years. The citizens should wonder how, with this experience, the council could just “mess up” handling our business and finances.

Four members of this council are up for re-election next year. Those four districts are Easley (Jennifer Willis), Liberty (Neil Smith), Pickens (Randy Crenshaw) and Dacusville (Tom Ponder). Perhaps it is time Pickens County has new leadership.

The citizens of Pickens County deserve more responsible and logical public servants. We must continue to monitor and hold accountable these elected officials.

And thank you, Pickens County Courier, for your excellent reporting on this issue.

Clova Vaughan

Easley

Surely, we are better than that

Editor:

I watched with interest last week as Hillary Clinton testified before the Benghazi Select Committee. The loss of four lives in Benghazi was indeed a tragedy, and we need to do everything possible to prevent any loss of life. Conservatives have certainly investigated this tragedy, perhaps to an extreme.

While we had no control over the attack in Benghazi, I am perplexed that in South Carolina, a state controlled by conservatives, we refuse to prevent similar tragedies that occur every week. More than four people die in South Carolina every week because they do not have access to healthcare.

A study done on Massachusetts residents after the implementation of Romneycare — the basis of Obamacare — concluded that for every 830 people having access to healthcare, there will be one fewer death per year. Thus, if we expand Medicaid and insure at least 172,640 people, we will save four lives per week. I have heard several estimates of how many would be covered by an expansion of Medicaid — the actual number would depend on the policies implemented by South Carolina — and the lowest estimate I have heard is 200,000.

Four lives per week, every week. Every week we don’t expand Medicaid, we allow four more citizens to die. Citizens that we have the ability to save!

We can do this without costing the state any money. The cost would be paid by the federal government. In fact, this money would boost the South Carolina economy.

Some will argue that they don’t like Obamacare. Then we can call it something else. Others states have put their own brand on their Medicaid expansion.

Some will argue that we don’t want to accept federal money to expand Medicaid.

Well, we had no trouble asking for federal assistance to repair damage done by the recent flooding. Could it be that the assistance for the flooding damage will assist many folks, both rich and poor, while Medicaid assists mainly the poor, who have little voice in our state government?

Surely, we are a better state than that!

Carl Fortson

Seneca

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