Mr. Joe is a nonagenarian we know through my mom. As long as we've known him, we've never seen him without a hat. Here he wears his favorite. A hat from Hawaii. I ask if he's ever been to Hawaii, and this strikes him as funny. Credit: JosephNils: www.picturetruths.blogspot.com
- Mr. Joe is a nonagenarian we know through my mom. As long as we've known him, we've never seen him without a hat. Here he wears his favorite. A hat from Hawaii. I ask if he's ever been to Hawaii, and this strikes him as funny.
- This is the view from Mr. Joe's house in Gretna. He built this house with his own bare hands. It is built to withstand hurricanes and robbers and Armageddon. Mr. Joe says: "Bring it on, cause if he ain't dead yet, he soon will be.
- Mr. Joe still cooks for himself and his wife. He is from Thibodeaux. He is of German stock. His parents did not speak English. He has eaten most warm-blooded animals running around this state. He has eaten cold-blooded ones too.
- Mr. Joe makes gumbo with alligator sausage. Sometimes he uses deer. Starting in 1904, he learned to shoot a rifle. Mr. Joe says people made guns useful then. Not like today. He doesn't know how people got so far away from right.
- Mr. Joe's parents died early and left five children orphaned. Four brothers all working different jobs. The sister kept the house. That's how it was in them days. Mr. Joe stayed in school. But he was still responsible for catching dinner for everyone.
- Mr. Joe does not need tattoos to tell his story. You can see his story in his hands and on his face. You can hear it in his voice before he speaks a complete sentence.
- Mr. Joe's house is like a time capsule. Wood paneling and original lino. Formica table and wooden chairs. The bathroom is avocado. The walls are mostly bare. Nothing seems touched. Nothing disturbed.
- Mr. Joe's wife has Alzheimer's. He cannot put her away, though. She was a good wife. Sometimes, it's like she's talking to angels. You want to see what she sees. You want to hear those angel voices. You want to know when they will take her home.
- Mr. Joe likes watching Regis and Kelly. He turns the TV up way loud because he can't hear so good. The hearing aids don't work, he says. Mr. Joe thinks Kelly is too skinny. What's wrong with women these days? She otta eat some fried catfish, he says.
- In the afternoon, Mr. Joe sits in his lounge chair and watches baseball. If baseball isn't on, he watches soap operas. Mr. Joe's wife watches too. If you wait long enough, you will hear Mr. Joe snore. And, when you look at Mr. Joe's wife, she is smiling.
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