BAYOU BLUE CRAWFISH!

BAYOU BLUE CRAWFISH!

KENNETH E. HALL    JULY 30, 2016         HOUSTON

One day at ℱerncrest school, while in the eighth grade, I read an article, most probably in one of those Junior Scholastic magazines, we used to get. This got my attention. It was about rare BLUE crawfish! I was taken aback: I had never heard of such, and I thought this was a pile of nonsense. 

Being a Friday, I had a chance to ask someone who really knew crawfish if such a thing were truly possible... I'd ask the folks at Jaeger's Seafood where I worked on Fridays as a busboy.

After eating a double hamburger on French bread, and donned my well-starched apron, I entered the main dining room to take my station and begin work, but I couldn't hardly wait to ask someone about this article.

Soon enough, I asked Mr. George and probably one or two of the other folks there had they ever seen such a thing as a blue crawfish. I told them about the article before asking them, lest they laugh at me. I got teased and ridiculed quite enough at school without going out of my way to bring this upon myself at work as well!

To my surprise, these seafood experts had indeed seen a few in their day!!! Satisfied, I worked the better part of the evening, my mind being on things other than on blue crawfish. Then I got a tap on my shoulder - someone had located a blue crawfish among the dozens of sacks they had just received for tonight's dining. There it was, live and kicking! I put it in a can of water and took it home to the apartment.

The next day, I took it over to MonMon and PawPaw's, and they were quite surprised to see such a thing. We transferred the blue-grey mud bug to a larger container, more apt to his earlier surroundings. I kept the thing as a "pet" of sorts, and the following week, when I returned to my grandparents's, I could the little critter doing quite well.

My grandmother had been feeding him boiled rice, and the little guy took quite a liking to the stuff. I asked MonMon and PawPaw if he ate well. PawPaw answered me that he "eats up a storm." MonMon agreed, adding loudly:"And he EEEEETS!!"

It sound so funny how she chimed in like that, and a few times in the future I teased her in good fun, about that melodious reply. MonMon always would deny it! As for the crawfish, the novelty wore off, and so we threw him into Bayou St. John, where presumably the blue crawfish lived out his life happily in the mud, deep beneath the brackish water.

One thing is for sure, he fared out better there than had he joined his fellow crayfish in the boiling pot, to be served up on a plate later that evening!