Bayou Gal (eBook)

Nelda Stidham-Woodruff (Autor)

eBook Download: EPUB

2025 | 1. Auflage
216 Seiten
Bookbaby (Verlag)
979-8-89901-582-3 (ISBN)

Infos

My mother asked me several times to write a book about she and some of her ancestors that lived off the land. I always said I couldn't write a book. Ten years after her death, i found a box of her things and a story she had written about herself. I knew then, it was time to write my mamas legend. From there, I wrote many other stories, including my life.

I was born in New Orleans in 1952. My father was in the US Air Force. That meant for the next 13 years we traveled all over the United States. I've lived in Japan and the Philippines as well. I have son and a daughter, and 3 beautiful grandchildren. I had many jobs in my journey through life, but the absolutely best one was hunting alligators and crawfishing with my mama.

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When Hurricane Betsy hit Louisiana in 1965, the first year that Nelda Stidham-Woodruff had moved back to the South from California, was an experience she'll never forget. Betsy was only the first in a chain of hurricanes and hot, humid climate in the bayou. Follow Nelda as she recounts some of the unbelievably dangerous encounters she's been through while living her best life in the Louisiana bayou. Filled with her passion for the bayou and the culture of the area, Nelda's stories will keep you on the edge of your seat and leave you craving Cajun cuisine and hot summers. In the spirit of "e;lagniappe"e; a little something extra Nelda has included several recipes for readers to try out at home!

Textauszug

Chapter 1 Where My Journey Began- Air Force Brats

Mama in her sports car

I was born in New Orleans, Louisiana on June 25, 1952. My sister Barbara was born July 26,1951, just 10 months and 29 days before I arrived. Dad was in the Air Force, stationed in Alaska. Nana, my dad’s mother, was there when my mother was going into the delivery room. They all were certain I was going to be a boy, and they planned to name me David Stidham Jr.

They hadn’t even thought about a girl’s name. When the doctor said it was a little girl, everyone was surprised, my mother even more so. Back in those days, there was no way to reach my dad in Alaska to ask him what he wanted to name his daughter.

Nana suggested “Then why don’t you name her after you, Nelda?”

Mama said, “That’s a great idea!”

That’s how I became Lil Nel.

Barbara and I were very close as we grew up; we did everything together. While dad was in Alaska, Mama, Barbara and I lived in Covington, Louisiana with my grandmother until dad got back from Alaska. Then he got his next assignment at Kadena Air Force Base in Okinawa, Japan, and that’s when our journeys began. We began learning what it meant to be Air Force brats.

Mama wasn’t afraid to do anything. She was only 21 years old, sailing halfway around the world with her two babies to live in Japan for a couple of years. The Land of the Rising Sun didn’t faze her; she was ready for any circumstance. It took us two weeks to get there by boat, and the ship was not like cruise ships of today. For Mama and her two little girls who had never been out of Louisiana, I’m sure Mama had her hands full.

Mama had some of the cutest little Japanese housekeepers. Their names were Suko and Chico. They loved playing with Barbara and me. Their diligent care gave Mom and Dad a chance to go on some hunting trips while there. It might be surprising to think of hunting in Japan, but they did. They were Louisiana people. We girls were still too young to learn to hunt, but we did learn to eat with chopsticks at a very young age.

One thing I remember about the seafood of Japan was seeing the biggest crabs I had ever eaten. There was also lots of snow, which we never got back home. Mom and Dad loved to play in the snow with us so these were happy times. We lived there for about three years and then Dad got new orders. It was back to the States and Dad had to report to Eglin Air Force Base in Panama City, Florida.

When we arrived at Eglin, we were amazed at the beautiful white beaches and the water that was crystal clear. Dad rented a house for us right on the beach, which was awesome. We loved to swim and play in the beautiful water, and we had a pair of white rabbits that played hide-n-seek with us. We lived the beach life for a couple of years. Then Dad was stationed in Massachusetts.

His assignment was to Hanscom Air Force Base. In echoes of Japan, we were back in cold country again, quite a change from the beach. Our disappointment was cured when Dad made a big skating rink in our yard. He framed off a big section and then called the fire department to come fill it in with water. This did great things for our social life. The rink was large enough for all the kids in the neighborhood to skate on.

Dad always thought about the other kids in the neighborhood, and they thought “Mr. Dave” was the greatest.

After about a year, Dad got orders to go to Tinker Air Force Base in Oklahoma City, Oklahoma, and that’s where I had the biggest scare of my young life. I didn’t know about the idea of “Tornado Alley” but I soon learned. The weather was getting bad, with dark and strange-looking clouds moving wildly. Then suddenly a tornado touched down on the ground. We were standing in front of a huge window in our house when we saw it, and heard a sound like a roaring train. We froze. Mama quickly pulled us away from the window. The last thing we saw was the tornado hit the house a block away from us. It was coming toward us quickly. I was crying, and Barbara was laughing hysterically. Mama was praying.

Then suddenly, the wind changed and lifted the tornado up and away from our house. Thank God, we were spared.

After about a year, Dad had to report to Norton Air Force Base in San Bernardino, California. That was a big relief, because we were ready to leave Oklahoma and its constant, awful tornado warnings.

Barbara and I were nine or ten years old at the time and moving to California sounded so exciting. It was a long drive there, and like so many other trips, Dad always made us do schoolwork. We had to do timetables, addition, subtraction, and English. But he always made sure we had fun, too. He would stop early in the evenings at hotels with pools so we could swim, eat a good dinner, get up early, and do it all over the next day.

We lived in a valley next to the beautiful San Bernardino Mountains. It was only a few hours ride up into the mountains to reach Big Bear Lake, Lake Arrowhead, and a popular attraction known as Santa’s Village. Just to the west of us, about an hour’s drive, was the Pacific Ocean. The first time I saw muscle men, surfers, and string bikinis was at a spot called Muscle Beach in Venice, California.

We had a great time for the next four years. Southern California was a wonderland for kids with Disneyland, Knott’s Berry Farm, and the San Diego Zoo. Hollywood was fascinating, too. Several of our cousins from Louisiana came to visit us. We always took them to Disneyland. Barbara and I were there seven times in the four years that we lived on the Norton base. Dad loved all the characters and he and Barbara loved the rides, but it was not so much for me and Mama. Dad would get me to go on rides that spun around to get me dizzy and vomit. He thought that was so funny, but that was Dad, always a jokester at heart.

I preferred a different kind of ride than those at amusement parks. Barbara and I got to go to a nearby ranch and ride horses all day. Mama wanted to make sure that we knew all about horses like she did. She always talked about her favorite horse, Beauty.

At one point, Mom and Dad thought it was time we learned how to hunt. They would take us out to the fields to hunt doves and pheasants. They not only taught us how to shoot, we learned to hunt with bow and arrows. Mama wanted to make sure that Barbara and I would be able to hunt with her once the family got back to Louisiana.

On every base that we lived on, Mama was always involved in the activities there. She was on a bowling team, and taught bowling on certain nights for all of us Air Force kids. I can’t even begin to count the trophies that she acquired over the years. Mama was an excellent golfer also, with many trophies to show for it. Everyone would say that about her. I think everything my mom did, she was good at it.

She would bring us to visit Dad on the base sometimes. We loved that. He would show us areas that were off-limits to the public. That was so exciting. One building, probably three stories tall had a gigantic screen covering the walls on the inside of the building. The screen was lit up with icons that represented planes. This was where they tracked military planes around the world, which was very fascinating.

Dad was a jet pilot; one of the planes he flew was the P-51 Mustang. Sometimes, during the day while Barbara and I were at school, a jet plane would fly over and then go straight up and break the sound barrier. We would wait for the sonic boom, then Barbara and I would look up in the sky and say “There goes our dad!” We were so proud of him

Mama bought a sports car, a beautiful Triumph TR-3 two-seater, candy apple red in color. Dad made a small bench to put in the back so that Barbara and I could ride with them. The previous owner of the car was Dennis Weaver, who played the character Chester on the long-running TV Western “Gunsmoke.” Mama looked so hot when she was driving that car. It’s the car that Barbara and I learned how to drive in. We didn’t mind one bit that it wasn’t an automatic. Mama thought it would be better to learn a stick shift first.

As we grew up, automobiles had prime importance. One reason was because Mama’s first cousin was race car driver Paul Candies. Dad loved the Funny Car races every Sunday, and for a while we would jump into Mom’s car and head off to the track. That was fun for all of us. We would all go to the movies in the Triumph and then out to eat somewhere. Most of the time we would go to McDonald’s or Taco Bell. All these treats were good and cheap back then. McDonalds was a big deal in San Bernardino because in 1940 the first McDonalds was built there.

Living in California in the early 60s could also be very challenging. There was a time that Barbara and I wanted to go shopping by ourselves, at a location not far away. We rode the bus there. We were on the sidewalk, window shopping, talking and having fun and minding our own business when suddenly two older black girls passed by. “Tell your friend she looks stupid in those shoes,” one of them said.

“Well #1, she’s not just a friend,” I replied. “She’s my sister, and #2 she didn’t look stupid.” Then I added, “She looks a hell of a lot better than you would.” That was a mistake, because she beat the heck out of us.

We decided to go in a store and Barbara was in front of me. When I reached for the door, something punched me square in the middle of my back and I lost my breath.

Barbara didn’t see what...

Produkt-Details

• Erscheint lt. Verlag: 16.5.2025
• Sprache: englisch
• Themenwelt: Literatur ► Biografien / Erfahrungsberichte
• ISBN-13: 979-8-89901-582-3 / 9798899015823