Do you have a place at the Liar’s Table? Every small town has one. It’s the place where men enjoy fellowship and copious amounts of coffee, and can stay as long as the waitstaff will allow them.

Throughout this summer, every Wednesday morning our women’s group has met at a local diner called Bundy Hill. It’s a great place on a busy road, on a hill in front of a gravel pit. The food is fabulous, the coffee is great, the cook is talented, and the waitresses are the best.

We have created our only little niche in the diner where the waitresses pull two tables together and save our spot from the men. I think they enjoy our female fellowship, among a clientele that is as predictable as the sun rising in the east and setting in the west.

Invariably there is one sweet old man who stops by our table and greets us with a smile. Bud, in his eighties, is retired from the road commission and knows a lot of folks in the county. He enjoys telling stories about his baseball prowess as a youth and recounting his children’s athletic accomplishments from the 1970s.

This week Bud sat down with us and told us about his wife, who has dementia. He bragged about what a great wife she has been for 68 years and how they met at a very young age.

He expressed his frustration with this disease, but I never once felt as though this man felt defeated. He still had as much enthusiasm for life and for people as I imagined he had when he was in his forties, going full-throttle.

As he talked, I looked around at the people in that diner and began to see what a benefit that Liar’s Table is for so many folks. It not only serves as a place of nourishment for the body but of encouragement for the soul.

Oh sure, these men will share savory stories of the neighborhood, but they will also share concerns of life. They will talk politics, discuss solutions for the local schools, and what the preacher said last Sunday.

The Liar’s Table is filled with men who need a reprieve from a spouse with physical demands, wayward children, or who need to learn how to deal with a son-in-law. These are men who have been around the block, with knowledge to share and inspiring stories to motivate.

These dated diners scattered throughout rural America serve as a place for neighbors to keep in touch, history to be kept alive, and older men to keep their brains moving and healthy. Mentoring takes place there. Encouragement is offered there, and capitalism thrives there.

The local diner is often labeled as a place of idle gossip, but I contend it’s where life happens. The bonds of friendship are tightened, traditions are kept, and people’s lives are sustained, encouraged, and edified. This is the fabric of our country that takes every unique life and weaves it together to create a beautiful portrait of America.

The views and opinions expressed in this column are those of the author and not necessarily those of Farm World. Readers with questions or comments for Melissa Hart may write to her in care of this publication.