That warm, spring Mississippi Delta Saturday was ideal for doing anything outdoors, but the calamitous way it turned out was far from ideal. Nobody outperformed my lifelong best friend and mentor Jaybird in preparing delicious, deep-South cuisine, especially crawfish. When my friends and I asked the old black man to boil several hundred pounds of them, he said, “Boys, that will be a great way to spend this glorious day. Y’all load up my big cooking pot; let’s enjoy some country-style cutting up.”
Our favorite place to undertake excursions into crustacean culinary conviviality was at a grass airstrip known locally as Redneck International Airport. We men set up cooking equipment, while the women arranged tables and chairs. My airplane, a Piper Cub, was hangared at the strip. Providence was peering over Mr. Piper’s shoulder when he designed the tiny tandem-seat trainer. No aircraft is more fun to fly. The Cub was nicknamed “Freddie” in memory of my flight instructor, Mr. Fred Frazier, a legendary crop duster, who used Cubs to train military pilots.
