Celestine Jolivette Columbus was my great-grandmother. My mom’s dad’s mom. On December 6th, she passed away at 99. I have only a few memories of my great-grandmother.1 But they all revolve around food and family.
Great-grandma lived in Port Arthur, Texas, the closest you can get to Louisiana (where she was born) and still have a Texas address. From what I remember of it growing up, Port Arthur is a humble town. The people are brown from the sun and their Creole roots. They wear jeans and boots. Zydeco music (often played with a washboard, triangle, and accordion) plays at festivities. The food is spicy.
Great-grandma and grandpa lived in a brick home on a big, grassy lot. We’d walk up the concrete porch steps and enter the living room, every surface of it soft - plush chairs, lace doilies covering dark wooden furniture. Heavy framed silver photos adorned every surface, several clustered together wherever they would fit. Great-grandma would hold up a photo and point - “You know who this is?” It might’ve been a photo of my younger self or sister or cousin. It could’ve been her as a child or my mom. We didn’t see her often, and she loved to reminisce.
Sometimes we’d walk straight through the living room and find her in the kitchen, stirring a huge pot of gumbo over the stove. Turning to us with a smile, she’d say, “Gimme some shug-ah,” her familiar Cajun way of asking for a kiss. I never knew quite how to respond to that, growing up in the city where everyone spoke differently. But I’d hug her around her waist, one of her hands holding tight to the ladle still resting in the big silver pot.
There was one bathroom in the house, as far as I knew. Maybe she and Great-grandpa had one in their room, but I never saw it. The one that I knew was in the hallway, right off the living room. It was completely pink. I loved it.
Every possible surface was covered with a fuzzy pink cover or mat - the bath mat in front of the shower, one in front of the toilet, one in front of the sink. The toilet seat. The top of the toilet tank. I wanted to touch every surface. I wanted a bathroom like this at home. Why didn’t we have a fuzzy bathroom? Why didn’t everyone?
My sister and I slept in the guest room near the bathroom. Great-grandma and grandpa’s room was down the hall, on the other side of the bathroom.
Besides the living room and the kitchen, where a white corded phone rested attached to the wall, the other room we spent time in was the living room. This room was in the back of the house. It was also soft - carpeted, with a cheap but plushy couch - though not as brightly colored as the bathroom. I remember this room as beige. The couch backed up against the wall and faced an old-fashioned television. We’d sometimes sit down and watch it together.
To the side of the living room, just before you exited through the back door, was a little mudroom. Great-grandma and grandpa kept a freezer chest in there, which almost always held popsicles. This was one of my great joys, in addition to the trailer parked in the backyard, from which we were allowed to enter and grab a soda from its fridge.
The backyard was encased by a low chain-link fence. It was the front yard I loved best. A willow tree stood just to the right of the house. It’s the only one I recall seeing in my childhood, and I loved it. Its lilting branches reminded me of a fairytale. We’d have Easter egg hunts in this yard with our cousins, all dressed up in our dresses and white shoes, casing the yard for brightly-colored eggs. I enjoyed the running and the finding. But I could’ve stayed under that tree forever.
Even in the spring, visits to Port Arthur felt like perpetual summer. We’d have crawfish boils and dance zydeco. The crawfish, red potatoes, and corn were seasoned with Tony Sachery’s, the Creole seasoning that left the pleasant burn of life on our lips. The grown-ups wore cowboy hats and boots and belts with silver buckles. While they danced, we’d scramble around the park with our cousins, clambering on the playground.
We’d have sleepovers with our cousins. Once, M stayed up late talking to a boy on the phone. We went to church in the morning. “Are you Catholic or Christian?” R asked. I didn’t know how to answer that. I was pretty sure I was both.
I didn’t know what they were, but not having had my first communion yet, I knew I wasn’t supposed to take communion at church. Aunt M told on me later to my mom, who informed her I couldn’t take it yet. I felt awkward and confused walking to the front of the church with my arms crossed over my chest for the priest to bless me. At home, I just stayed in the pew.
My only memory of my great-grandma as an adult was seeing her dolled up in a long, golden dress for her 90th birthday. Mostly, she sat while everyone ate and celebrated around her. I danced zydeco with my dad. We all took a photo together before the end of the night - she in her golden dress, quiet and tired in a chair that enveloped her, the skin around her eyes too big for what remained of her once-full face.
I remember the full face, too. The one with ample cheeks and light brown skin. Fine, dark hair around it. My great-grandpa too, darker and leathery. Both laughing and sitting on folding chairs or inside watching tv.
Great-grandpa passed away years ago, but Great-grandma kept living at home, all the way until the end. She was born in 1926. One more year, and she’d have made it to 100. The women on my mom’s side of the family live to be very old. I’m hoping I got their genes.
Her obituary detailed that she had 4 siblings, 4 children, 13 grandchildren, 13 great-grandchildren, 7 nieces, and 4 nephews. I know some of them. I’m sure I’ve met most at least once. Some are mysteries to me. Many of these family members I haven’t seen in years, having drifted with time and distance. Yet she seemed to be someone people could gather around.
I wonder if she will dance in the afterlife, if she will reunite with Great-grandpa or wait for the boyfriend she’d been with after his passing. I hope she makes the whole place smell like gumbo, that all the angels line up for seconds, and she just smiles in a knowing way, refilling her ladle, nodding to the beat of the music.
Note: Time has blurred my memory over the years. The details recreated are my best recollection given the passage of decades. I still look back on them fondly.
