Writer falls in love with Cajun paradise
Print
Email
Save
Share
Del.icio.us
Digg
Facebook
Reddit
POOR MAN’S PROVENCE, FINDING MYSELF IN CAJUN LOUISIANA
By Rheta Grimsley Johnson
New South Books, $23.95
In 1996, newspaper columnist Rheta Grimsley Johnson wrangled an assignment from her editor in Atlanta. She was to cover a boar hunt in south Louisiana, but the story turned out to be a bit of a bust.
A group of young men were celebrating the pending marriage of one of their friends, “Michael Bolton of Baton Rouge.” They were at a pay-to-hunt lodge called Boarbusters Hunting Lodge. They were charged per animal they killed. They were using bows and arrows and when the first shot was fired, the shooter’s arrow “hit one hog, came out the other side and flew right on into another boar.” Both hogs were killed. This was not lagniappe. The party had a limited budget and had exhausted it with one shot.
Because the boar hunt had ended so early, Johnson and her husband, Don, had some free time to explore. So they drove into the Atchafalaya Basin and went looking for a marina. What they found was the little town of Henderson, hard by the levee on the west side of the Basin. They were enthralled. It sure wasn’t the scenery.
“Henderson’s main road, which runs for about two miles from the interstate exit to the levee, is flanked for half its distance by a big, weed-infested drainage ditch. When the ditch is full of water, which is often, the litter in it floats. Plastic drink bottles, beer cans, potato chip bags, and cigarette cartons all rise, flanking the town’s signature street with a soggy, 7-Eleven selection of refuse.”
No, it was the people that captured Johnson’s heart — and a houseboat called the Green Queen. Soon the couple were dividing time between homes in Atlanta, the town of Iuka, Miss., and Henderson. When Johnson quit full-time newspaper work to go into syndication, Atlanta got crossed off the list. They eventually sold the houseboat and bought a small house in Henderson where Don was free to go duck hunting and Johnson could ramble around seeing Louisiana and absorbing culture.
“I’d pick a destination from my stack of travel books and sling the camera strap over a shoulder. I might head for an old family bakery in Jeanerette that made superb ginger cakes, or a city called Rayne that boasted of its many frog murals painted on anything that would sit still, or an antique store housed in a defunct schoolhouse in the charming little town of Washington.” Sometimes Johnson would just set out with no particular destination in mind, no place except Louisiana. “Along the way to wherever I’d end up, I admired the sumptuous landscape.”
She learned a lot on her rambles. She visited a Mardi Gras courir (run). There were so many festivals and charming small towns to visit. She went to the Angola Prison Rodeo, which provided food for thought. But that wasn’t the only kind of food she found in Louisiana. Johnson learned that these people can cook.
“They call Louisiana the Pelican State, but only because I wasn’t in charge of naming it. I think Louisiana should be known henceforth and forevermore as the Plate Lunch State. There are more funky, blue highway blue plate specials in south Louisiana than anywhere else on earth.”
A Cajun couple, Johnelle and Jeanette Latiolais, practically adopt Johnson and her husband. They cook crawfish for them. Boudin. Roast and rice. They make them part of the eclectic scene at the Henderson levee. Johnson grows to love the Cajun people more and more, and she uses this book to give eloquent testimonial to that affection. Still, Johnson’s not above scolding the Cajuns for a few of their faults. The omnipresent litter drives her crazy. She hates the loud motorcycles and oversized pickup trucks. She tries to give cockfighting a fair evaluation, but her distaste for the practice shows through. Racism casts a lingering shadow on some parts of the bayou, she finds. Drugs mar the lives of too many young people there. Cell phones are nearly as bad as the mosquitoes in Henderson. But along with learning new words and trying new foods, Johnson absorbs a lesson in Cajun tolerance when one of her neighbors informs her that if she doesn’t like the way things are in Henderson, maybe she should just get out — love it or leave it. She doesn’t want to get out.
“So I do not leave. I love.”
Johnson is not the first person to take the geographic cure and find solace in an exotic location, although Henderson is not quite Provence (the title is a reference to the hit book A Year in Provence). The difference between Johnson and other nomads is that she has the keen perspective and fine writing skills to bring her insights to the page. She’s not just a rolling stone either. She still has her place in Henderson and still lives there part of the time. Her abiding love of the people and place shine through in her writing. Louisiana’s bruised image could use more healing like Johnson’s book provides.
Monday, May 12, 2008
7:43 AM