Member-only story
Introduction
About Me — Julia Perrodin
Lâche Pas la Patate
I once watched my dad pull his own wisdom tooth with a pair of needle-nose pliers. Clarence Perrodin had a put together way about him, thanks vastly to my mom who starched and ironed his pant creases so flatly and precisely you’d have sworn she used a steel press. In summer, which is most of the year in South Louisiana, he wore long-sleeved, airy natural fibered collars with neatly rolled arms. Organic fabrics for an often stagnant humidity exhaled unforgivingly by the surrounding marsh and coastal wetlands. His sleeves covered an enormous scar swallowing his bicep where the churning blade of an outboard motor relieved the bone from its muscle and was subsequently reattached by the skilled hands of a tired surgeon. He convinced all five of his daughters, until we were embarrassingly close to adulthood, he got that scar wading in a marsh infested with large, ravenous alligators.
The recall of that evening is distinct and vivid. He sat on a late 70s recliner with terra cotta tweed upholstery and a wooden handle. The sun streamed through the window behind his chair so that when he moved, particles of dust were illuminated and singular. There was an All in the Family laugh track in the background, and the smell of roux being patiently browned on the stove filled the air. I can even feel the beveled…
