From Somewhere

My parents both grew up in a very small town called New Roads, Louisiana in Pointe Coupee Parish. This is near Baton Rouge and sits on an oxbow lake that used to be a part of the Mississippi River. Even today this town looks like its stuck in the 1950s. Things move very slow in New Roads and most things just don't change. My Dad's family has a plantation there that has been in the family since before the civil war.

As a kid I moved around a lot since my Dad was in the Air Force. But we were from New Roads. We lived there for a while when I was in elementary school but even when we lived elsewhere it was always home. And during the summers when we were away we would head back to New Roads.

Of course, the place to stay was Grandma and Grandpa Gremillion's house. Days were spent down on the lot, a camp my Grandpa bought on False River. The lot is where the fishing happened. Cleaning fish was just something you did! And fish fries were the best. Grandma and Aunt Helen would make the special mustard based corn meal breading to fry in. Plus you got lots of hush puppies. All the Gremillion cousin's were there. There was lots of swimming, jumping off of the pier, boating and water skiing.

Dad's parents lived on the 'river'. Visits to Grandma and Paw Paw Morrison's house on False River was good fun. This was across from the backery so fresh donuts would be had by all. The snowball stand was just down the road too! And Grandma kept those small coke bottles in the closet down the hall. Chris and I would then head down to the river and check out the crawfish towers and play on the pier.

Some days we would head to Gretchen street. This is were all the first cousin's lived (14 of them total). Often we would play kick the can until late at night.

And the fancy diners were at the original Ralph and Kacoo's before it even thought about becoming a chain.

New Roads remains strong roots for me. I could go on and on about so much of the place. These are my memories and traditions.

The thing I wonder is what my kids will think about when somebody asks them where are they from? They are a product of the burbs. My wife and I are from different places and we have moved here after moving around ourselves. Our parents gew up in small town America. Our generation has moved around to where the work is. And now our kids have these extended roots but not deep roots. Some gravitate to our past roots and some of the kids want to chart their own course into unknown places. I guess they would just say they are from Flo Mo...