Patsy Boone, 77, of Whitsett, N.C., died Saturday, and with her went a voice shaped by the accents and experiences of the old South. Not the old South of magnolia blossoms and harpsichords in the parlor, but a South where the sweet essence of honeysuckle mingled with the sharp odor of fertilizer at the edge of blistering red-clay fields. 

It was the voice you used to hear coming from the back porches of rural homes where women shelled peas and beans or peeled peaches in preparation for canning.

I discovered it one day when Patsy made a telephone call to me. I was in Mobile, Ala., and she called me from Whitsett to tell me about the virtues of her hometown.

I started typing as soon as I heard her accent, eager to get a word-for-word rendition of a voice that seemed to echo out of my early childhood.

After that, it was I who made the telephone calls, asking Patsy for comments on issues of the day, not because I wanted informed opinions, but because I wanted to hear her talk.

Readers reacted in different ways. Patsy was not an intellectual. She lived with her widowed sister, Annie Ruth, in a two-story white house in Whitsett that had been built by their father. Our conversations generally revolved around what was going on in Whitsett and in nearby Burlington; the creatures that inhabited their house and its environs; whimsical comments on the comings and goings of her neighbors in Whitsett, not always appreciated by the subjects.

But I eventually learned that this simple small-town North Carolina woman had traveled. She had been to Europe, to Greece and Turkey and to the Caribbean, not always knowing exactly where she was and what she was seeing, but always taking it in with the awe of small-town eyes taking in the wonders of the world.

Some thought I was being condescending and disrespectful when I quoted Patsy verbatim. Patsy apparently thought not. 

“Could you not have found some way to avoid the direct quotes that were anything but complimentary for your subject?” asked one reader.

Some of her neighbors in Whitsett thought she was giving the town a negative image, and when she told me that, I stopped writing about her.

Patsy moved into Liberty Commons, an assisted-living home in Elon, after a fractured hip made it impossible for her to get around in the family home.

She embraced her new surroundings and was named “Miss Liberty Commons.” A crown went with the title.  Patsy loved to sing. Her niece, Karen Boone, recalled that she had a sweet voice, and I remembered the phone call I had made to her after she moved into Liberty Commons. She sang “Let Me Call You Sweetheart” into my ear, and I loved it.

A memorial service for Patsy will be conducted at 2 p.m. Saturday at the home of her brother, Tom, at 1428 Kirkpatrick Road in Burlington.

As a sort of memorial of my own, I’d like to share with you again some of my favorite quotes from Patsy:

On doctors: “I’m gonna tell you the dad-blamed truth: I doubt if the doctor listens to his ownself. They don’t even have time to take care of their dad-blamed self.”

On dentists: “I never did like dentists, you know. I think I’ve had one set of false teeth that I ever remember. I learned to chew as good without them as I could with them.”

Patsy cultivated a disdain for false teeth during the years she earned extra money by “staying around” with older people. Sometimes her clients would eat in bed and tuck their dentures under the pillow. Patsy disliked coming across them when she made the beds.

On her trip to England: “As far as me seeing any what you call queens and kings, I didn’t know. They had a lot of old-looking buildings. They’ve got their bars and things that people like to go in and drink.”

On visiting Germany: “It was ‘the fuehrer was there, the fuehrer was there.’ I don’t give a dad-blamed hoot about the fuehrer. I didn’t think much of him then; I don’t think much of him now.”

On French cuisine: “They had great big old dogs running loose in the cafe. Well, that was the last I eat of that food, as they say.”

On French art: “There was that place in France where I went to this Notre Dame cathedral. … I am not too stupid that I don’t recognize beautiful art when I see it, and it was beautiful.”

On the leaning tower: “I will say I saw the Leaning Tower in France. I didn’t go up in it. I was probably being cowardly. … If you want to know the truth, I’ve seen the tower; I’ve seen pictures of it. It ain’t nothing but a building there, and I don’t see that it’s all that important.”

Karen tells me that Patsy died after a lengthy illness. She finally was transferred from Liberty Commons to a hospice. I recalled what she had said about a previous trip to a hospital:

“They put you to sleep, and I’m glad they do. I don’t think a thing in the world about setting there and looking there and counting what they’re doing and that. Anybody wants to ask me what happened, I can’t tell ‘em. It’s better that way.”

I hope her final sleep came peacefully. If you’re ever passing the N.C. 61 exit on I-85 east of Greensboro, give Patsy a shout-out.

I will.

Write Gene Owens at 315 Lakeforest Circle, Anderson SC 29625, or email him at WadesDixieco@AOL.com