Page 9 - Bright-As-the-Sun

PauPee: Childhood and Teenage Years 3

Paula’s utter love for the beach to those
childhood beach trips. We also went on
smaller trips to Holly Beach when we
were small.
Our family attended church at St.
Alphonsus Catholic Church in Mau-
rice. We grew up with a firm Catho-
lic faith instilled in us. We always be-
lieved in God. My parents taught us
to be kind by example. Neither Mom
nor Dad ever talked down to anyone.
They also showed us the love a couple
should have for each other. Paula and
I always agreed how lucky we were to
have the parents we did.
Paula was a shy child who kept to
herself. When she was five and I was
four, I called her to come see me in the
bathroom. I proceeded to lie, telling her Paula 1971
our mom told me to cut her hair. Believ-
ing my actions to be Mom’s orders, she sat there and let me cut her
bangs off. I sliced through inch after inch of her strands and choppily
removed her hair. Although I was younger, I bossed her around be-
cause of her childhood timidity and passive nature.
We attended Erath Elementary for a few years. When Paula was
about ten years old, we moved into an Acadian style all-cypress home
in Lafayette on Teljean Road. Our parents built the house on property
that our mother’s family owned. We had a total of four acres. On the
weekends, Paula and I traversed the property and surrounding fields
on an old red three-wheeler. We both would take the bus from our
house on Teljean Road to Judice Middle School.
In Lafayette we had a lot of friends and cousins over. Because
Paula and I were so close in age, we shared friends. We would hang
out with our friends Lesley Demette, Renee Flowers, and Monique
Gilbert. Three cousins who became our close friends were Rhonda
Touchet, Dena Duhon, and Ann Marie Suire.