Hurricanes and Nona's Punchbowl

Photo: My grandparents' back yard after Hurricane Camille, 1969.

Today is the 40th anniversary of Hurricane Camille. The one we used to refer to as "the big one." Before we knew what big really was.

I started this blog so that the younger members of my family could learn about where they came from and be proud of it. A nice side benefit is that every time I sign on, I get to spend a little more time with people and places that I miss beyond words.

I don't want to be accused of remembering the past through rose-colored glasses. There were lots of hard times, and hurricanes were part of them. Hurricanes helped make the people of the Point those scrappy, tenacious, hard to impress survivors that they were -- and still are.

We were living in Baton Rouge when Camille, headed for Louisiana, veered suddenly to the east right for Biloxi.

I remember my mother pleading with her parents over the phone not to ride the storm out in their house. At the last minute, they packed up their medicines, grabbed Uncle Michael's wedding pictures from the top of their TV and evacuated.

Their house, though gutted, was still standing. They were lucky. Their first house that originally stood there was lost during the Hurricane of '47.

Days after Camille, my mother, daddy, sister and I drove over to Biloxi. The trip, usually only a couple of hours by car, took nearly all day. Bridges were out and roads closed.

At eight going on nine years old, I harbored rather romantic notions about hurricanes, culled mostly from movies. My friends and I used to play a "let's pretend" game where we were storm refugees. What did we know then?

My eyes grew wide as, inching down the open sections of Highway 90, I saw televisions and washing machines sitting unclaimed on the white sand beach, the now-gentle surf lightly lapping against them. The Buena Vista restaurant my dad once managed had been reduced to a pile of glass shards. Boat hulls protruded from people's houses. People's belongings fluttered from trees, antennas, boat masts and piled up along with sand in the gutters. It was like the aftermath of a Mardi Gras parade gone bad.

"You'll never see anything like this again," Mama told my sister and me as we surveyed this suddenly unrecognizable world. She was usually right about everything. I wish she'd been right about that.

My uncles and Grandpa, sweating in the intense August heat, carted ruined belongings from the shell of my grandparents' house. My grandmother just watched and cried. The only time we saw her smile is when Uncle Michael reached down into the smelly muck (and if you've been through a hurricane you know that smell) and pulled forth her cut-glass punch bowl filled with muddy water but still intact. A further search of the sludge yielded some matching cups and candy dishes.

That discovery seemed to be a real turning point for Nona. She dried her tears and busied herself with cleaning up her treasures and planning for the future.

There was never a question in my grandparents' minds as to whether they would rebuild. This was their home, their neighborhood. As Nona pointed out with typical Point Cadet fatalism, "How long have we got left anyway?"

The punchbowl made appearances at weddings, graduation parties, baby showers and other family galas. And always there was the story of how it had survived Camille. It became a symbolic, even mythic, part of our family lore.

Years later, when my mother moved in with me, she didn't bring much. But she did bring the punch bowl. In the few lucid moments of her final days, she asked about it incessantly. Had I checked on it? Was it in a safe place? That punch bowl became her obsession.

Thirty six years after Camille, another even worse storm headed for Louisiana, wobbled east and hit the Mississippi Coast. In Katrina's aftermath, still numb with shock, I picked through what remained of my house, looking for something, anything, salvageable. In a total deja vu moment, my cousin Joey dug into the muck and pulled out Nona's punch bowl, encrusted in sludge but still in perfect shape. We jumped up and down like little kids and did the dance of joy

At that point I knew everything was going to be all right for me.

That punch bowl's got some kind of mojo.

Point Party Punch

I've had this punch, and its many variations, at too many Point weddings, showers, christenings, bunco games, and Sarah Conventry/Tupperware parties to count. It doesn't matter what kind of sherbet you use. To give this a Creamsicle flavor, use a mixture of orange sherbet and vanilla ice cream.

1 lg. can pineapple juice

1 sm. can frozen lemonade

1 sm. can frozen orange juice

1 liter Sprite

1/2 carton of pineapple sherbet (may substitute lime or orange sherbet)

Mix all ingredients in punch bowl. Spoon in sherbet just before serving. Serves 25