Bill Fortenberry

I received 3 handwritten notes in the mail recently from three leaders for my company's Teammate Appreciation Week. While I appreciated each and every one of those words, one particular sentence may have been the best compliment I could ever have received: “You may not be our ‘Dottie,’ but I think you might be our ‘Dolly.’” The “Dottie” reference is an inside joke. The Dolly reference? That’s DOLLY. As in Parton. As in one of the most respected humans on the planet. Dolly had just passed when...

I've had a manilla folder tucked away for nearly 30 years. Inside are three years of newspaper columns I wrote at the end of my tenure at the Rome News-Tribune. Other than for posterity, I don't know why I was saving them. They are snapshots, moments in time. They illustrate the life of a young father, a man grieving the loss of his father, a writer trying to understand the difference between "Southern" and stereotype. I pulled out that folder last week, inspired by an idea: What if I...

All I could see was a mountain between me and Athens. It wasn’t a roadblock with a detour sign. It was an honest-to-goodness “Road Ends Here.” I had been accepted to the University of Georgia, and I really wanted to go, but I couldn’t see a way forward. At 17, I didn’t understand it. I had worked so hard at being the good student, getting the best grades to ensure a path to college. I had received the “Yes,” but the wallet was empty. As a first-generation college student, my family had no...