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I grew up in a small town called Newellton, Louisiana located in Tensas Parish, the heart of the Mississippi Delta and the least populous parish in LA. It is on the MS River, and harvests cotton, corn, rice, soy beans, wheat, etc. The house that I grew up in was about a mile outside of Newellton, on Newell Ridge Road between fields of cotton and corn and near grain bins. There were a few Indian mounds across the road from my house, and every year the tractors would plow the field beside them, we would go look for arrowheads. Growing up, I was involved in 4-H and raised and showed sheep. We owned about 75 sheep, and the ewes (females) would give birth to about 30 lambs every spring. We would watch most of them give birth and name them as soon as they were learning to walk. Growing up at this house, I spent a lot of time outside with my brothers, and learned a lot about nature, agriculture, and the many values of life.

Our home in Newellton was a three bedroom, two bath home on about five acres. There was a detached garage, a storage shed, and then a barn for the sheep. The house had a basement that we played in all the time. The carpet in the basement was orange and brown plaid and straight from 1968. There were two bedrooms and a bathroom the was permanently out of order, so my mom used it as storage. She is a florist, and had a flower shop there at our house out of the sun room, so she used those rooms for storage to all of her decorations, flowers, ribbons, as well as our winter clothes, Santa Presents (don't tell her I knew this), and old boxes of pictures and memories. In the main room of the basement, there was a long shelf of our toys, a pool table, an old record player and 8-track player where we would listen to Chicago and James Taylor, and there was a dress up area where we would have concerts and plays. It was great fun. I remember a dart board hanging on the wall, a picture of John Wayne that my dad had in college, and wreaths that my mom used throughout the year. We would also stay down there during storms. Those were fun nights that all five of us could stay in one room together. Needless to say, many great memories of my childhood lie in that old basement of orange and brown.



My room on the other hand, had pink carpet with lovely pink bedding on a canopy bed, pink ribbon wallpaper, and pink everything else. Literally. I was the only girl and my mom took that to her advantage when decorating my room. An important part of my room was the furniture. It was my mom's furniture that she had growing up, and I still use the desk and nightstand today. It is painted off-white with gold inset decoration and flowery hardware. By the way I just described it, It sounds quite awful looking, but its near and dear to my heart because I have had it and used it my whole life, and my mom gave it to me.


An important object in my home that held sentimental value to my family was probably the piano. My great-grandmother was a pianist her whole life, and taught over 1,000 piano students in her lifetime. Growing up, she was in piano concerts with up to ten pianos around Baton Rouge, and was the pianist and organist at her church for 65 years. Her daughter, my grandmother, was also, and still is a pianist. She taught me and my two brothers piano, just like my great-grandmother taught my mom. Before my great-grandmother died, she gave her pianos to each of her granddaughters, and that one is the piano that we all learned to play on. The piano was in a niche in my parents bedroom in the house I grew up in, and that's wehre I learned to play. One day, I would like to receive it, so that it can continue to hold its sentimental value.


One of the most memorable events that happened at this house was the day that I had to leave it. My family decided to move to Vidalia when I was fifteen, a freshmen in high school. I never wanted to move from that place because it was all that I knew. It was my only home. I was comfortable. And I cried the full two week prior to leaving. After the first fifteen years of my life, making memories, having friends over, birthday parties, bonfires, playing with the sheep, Christmas mornings--that would happen no more in this place. When we left, I cried all the way to my new house. It felt like we were going on a vacation and ended up staying in this new house. Everything was different, and new, and even after seven years of my family being in that house, I still like to consider Newellton my other home. I will never forget everything that happened in my first house, and consider it home for the rest of my life.