Year: 2023

One last Laurel photo…

We were supposed to stay here another day, but a opportunity to visit with a couple of folks who live on the “North Shore”, which is what the people here in these parts call anything on the other side of Lake Pontchartrain from New Orleans, so we bailed on our stay to head south.

First up was another trip to Mandeville for café au lait and beignets with a friend. Halfway down I-59 south we got a text that she couldn’t make it because of a prior arrangement she forgot about. Not a problem we were still going to the Café Du Monde for treats, but we changed the location to Covington instead of Mandeville because it was more on our way to the second rendezvous in Hammond. This is where we visited with the mother of Sally, who we on our way to see in Santa Fe, and a second Mom to Donna when she was living in New Orleans back in the 60s & 70s.

So now, tomorrow instead of going from Laurel, MS to Leesville, LA we are driving from Hammond, LA to Leesville. Before we were going to be heading due west on US84 for most of it, but now we have to go west northwest and there are a lot of rivers (including the Mississippi and the Atchafalaya), bayous and swampy areas that preclude an easy direct route. This afternoon we created a convoluted route and we are hopeful of being able stay on it tomorrow.

This morning we took a little side trip to a place we spent three years at, about 40 years ago, Meridian, Mississippi. After returning from Guam and a 6-month bit of schooling in Tennessee, I was assigned to NAS Meridian. Donna worked on her college degree while I worked at the Navy base. We found an apartment in a complex on the north side of town that allowed her to go the college without having to deal with downtown and I could head due north to the Navy base. Believe it or not, but that apartment complex is still there and going strong. We drove through the loop and while it did look familiar neither one of us could pick out the building we lived in.

We visited the campus where Donna went to school, but it wasn’t totally recognizable. We also drove a part of the route from the apartment complex to the Navy base that I drove and would sometimes bicycle ride to (Donna would often ride halfway and return back home.) We drove some through downtown and it was almost completely unfamiliar. We stumbled onto the US Government complex building and took the above photo because it included the Post Office. It is amazing how much detail is lost after 40 years, including neither of us remembering just how hilly the terrain was there.

On the way from Laurel to Meridian we drove up on US11. Which in a fit of madness and youth we once rode our bikes on (loaded with a pup tent, 2 sleeping bags and a white gas stove) as part of a 4 day trip to her Mom’s house in New Orleans. We didn’t expect to be able pick out anything we’d remember, because we would have been traveling at 1/5 the speed we were driving and because pretty much any two-lane backroad through southern Mississippi looks the same.

About three quarters of the way to Meridian, Donna noticed a sign for a Confederate Cemetery as we whizzed by. So we u-turned and went back to check it out. We drove into a cemetery, but it seemed a bit too recent when I noticed, just across some railroad tracks the familiar sight of small white marble headstone in neat rows. So we went over to the right place. Even if their cause was misguided, on this Memorial Day weekend it is still important to remember those that gave their all.

Even if this little side trip didn’t bring distinct memories back it was nice way to spend a morning. We got back to Laurel and had lunch at an actual local restaurant. We have mostly eaten at the VRBO or at southern chain type places we remember fondly from our South Carolina days, but we can highly recommend the Texas Pitmaster BBQ if you are ever here.