La Prairie des Femmes

When I came to the Prairie des Femmes I was a girl, unbelieving and spoiled as any Sacred Heart queen of Evangeline Parish could be in those days, the 1990s. I doubted even the name of the prairie, my new home. Was this la Prairie des Femmes? She was so far flung, the fields were so brown and barrren, the houses, trailers and shacks dotted along the coves. The houses were mostly older, some shacks, and modest trailer or modular homes. There was one big house but it was at the front of the road at Frozard, Olivier Plantation. My future husband knew that I would like that our new home had an old French name. A mysterious name. She had history. But that, you couldn't see... There was not one piece of paved road in the prairie, and most of the road that snaked back into the open fields coiled around a muddy bayou and her steep banks. The road slithered off into the prairie, still hugging the oxbow woods, a scrappy but untouched woodland that roped and roamed along the road that day. How could this place be called la Prairie des Femmes? I barely believed him that first visit out here, when the land was grey, all of the golden rod had browned. He asked me if I liked it. It was like showing a woman a mirror and reflecting herself back at her. It existed. We were there. There was downpayment. It was far. It was wild. It was barren. It was fruitful. It was peaceful. It was dangerous. By and by, I talked to people who knew of the story of the Prairie des Femmes, and I accepted, after seeing the old name on the map, that this new place was my home.