Amos Thibodeau Jr. was the first boy in his family to go to the public school in 50 years. His daddy, Amos Sr. had been schooled in the bayou way: fishing, hunting, growing crops.

Amos Sr. always said, “Our land is all we need. What more can a man ask?”

Young Amos’ mama looked at life with a different eye. Born and raised in Lafayette, she was city raised and city schooled. She put her foot down on the boy’s 10th birthday and enrolled him in the town school.

Now Amos Jr. knew the swamp. Not so much the town, since he lived 8 miles back in the bayou, connected only by a dirt road and a shallow canal. So when his teacher, Miss Boudrieau set the date for show and tell, it was natural that the boy would look to nature for his project.

Amos brought a sealed bucket to show and tell. He said to the class, “The pigmy rattlesnake is one of the deadliest pit vipers in Lousiana,” which prompted the hasty and panicked evacuation of the whole school.

His egg never did hatch and Amos never went back to school again.