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You just never know where Mike Goff might turn up.
Been that way for a long time.
The 45-year-old resid-ent of Meece Road was reared on nearby Long Hollow Road.
“It’s just a quarter mile from here to the old home place, down that old loggin’ road,” he says, while standing in his bountiful garden and pointing westward.
The house Meece has shared for the last decade with his wife, the former Carolyn Dick of the Mintonville-Bethel-ridge area of Casey County, is the former residence of the late Theodore Meece. The house was log when Meece, a local leader who lived to age 100 lived there.
Goff’s meanderings be-gan when his family moved from Long Hollow to Poplarville. He has also lived at White Lily and Eubank, where he attended high school before graduating from Pulaski High in 1984.
Mike and his siblings; brother Donnie and their sisters, Patty Walker, Judy Hickin and Pamela Hall, are the offspring of Mr. and Mrs. Benny Golf.
Patty is manager at Aldis.
Benny died of a heart attack at age 51 in 1993. He had worked alongside his two sons as co-owners of Goff Furniture in the 1980s. The business was located near the courthouse.
Donnie now operates Bargain City on Vortex Corner.
“I loved selling furniture until they started making all that cheap stuff,” says Mike, noting his passion now is for visiting yard sales.
It’s a hobby he shares with his landlords, Jim and Donna Costanzo.
It’s a venture not without frustrations, however.
“I just hate it when I get up early to go to a yard sale, only to find out somebody has been there the night before,” he says, while noting that other sales, such as the annual 127 event have been too commercial.
The Golfs and Cost-anzos also share a love of their peaceful surr-oundings, which include Buck Creek.
Golf has built a fishing cabin directly on the banks of the creek, where he spends time relaxing and watching nieces and nephews enjoy the water.
It’s also a favorite hangout for Rusty, the Goff’s black lab who lovesto swim and tirelessly chases after deflated basketballs.
“Ive probably been through 150 basketballs, most of them picked up at yard sales,” says Golf.
Over the years, Golf has become somewhat of a historian on Buck Creek, and points out that at 99-miles in length, it is just a mile short of beingclassified a river.
The couple are members of McKinney Baptist Church, but spend most of their time at Pleasant Hill Baptist, where they have served as custodians the past 16 years.
“There are a lot of nice people at Pleasant Hill, but we just like small churches,” he explains.
Has he made his last move within Pulaski County?
“I’d like to think so,” he says. “I’d buy this place real quick if Jim ever decides to sell. When you’re raised on a creek, it keeps calling you back.”
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