The morning was going just fine. It was Saturday and Nicole was outside helping her dad tinker with stuff. I was playing a game of scrabble online and the telephone rang. I answered it and it was our middle daughter’s significant other. He told me she had left for work at 6 pm last night and had not returned. My heart skipped a few beats. I asked him if they had fought over something. He said, “no.. I kissed her goodbye before she left for work.” I said this was not like her and why didn’t he contact me last night. He said he left a text message at midnight… of course, I didn’t check my phone at midnight because I was asleep. I immediately called her phone and she didn’t answer. Fear set in and I started crying…walked outside and told Ken, “we have a problem, Stacy didn’t come home after work last night and Darren hasn’t heard from her.” He immediately came in and both of us started calling her friends. I called my other daughter, my mother, a few of Stacy’s friends. I was in terror mode! I called my next door neighbor and told her and the phone rang…it was another text message….from Stacy. She said, “mom, I’m ok. Darren and I had a fight and I am with some friends trying to relax from all of it!” I then called Darren and asked him why he lied to me about them not fighting, when in fact, they had.

I realized at that moment I had become the “bait” on his fishing pole. He was fishing for information and did not even consider how much fear it would cause her father and I. Just when you think you have finished the job as parent, you are thrown back into another time.

Immediately, I began scolding him. I didn’t want to know what their fight was about. I didn’t think it had anything to do with me. However, I told him he needed to decide whether he could commit to a relationship or not. I hung up and then Stacy called and we talked. She said she was sorry but she never thought Darren would call us when he knew they had a fight.

I am thankful that all has been resolved. The two of them sat down and worked out the problem (me thinks). They are coming for supper today. I now know what the feeling is when a mother’s worse fear surfaces….it is not something I ever want to endure again.

I was born in Port Arthur, Texas, the eldest of 4 kids. My father was German-French and my mother Russian-French. Historically, Port Arthur is a melting pot of different cultures with the Acadian French and Cajun families being predominant. Only 15 miles away, Beaumont, Texas, has a broader spectrum of nationalities. Having grown up in a politically based family from that area, I know there are two strong political forces there. One is Port Arthur-Louisiana politics, and the other is Beaumont politics. My great-grandfather Provost migrated to Port Arthur almost immediately after the Cholera Epidemic in and around New Orleans when so many died. He moved his entire family to Port Arthur for a new start and worked in the City of Port Arthur Warehouse. He died in his fifties while on a daily delivery and his horse carried him home that day.

I am very interested in old Louisiana and Southern family culture and religious interactive phases. On the religious side, I am very interested in Vodoun or Voodoo influence within the Catholic Church, as relates to the cajun and slave communities. This influence is most powerful within the old acadian families and I believe it is the roots from where I grew! To understand the “where it came from” sheds light upon the “who and what” of today.

I was educated, as most of the Provost family, in the Catholic faith as well as in Catholic School. I started 1st grade at St. James Catholic School (went to Nederland Public school 3 years) and graduated from Bishop Byrne High School. So, part of my determination stems from the strong influence of several self-made women: “nuns.” These nuns taught me how to learn on my own and they shared with me the true meaning of self-discipline. I founded my womanhood and career on what I was taught. They say “ONCE CATHOLIC, ALWAYS CATHOLIC” but over the years I have shied away from Catholic indoctrination and moved forward into a deeper idealistic attitude about organized religion. I do believe and have faith in a power higher than myself and try hard to live in a spiritual place.

I was raised in a musically inclined family. My paternal grandma was originally from Jeanerette, Louisiana. She was raised on a Provost plantation and had formal music tutors as a young girl. My father played every stringed instrument you could imagine and actually accompanied Tyrone Powers for a short time. My father personally taught every one of his 4 children music and we had a family band. We would practice in the evenings and our neighbors would bring lawn chairs into our backyard so they would hear us practicing. Over the years we entertained publicly and our family band grew to include other musicians, or wannabe musicians, from all around!

Life in the Port Arthur (lived in Nederland from 9 years old to 25 years old) area was wonderful! Our family was close and most of my best lessons in life came from my family. We drifted down the Bayous, dark and still, while the moss hung limply from the trees on the banks! We fished, crabbed and shrimped then came home to prepare the evening meal. We cut our teeth on “red pepper” and learned how to eat crawfish as our first “finger food!” We imagined ourselves at sea with the great pirate/ancestor, Jean Lafitte…Jean Lafitte, pirate/vampire/patriot of the War of 1812 (Battle of New Orleans), my geneological history. This may explain part of the rebel in my personality…however, I don’t expect it to completely exonerate me!

And when the great weather change occurs on the coast, many Port Arthur refugees ran to safety. Our family weathered those storms several times. During Carla, we had to be evacuated to San Augustine, Texas and found shelter in the courthouse. The jury room cots were our beds and the courtroom our playground. All the cousins participated with our eldest cousin being Judge. Many of us had our first taste of how cruel the justice system could be when Judge Charles issued the verdict for our crimes! So, began my own political foundation…never trust your cousin, if he is the Judge.

Sometimes things don’t turn out like you dreamed they would. In 1980, my wonderful father died at the age of 50. The Texas recession hit and many of the refineries closed causing small businesses supporting commerce to collapse. At that time, I found it necessary to relocate to a better economical region.

Hence, the great Hill Country relocation to live on a real working ranch in the Hill Country at Bergheim, Texas. Nestled in a 500-acre ranch with many oak trees, my large rock home built after the turn of the century! A “tank” (Pond) with catfish so full that all you had to do was stomp on the bank and see them surface! The ranch has a quietness to it where you can be swallowed up for life! You can walk down the ranch road on a cool Winter day and actually see the breath of a small squirrel searching for its “winter stash!” And, Spring, lovely Spring, where all the babies are born and run and jump..excited just for one new day! To live as part of it all instead of in it? Those are memories I share with anyone looking for romance! Or, you can ask me to tell you a few of my special “Texas Tales,” just to keep the conversation going.

Ken and I met in 1991 and married August, 1992 and relocated to Illinois for 5-years. The weather was too harsh for me, and I missed my family and friends, and more than anything, THE GREAT STATE OF TEXAS! I felt like a salt-water fish flopping around in a fresh water tank! So, on February 3, 1999 we relocated to Smithville, Texas to set up business and our home….. never again to leave Texas! Our roots are in place again. With Texas license plates and driver’s licenses, we both are very happy to be home again!

Our family tends to grow outward and there is always an extra chair pulled up to the dinner table. I know I’ve added more than a cup of water to the gravy in order to stretch the meals and so far I’ve not run out of extra pillows and blankets to create another sleeping pad. We’ve had baby skunks and o’possums, field mice and bugs, and done mouth-to-mouth life saving techniques on a baby rabbit that the dog thought we might enjoy for supper. We have a permanent burial ground for pets; some of which weren’t even ours.

We agree to disagree on many topics and I really don’t think our home is based on democracy. Every one has an opinion about something, but no one really listens to them anyway. I feel it safe to say that we consider ourselves quite normal–no matter what others think. One of the kids wants Barney shot and the other one loves Barney.

One kid thinks dad loves them more and all of them use what ever technique necessary to get attention–so, that must not be too important anyway. Well, whatever happens on a day to day basis, we’re still here for each other. And, I kinda like that feeling.

Behind every “good woman” is a “good family.” Without my family, I would have a very empty life. Ken and I spent 8 years as foster parents and many of our foster children have made our family their “forever family.” Many of our foster kids (adults now) still call us mom and dad (and some “grandma and grandpa” ) — forever — after they aged out of the foster care system. Part of our children still live in Illinois….the other part in Texas. Although miles separate us physically — distance doesn’t break the bond of our love!

My husband, Ken Nyberg, the greatest thing since the invention of the mouse trap! He has been a wonderful father to our children and a great husband for over 18 years now. Ken holds everything in our lives together with baling wire and thinks friends don’t let friends drive anything but Chevrolet. He has a John Deere tractor collection and still plays with them. Ken is an over-grown kid and you can find him tinker’n on something 24 hours a day. He is a Park Ranger for Bastrop State Park, in Bastrop, Texas.

When I turned 50, we adopted another little girl, Catherine Nicole. Her adoption was final September 25, 2003. She turned 8 years old on July 17th. She is now attending Brown Primary as a second grade student. Nicole is the mistress of the entire Smithville Nyberg Clan!