Swapping stories

Today’s story from Louisiana is a bit more modern folk tale, and with all the politicians on tv lately it seemed appropriate. “The Politician Gets His” was told by Hubert L. “Anatoo” Clement, Sr. in Swapping Stories: Folktales from Louisiana edited by Carl Lindahl, Maida Owens, and C. Renée Harvison.

I’ll tell you a little story–it won’t take long. I got a opponent what run against me for governor. . . . I was worried about him, but I don’t have to worry no more. He’s all finished. You see, he was working on his roof, and he make a platform, and he start speech against me up there. He got in a big high, “throw mud” campaign against me, and he fall off of there. He hurt his self bad on the head.

And they put him in the bed, and they put his little girl sit by him. And she’s there watching him, and his wife was in the kitchen. She was cooking in the kitchen, and the little girl looked at him and she said, “Papa,” she said, “are you dead?”

“No, chère, not yet.”

So she waited a little while, and she said, “Hey, Papa, you dead now?”

“No, chère, I’m still hanging on. What smells so good?”

She said, “Well, Mama in the kitchen. She’s making some gumbo.”

“Oh, chère,” he said, “That’s my best thing. Before I die, go in there and ask Mama to send me just a little bit in a cup. I going to eat that one more time before I die.”

So she said, “Okay.”

So she went in the kitchen, and she stayed a while. Then she came back in there, and he look dead. She said, “Hey, Papa, you dead now?”

He said, “Hey, not yet. Did you brought me some gumbo?”

She said, “No.”

“Mais,” he said, “Chère, why you didn’t brought Daddy just a little bit of gumbo, so he can eat one more time some gumbo?”

She said, “Because Mama said, ‘No.'”

He said, “Why your mama said, ‘No,’ chère?”

She said, “Because Mama said that’s for the funeral tomorrow.”

I thank you please!

It made me laugh. The audio book I finished earlier this week, Gates of Evangeline, took place in Louisiana too. I’ve been getting in the mood for Walt Disney and we’ll be staying at the Port Orleans Resort – French Quarter, hence the Louisiana story today.

Thursday’s Tales is a weekly event here at Carol’s Notebook. Fairy tales, folktales, tall tales, even re-tellings, I love them all. Feel free to join in.

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