This book originated in letters written to a long distance daughter in hopes that she would absorb family tales and traditions through them. That didn't work, but I continued writing the stories, branching out into observations of friends and colleagues along the way.
My grandmother wrote for "Harper's," "Atlantic," and other magazines and taught English at a Southern college. She was best known as a poet, and her obituary was written by Robert Penn Warren. My mother wrote short stories for the magazines that used to be called "The Seven Sisters." They both encouraged me throughout their lives in their own non-gentle ways, like laughing in derision at poor syntax or faulty plot premises or, in one case, throwing a glass of wine in my face.
I've written professionally since 1975, pieces from obituaries to children's stories, librettos to radio ads for fish sausage. 
I believe a writer should pay readers for their company by entertaining them. I also believe that writing, cooking, and music are the same art, with dialogue and description interacting the same way basic ingredients and spices or rhythm and lead do. That's pretty much my philosophy of writing. Oh, and I intentionally choose words of either Latin or German origin to create  character and backdrop images properly in readers' minds.
At a beer garden flanking a slow, Southern river on a warm, Spring day, a transplant to the South from one of those Yankee square states looked around at familiar characters at other tables, and then said to me, "You know, Arthur, it's as if the rest of the country is black and white, and down here, it's technicolor. That kept me going, and I hope readers will agree with my former Yankee friend.