Gene mixes his eggs and grits up real good, drinks his black coffee and puffs away at his second Carlton cigarette of the meal. A tattered navy ball cap with ``FILS'' on the front rests next to his plate. So does a portable police radio scanner, turned off, that looks like a walkie-talkie.

That hat I found on the street. I have seven more back at the house . . . I used to monitor the Charlotte Fire Department, and now I try to monitor the Rock Hill Fire Department . . . I play spoons at home, they call me spoon man.

Tom has just returned from Switzerland, where he helped introduce Gene's work to an international audience by making remarks at the opening of a new exhibit at the Collection de l'Art Brut, one of the world's most prestigious folk art museums. The museum has bought 59 of Gene's sketches.

``They try to find artists that are uninfluenced by mainstream artists,'' Tom says. ``Gene's really interesting in that he uses popular culture - movies and television - but after that, it's all Gene, all Gene.''

I draw when I don't get too tired, and then I sit down to let my mind rest.

Last fall Gene's art was on display at Winthrop University Galleries, and later this year the S.C. State Museum plans a traveling exhibit.

``There's a real consistency to all of his drawings,'' Tom says. ``They're raw. A lot of trained artists might think they lack a lot of sophistication. But when you look at the body of work as a whole, it's just, God, so entertaining, so wonderful.''

Gene mostly profiles heads, using segmented lines, almost puzzle-like. He draws Clint Black, ``MASH'' characters, ``Deep Space Nine'' characters, country western singers, Humphrey Bogart, old TV characters from ``The Honeymooners'' and ``I Love Lucy.''

What style is his work?

Tom laughs at the unanswerable question. ``That's Gene's style.''

That's what you call hillbilly style.

OK.

``The thing is, it's hard to describe these in typical art terms, because they defy typical art,'' Tom says. ``Some of his work is a little cubist, which is interesting, because he knows nothing about that.'' Cubism was Pablo Picasso's genre.

Tom, who had owned the drawings the Swiss museum bought, used the $2,000 he got to help pay some of Gene's expenses, and to set up an account for Gene to eat at the Watkins Grill.

Gene used to walk to Watkins every day to sit at his corner table and eat and draw, but now he comes less often because his 61-year-old feet hurt.

This damn weather sure makes a mess out of me.

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