We’ve now been at Nolan’s since Monday morning. It’s been quite an experience. Nolan starts drinking beer at about nine in the morning, and continues steadily throughout the day until he goes to bed. As he says, he doesn’t drink to get drunk, never has. At 71 years of age, retired from active duty in the oil fields, he’s still active and in great shape, though he no longer works full time anywhere.
He lives right on Hwy 82 in the center of Pecan Island surrounded by camps, other trailers, and the family homes of his mother (now deceased) and his younger sister. Born and raised in Pecan Island, he moved to Abbeville, about forty-five minutes up the road, for a number of years, but he’s been back here in Pecan Island for over twenty-five years now.
Having hung out with him the last two days, we’ve come to understand that Nolan is an institution here. His buddies drop by to say hello and chat; he wanders the area “drinkin’ beer” with a number of the locals (he’s got a regular route); he has his coffee and a bun in the early morning at the only store in Pecan Island; he helps out friends with odd jobs that need doing; and he spends many afternoons at the only bar in Pecan Island (the Coastal Bar), drinking beer and playing a card game called Cadillac.
He’s got a shed for hanging deer and wild boar to slaughter and skin them, in season and sometimes out of season. He makes sausage from the pork and the venison, and he’s always got a freezer full of shrimp and crab, cleaned and ready to eat. This morning he boiled almost six dozen blue crabs he’d gotten yesterday at the bar, and had them cooked and completely cleaned in only a few hours.
He cooks so much that he’s got three kitchens – the regular one inside the trailer, a second one on a porch that he has built onto the front of the trailer, and another completely separate kitchen that he built out back, attached to the shed where he skins the wild boar and deer. I’m guessing that kitchen is exclusively for major projects like the deer and boar.
From comments we’ve overheard, we suspect that Nolan is famous for his beer intake. Tuesday night the woman in the local store reminded him, “There’s a new deputy assigned here now, Nolan, and he’s gonna be writing tickets” (apparently referring to Nolan’s habit of driving with open beer cans in his hand, with a steady alcohol level over the legal limit). They discussed that for a minute or two, and she reminded him, “This new deputy is ‘dark complected’, you know”. “Awww, why do they assign a nigger down here, anyways,” he responded. “They oughta know by now that coloreds don’t belong down here. Why hell, most a’ the coloreds don’t even wanna be down here”.
In the bar, several of the young guys were teasing Nolan, and the bar owner was right upfront with her comments. “If Betty moves back in (his second ex-wife who is apparently moving in next month – she bought the trailer he’s been living in), y’all gonna be able to quit drinkin’, Nolan?”
Nolan just takes all the teasing in stride.
Our trailers and bikes are safe and tarped out in the shed. Nolan has given us his bedroom to use (he had the sheets and bedspread washed and dried by the time it took us to take down our camp and move over here), and there’s a washer and dryer in the bathroom. We’ve already been able to do two loads, and we’ll leave here with clean laundry.
The first day Nolan got us water, breakfast sandwiches, brought home fresh coffee and packaged pastries, and bought us a six-pack of Mike’s Hard Lemonade – one of our favorites.
He taught us to play Cadillac and made sure we are competent; he’s taken us on a driving tour around the island; he’s brought us to the store and introduces us to everyone we meet; and he took us to the Coastal Bar yesterday for Coor’s Light in mini-bottles, microwaved popcorn, and a lengthy game of Cadillac with the locals at the bar.
We are inside out of the weather, and Nolan makes sure to turn on the weather report on the TV every day at noon and again at five. He’s called at least a half dozen friends and relatives to announce with pride our arrival at his trailer. He asks us questions about our trip, and he reminisces extensively about his own life.
Another plus is that we do have cell phone signal, so we’ve been able to text Alex about things that need to be taken care of. There’s been no privacy to make any other calls, and we’ve been a bit shell-shocked anyway. Nolan said we can go down the street a bit to the Gun Shop to get Internet, so we might try that tomorrow. We’ll only have time to upload our blogs, but that will still be awesome.
The weather is headed into our area tonight and in the wee hours tomorrow morning. We’ll supposedly have a short break for a few hours tomorrow, then more rain and storms are coming in through Friday. We are praying that the rain stops during the night on Friday and that we’ll be able to leave on Saturday. We’ve already got our cycling gear in the bedroom, stacked neatly and ready to go.
Our first stop will be twenty miles down the road at the Rockefeller Wildlife Refuge. Yesterday afternoon at the bar I spoke to Ronnie Hebert, who works there, and while he didn’t promise anything, he said they try to make allowances for out of state travelers. All the housing for campers was destroyed during Ike, so the most we’d be able to do is pitch a tent, but they do have a bathroom in the office, and they have an “agent” on the grounds 24/7.
I’ve spent most of the afternoon writing, doing laundry, and texting things to Alex, while Chelsea types up some leftover paperwork (we are getting organized and lightening our load bit by bit). We’re going to settle in and watch a movie on her laptop now. Nolan is off drinking beer with buddies in Abbeville. He’s picking up Betty tomorrow morning, buying a new hot water heater, and they’ll be back here before noon. We are enjoying the alone time, as I want to get a full month ahead on the blogs for our new adventure travel resources website.
Signing off from Pecan Island…