It’s time to back up now and fill you in on an ongoing thread that was about to change our lives. In November last year, an old friend of mine looked me up online and got in touch with me.
I’d only known him for three years, thirty-four years ago, but it was a memorable relationship.
He is now living in a small town in northwestern South Carolina, but had a condo in Daytona Beach, FL. After a bit of exchanging emails back and forth, Pat decided to come down from Daytona and visit us for a day in late December or early January.
Chelsea and I had a great time. It was peaceful and though we should have been packing, it was nice to have a change of pace and think about something besides downsizing.
We kept in touch over the next weeks and months. Pat kept encouraging us to come up to South Carolina, telling us we could go sailing, whitewater rafting, go on motorcycle rides on the Blue Ridge Parkway, and generally de-stress in a gorgeous environment.
It sounded pretty darn good to us.
I wasn’t sure how it would work out though, so we went ahead and firmed up the plans with Heuetta, and in due time found ourselves in Gueydan.
Pat followed our progress with great interest, and when he became aware that the trailer was too small for us to set up a double office, and there didn’t seem to be any alternatives, he began to set up arrangements for us to stay in a home up near him.
Pat’s cabin is on a small river. A nearby neighbor has a home next to Pat on the river, but is building a much larger home on the top of the hill on his sixty-acre parcel.
In addition to those two homes, he has a family home/cabin halfway up the hill between the river house and the new home under construction. Are you still with me?
This family home has two bedrooms and one bath, with a large mudroom downstairs. It’s got a small deck, a washer and dryer, heat and air conditioning.
His family had been living in the home partway up the hill for quite a few years, but his wife and kids moved to a nearby town last summer. The house has been vacant since then.
Jim, the neighbor, agreed that Chelsea and I could housesit for a few months with the caveat that we’d take care of the chickens.
It sounded perfect to us, so we began making arrangements to leave, calculating mileage, costs, rides, and figuring out transportation. When all was said and done, Pat had agreed to drive down to Montgomery AL to pick us up and Kenneth agreed to take us up to Montgomery if we’d cover his gas costs.
We set a date of Monday the nineteenth to leave.
Getting Ready to Leave and Last Minute Visits
Now that we knew we were leaving we made an increased effort to see people.
On Thursday we met Max at the Methodist Church. We had a chance to say hi and visit for a few minutes while checking out the old parsonage, our home away from home in 2008 and 2009.
We loved that old parsonage and spent many a wonderful hour there. One of our all-time favorite memories of that house is those warm wood floors lit with mellow sun streaming through spacious windows.
We didn’t stay long with Max as we had schedules to be maintained. We sailed off for a quick visit to Jamie and Sean Gayle before heading home to change and meet Max for lunch.
Ever had a Cajun margarita? We hadn’t, at least until Max took us to the Regatta, a new restaurant right on the water in Lake Arthur. With its light wood interior, plants, spare decorating look, and spacious deck on the water, it reminded us of a touch of California flavored with south Louisiana.
The food was great. Thanks to Max’s suggestions we ordered something we wouldn’t ordinarily have and that would reflect the local cuisine (crawfish etouffee, what else?), though we all agreed he made the best choice with his barbecued shrimp.
The Cajun margarita was a disappointment, but it looked beautiful. The Cajun flavor was merely Tony Chachere’s seasoning salt sprinkled into a very weak and otherwise flavorless margarita.
I’m happy to report that the service was quite pleasant, the weather was gorgeous, and the view was both beautiful and relaxing, though catching up with Max was definitely the best part of lunch.
Like Kenneth did two weeks earlier when he brought us the long way home from Jennings, Max treated us by taking the scenic route from Lake Arthur back to Gueydan. It gave us a few extra minutes to talk.
Once again, the bittersweet knowledge of leaving so soon flavored the joy of the visit.
Friday was blissfully quiet as we started packing, hung out with Kenneth on the back porch, talked to Heuetta at lunch, and generally had a peaceful day.
Wild Weekend
Saturday on the other hand was fast-moving from start to finish.
The morning was pretty enough to have the trailer door open. I had the best spot to keep an eye on the mulberry tree outside, so I whiled away a few moments watching the tree, feeling slow and unwilling to get going.
I got a perfect excuse to sit longer when a noisy, active flock of cedar waxwings landed in the tree. We oohed and aahed for well over an hour watching the antics of the waxwings as they gobbled up the ripe berries.
Chelsea of course had the camera clicking nonstop. We were absolutely thrilled with a couple of the photos. What personalities those waxwings have! It doesn’t hurt either that they are such a pretty bird. We love the bandit look.
Our follow-up to the cedar waxwings was a very fun two and a half hour visit with Jane Hair at the Museum. Much to our good fortune the Swamp Spirit display was still up, so we wandered slowly around examining all the artists’ interpretations.
Meanwhile Jane ran across the street for lunch for all of us. We ate a decadent meal of juicy hamburgers with all the fixin’s, accompanied by root beer and fries. We don’t do that too often!
We couldn’t bring ourselves to leave. We kept delaying and delaying, so by the time we finally did leave we were running late for our afternoon schedule. As before, we didn’t say good-bye to Jane, we simply said “see you later”.