Have you ever met anyone who lives his or her life strictly &8220;by the book?&8221;

While it sounds like an admirable trait, living in a world with no &8220;gray area&8221; can be a little annoying, if not downright troublesome, sometimes.

Living &8220;by the book&8221; often conjures up images of the lovable, but flawed, character Barney Fife from the classic television series, &8220;The Andy Griffith Show.&8221;

The one-bullet toting deputy often served as both the comic relief and the person learning the moral lessons in the shows.

Generally, the plots would run something like this:

Barney would spot some normally law-abiding person breaking the law &8212; jaywalking, littering or even making moonshine. The offense wasn&8217;t as important as Barney&8217;s &8220;by the book&8221; handling of it. Barney would slap the cuffs on grandmothers and children alike. No one was above the book of law.

Usually, somewhere about halfway through the 30-minute comedy-dramas, Sheriff Andy Taylor would step in and help his &8220;black or white&8221; deputy.

Sheriff Taylor would help Barney see that a few shades of gray &8212; and a few levels of understanding and tolerance &8212; were the way problems or misunderstandings were best resolved.

Andy Taylor was a fictional character, but wouldn&8217;t it be nice if he existed and lived in Natchez?

The good sheriff could almost certainly help our community navigate through our differences with his homespun logic. He could probably help us all get along a little better and keep focused on our commonalities instead of our differences.

A good example of an unfortunate situation with which Andy Taylor could have helped with locally is the one that occurred between the Adams County chapter of the American Red Cross and the United Way of the Greater Miss-Lou.

A couple of months ago, the Red Cross learned that it would receive no direct funds from the United Way, only funds donated to the United Way which donors earmarked for the Red Cross.

The loss of funds &8212; Red Cross board members estimate the previous United Way funding represented approximately 25 percent of the local Red Cross&8217; annual budget &8212; was obviously a huge blow to the chapter.

What is staggering, however, is what is allegedly at the root of the change this year &8212; paperwork.

United Way officials say the Red Cross simply didn&8217;t follow the new directions for this year when applying for funding. Specifically, certain paperwork required for the first time this year wasn&8217;t provided, United Way personnel have said.

Red Cross leaders say they tried to comply and believed they had done so correctly.

A few e-mails and faxes were apparently exchanged in an effort to resolve the problems with doing things &8220;by the book.&8221; Did the United Way really just skip the funding because of missing paperwork?

It&8217;s difficult not to think that somewhere in the mix is a &8220;Barney Fife&8221; who is adamant that all the I&8217;s must be dotted and all the T&8217;s must be crossed &8212; regardless of the results.

Or, perhaps, something more is at play here.

For some reason, although neither side will publicly speak about it much, there seems to be more than paperwork dividing the two groups. Some bad blood seems to be lurking just below the excuse of poor paperwork.

If that&8217;s the case, that is a shame.

Both groups have long served this community well and the community would be better served if both groups were cooperating together rather than e-mailing one another about paperwork.

With only four or five blocks separating the downtown offices of the United Way and the Red Cross, Andy Taylor would certainly have known what to do: get them together for a brief talk.

Books are great to read and rules are necessary to keep things orderly. However, at some point doing things by the book is less important than doing what&8217;s right. Even Barney Fifes can eventually see that.

Kevin Cooper

is associate publisher of The Natchez Democrat. He can be reached at 601-445-3539 or

kevin.cooper@natchezdemocrat.com

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