Category: Louisiana Life

Stormy weather never frightened me until I lived in Louisiana and finally realized it could be lethal. You get a lot closer to God during a hurricane and/or its close companion, the tornado, both we’ve lived through. Bad weather is especially frightening in a trailer, often euphemistically called a “mobile home” but literal in the sense that these things will become mobile quickly given the right circumstances that have nothing to do with truck transport. I’ve grown to believe only idiots voluntarily ride out hurricanes if they have any other option, which we had but failed to capitalize on after two false alarms and most uncomfortable nights sleeping on what we called “the railroad tracks.” Continue reading “Underwater Living with Hurricane Juan”

Sharing any abundance was a Cajun norm shown me countless times and in many ways.

Gifts of food were so common I’ve long forgotten the bulk of them, but one shrimp haul I do remember well came from a family that only had a small boat, often called a Lafitte skiff, a boat only used in the more sheltered areas and not out in the open Gulf of Mexico where the larger trawlers the kids called “steel hulls” plied the open water. The smaller wooden boats were commonly hand-built by the fishing family or a local who specialized in that sort of boat building. Lots of good welders and ship fabricators inhabited the area and I often saw the welding sparks fly as another steel hull was being built along Bayou Grand Caillou. Continue reading “A New York Yankee in Cajun Country Part 2”

She was barely school age in her bright white dress, ether going to, or more likely as I was, coming back from church on one of the holiest days of the Christian calendar. On that warm Easter in a Winn Dixie parking lot I waited for my wife to exit the big grocery store in Houma with our Sunday favorite, fresh from the oven French bread done no better anywhere else. Eager for the weekly treat, one so tantalizing in expectation I played Pavlov’s Dog after the bell rang, I didn’t know I would soon get something far better than bread, spiritual soul food that still makes me smile decades later.

By this time, I’d restored and moderately hot-rodded a 63 Karmann Ghia and installed a nice cassette deck and high-fidelity speakers. I’d just popped in a Little Richard tape not expecting to connect so deeply to Richard’s southern roots, and was tapping my fingers on the steering wheel to “Whole Lotta Shakin’ Goin’ On” when I looked out at a dance exhibition I sparked about 10 yards away. Continue reading “A New York Yankee in Cajun Country Part 1”