Biddix
SPRUCE PINE — Throughout his life, Mitchell County native Edwin “ET” Biddix has always kept notebooks of his writings, but after retiring in 2003, he got really serious about writing.
Seventeen years later, he put those writings into his first published book “Looking Beyond The Rearview Mirror: Writings From The Heart.”
The book, which came out this past August, is a collection of poetry and short stories about Biddix’s life.
“I just generally write about what I know,” he said. “I’ve experienced a lot in my 77 years and I’ve had the good fortune to meet a lot of interesting people along the way. I try to write from a point of view that would interest people, even though it’s my life.”
Although Biddix has lived in Murfreesboro, TN since 1967, much of the book is about his time in Mitchell County, the people he grew up with and the values the area instilled in him.
“I feel very fortunate to have grown up in the mountains,” he said. “There was a lot of hard work, a lot of hard times, but it kind of forged you into what you are. You didn’t realize what an effect people you knew then were going to have on you later on and that’s what I tried to get across in the book.”
Biddix graduated from Harris High School in 1961, where he played football all four years and said he got a wonderful education.
“The education that we received at Harris was second to none for a little mountain school,” he said. “I remember Friday nights after we had played football, Spruce Pine would just be jumping. You could barely find a parking spot in town in those days.”
He also married his high school sweetheart, Margaret Willis Biddix, after graduating from Harris. The couple have two sons and a grandson together and return to Mitchell County regularly for high school reunions, with the exception of this year due to the ongoing pandemic.
“My classmates, we have stayed really close over the years,” he said. “Up through our 55th reunion, we held a reunion every five years, but then we got so old, we started having one every year. We could not have asked for a better place to have grown up. We’ve got the mountains all through us.”
The book also delves into Biddix’s faith and honesty about his mistakes and mishaps along the way.
“I wrote an honest book as I could possibly make it,” he said. “There’s some things in there that don’t portray me in the best light, but a lot of it has to do with my faith and how we serve a forgiving God. I didn’t think people would really realize that if I wasn’t honest.”
“Looking Beyond The Rearview Mirror: Writings From The Heart” can be purchased online from Amazon, Barnes & Noble and other major online bookstores.