Henry Michael Watts owned his stool at the Brown-Gardiner Drug diner.
He hadn’t bought it. But he sat on that stool on the counter’s left side most weekday mornings for decades. It was in every meaningful sense his stool.
It can now be retired. Because Mike, as everyone knew him, died Jan. 20. He was 79.
I met Mike at the diner in Greensboro, North Carolina, and shared his breakfast banter for five years. The diner is an artifact from decades ago, a survivor in an age of fast-food blandness.
Mike, too, was a throwback and antidote to blandness. Gruff. Shameless. Crude. Politically and culturally incorrect.
As diner manager Kendra Sells Roach noted, he asked most Mondays if your weekend had involved “intoxication and intercourse.”
He sometimes needed telling off – and didn’t object. That was Mike.
But not all of Mike. He cared. Checked in if you were sick. Invited you to lunch if hurting. Gave money to people in need. Rescued animals. Cared.
He’s to be cremated and mixed with his pets’ ashes. That was Mike. I miss him.
Friends and loss
She’s not gone. But you’re alone
Sweet story, Jeff. But don’t tell Mike that. Thanks for starting my day off well.
Darlene
Thank you, Darlene.
Oh hell ..the stories I could tell of Mike…We dived together…. . probably had a drink or 12 together…He was a member of a gun club I shoot at ….he kept saying I’m going to surprise you and show up and shoot with ya …..I kept saying I was going to meet ya at the Drug Store for breakfast ……neither happened ……They both should have !!!…
BUT out of this I found this 30 second read site
Thanks for the write up Jeff ….stay safe .V
Van, thanks so much. I went shooting once with Mike. I didn’t know what I was doing, and he was a patient teacher. He’s gone too soon for sure.
wanna go back and shoot let me know !!!! I refered to Mike as a Chicken House ….a lot of noise andd full of crap !!!!!! V