You used to couldn't talk to him about history,

Source: MM is a written record of a spoken interview. Full Context: handshake. On most days, just getting up out of his chair and sitting back down is a challenge. Several weeks ago, John Napier, the former South Carolina congressman and a Thurmond friend, dropped by the senator's office. Thurmond motioned Napier to come sit with him. Thurmond pulled an empty chair next to his desk, real close. " I miss you, " he told Napier. " Come back and visit me more often. I miss you. " # Increasingly, friends say, Thurmond is revisiting his past. " You used to couldn't talk to him about history, " Napier says. " More and more he's willing to reflect. " # Sometimes, out of the blue, Thurmond will regale visitors with almost verbatim recollections of important moments in his public life -- like the time, in 1941, that Circuit Judge Thurmond defused a shootout in Edgefield County, S.C. # He likes taking drives -- to visit Civil War sites or just to see the cherry blossoms. He comes to the office whether the Senate (MM is a written record of a spoken interview)