Tuesday, July 31, 2007


THEME FROM A SUMMER PLACE
Hey! Remember you were warned that my new blog would probably be about many crazy things unrelated to my Katrina blog. Every now and then I will have pics of new construction as promised. The above music video that I put up has inspired me to write about the summer place that we had for 26 years. Before marriage I had loved to fish and after marriage I was still fishing anywhere I found water. Having children didn't curtail my fishing, I took them with me and over the years they all loved to fish ... like me. Their ages soon changed that and they decided they liked boys much better, besides who wanted to be seen with their parent. My youngest was only 6 yrs. old and we were soon inseparable fishing buddies. It was inevitable that my husband would eventually buy a cabin on a manmade lake for me. The young daughter and I fished each day and evening on the weekends. Within five years, we made a permanent home there.

I loved to catch large mouth bass because they really gave me a fight.. a sport fish. George, my husband, would only fish "when they were biting". He bragged often at the office about all the BIG bass he caught but I would remind him that technically I caught those fish. He would call to me, "Get the scoop net, I gotta big one." I would say, "Bring him in closer he's too far out". He would always say, "I can't he's very big and the line will break." So like a crazy fisherman (or someone who will put themself out there for people), I would wade out waist deep to get his fish and carry them back to shore. praying the moccasins were frightened by all the commotion and wouldn't bite me. Whenever I called for him to bring the scoop net, I had the fish at the dock and all he had to do was scoop it but he seemed to always knock the hook out of its mouth and my bass would be lost. I rather quickly decided that we had become competitors and I wouldn't let him anywhere near my fish.

So one very hot day while fishing he said, "I am going inside, you have to be crazy to be fishing in this heat." I replied, "The hotter it is brings the "lunkers" out. He went inside and almost immediately an 11lb. bass was on my line. I thought I gotta get him as it would make me the "champ". Since there wasn't anyone to help me, I would have to do it myself. For 15 minutes I let the line out so the bass could run and tire himself.... reeling him in an inch at a time. I got him about 3 ft. from the shore than I jumped down into a "snaky" area with rod in right hand and a gaff in my left hand and pulled him to shore. I got him! The look on my husband's face was priceless.

If you have gotten this far reading this you may be asking, "Is there a moral to this story?" No!! But there is a reason for it. I spent 20 months writing about the storm and for those months I became the voices of people whose lives were devastated. I shared the emotions I felt from all I was witnessing but I began to lose myself. So this blog is about me.

Sunday, July 29, 2007


I call Sunday the day I reflect not only on the happenings in our areas but on the events in your areas too. Unfortunately, people everywhere experience tragedy in their own personal lives. When I recall 911, I know what the families of those lost have been going through. The same holds true for the Mississippi Gulf Coast and the parishes in New Orleans that suffered such atrocities after the storm ravaged us. Can you imagine the stories that have never been told? Progress is slow, but with each home rebuilt, repaired or remodeled, we have been given the chance of "making everything new".
Washington Avenue - Pascagoula

Friday, July 27, 2007

Old House

Thursday, July 26, 2007

I am fighting the urge to continue giving you further reports on our recovery in the coastal areas as I need the rest. This thyroid problem that I have is complicated ... I was wracked with pain in my legs and feet since awakening this morning and mysteriously in late evening it subsided to a pain I would have no complaints about. One would have to meet me to know the drive I have and having to hobble around would sure knock the wind out of my sails. I think it has been such a drive that I didn't notice that my first three daughters were getting older. Truthfully, I didn't notice at all until one remarked how old she was as I was griping to her about all this aggravating thyroid stuff and then she mentioned her age and I remember thinking "How did she get so old?" I think she was gently trying to tell ME something, don't you?

I still have a few flowers left as we have been getting rain showers. The flower below is a Pinta that attracts butterflies, bees, hummingbirds and today, a grasshopper.

AND

Wednesday, July 25, 2007

It's A Small World

I am already comfortable with this simple uncomplicated blog, I am free to write about anything so I will tell you a true story. The world is vast and many of us will not get to see it all but that's okay as we all carve out our own comfortable "niche" and live the life that we are given. We go to the movies or watch the bigger than life stars on TV. Theirs is a life so different from ours, right? Not always! In 1991, my husband contracted cancer and he was hospitalized at M. D. Anderson Cancer Center in Houston, Texas. It's a hospital that never sleeps when it comes to taking care of the patients. Procedures were performed regardless of the time.. night or day. My daughters would fly in to be with me as their Dad wasn't expected to live. This particular day my daughter Peggy was with me and we were both so nervous that we just stood in the center of the waiting area. We were startled when a rich sounding, proper voice said, "Good Evening Ladies!" "How are you this fine day?" I turned toward him and thought that he looked like a caricature of someone I had seen. He wasn't very tall (maybe because I stood before him wearing "heels" ) not strikingly good looking but nice looking and his ears were "too big". I did say hello and pointed to the door they had taken my husband through. He said, "My wife is in there too." I didn't say anything else as I was too distraught to have a conversation. Peggy and I became annoyed when he spoke again asking, "Do I look like someone you know?". Peggy said in an aggravated tone, "Yeah, Yeah you look like that guy, I forget his name, on Remington Steele." We walked away from him and sat on the other side of the room. Later we learned that he was Pierce Brosnan. Sorry Pierce, our paths crossed at an inappropiate time!

People from all over the world come to M. D. Anderson hoping for a miracle .. sometimes they do happen. I saw sheiks dressed in long ornate robes, sandaled feet, heavy necklaces, wearing turbans. I saw ladies dressed in a "sari" with rubies in the center of their foreheads. There were times we rubbed shoulders in the crowded elevators. Often we didn't speak the same language but we would exchange a smile that said we understood one another's plight of trying to save people we loved. I saw Telly Savalas as a nurse wheeled him out into the hallway I was walking through. "Who Loves Ya, Baby!"

It's a small world!

Tuesday, July 24, 2007

This additional blog has been created to take care of all the new construction pictures that I take in Pascagoula and sometimes Biloxi and Gulfport. It wouldn't be correct if I said I enjoyed gathering all the info about the storm. The constant stress of taking pictures and writing about what I was seeing and experiencing in the aftermath of Katrina took its toll... so I decided to end my Camille and Katrina blog and post pictures of future progress I hope to capture . At times, to pamper myself, the 'sky is the limit' on what you may find here. The words in the title are not mine and I purposedly didn't quote them "exact" as they belong to someone far greater than we.
Senator Trent Lott's Property

West Beach


Around Pascagoula