These are my folks, Dudley and Helen Primeaux

These are my Folks, Dudley and Helen 

Here's a little back story:

Helen and Dudley (Dud) met when I was 16 and were married within a year. Dudley comes from "down the bayou" in the Golden Meadows/Galiano area, below New Orleans. He is the hardest working, most decent man I know. He even adopted half a dozen children out of the goodness of his heart.

Helen is one of 13 children that she also helped raise, living deep in the bayou outside of Gueydan in a house with no electricity or indoor plumbing. Her family truly lived off of the land. She was married at 14 years old to a man named Lucien, a seaman (tugboats) from Lake Arthur who just so happens to have been my dad. She has 5 children.

They have both lived very hard lives but by their grace and good humor, you would never know it.

I spoke to my mother late this afternoon. She and Dudley are doing well and trying to keep their spririt. She says that Dudley has even cried from time to time regarding the generosity and kindness of their church (He's not one to cry). The Pastor, Mr. Rice, says that they can stay there for a year if it takes that long, and that they should not worry about where they will live. We discussed her living arrangements and her needs, such as how she only had one pair of shoes and was about to go to Goodwill to see if she could find something that fit her. We are lucky in that My wonderful Taunte Sally and Uncle Gary had no damage to their home, enabling Mom and Dud to have a place where they can wash what clothes they have and eat a cooked meal.

I told my mom that people here in DC were interested in sending care packages with food and necessities, which quite frankly floored her. She began to get stressed because she says that she has no room to put anything being that they only have a small space at the church, but I reassured her that when the time comes to rebuild, there will be people who will offer to help provide some of the basics. It is sort of funny yet sad, but the first thing that she mentioned was that she would need sheets for her bed, forgetting that she would need a bed as well.

She sounds good over the phone and mentioned that this tragedy was giving her perspective. She has decided that she isn't going to worry so much anymore, because she doesn't have anything left to lose except what is really important. There is something about facing tragedy that rips you from your patterns, and in that moment of desperation allows you to truly remember what it feels like to be alive, and I think my mother is experiencing this now.