Growing Up in Yazoo City, Mississippi

There are certain places that never fully leave you.

No matter how far life carries you, part of your spirit remains there—sitting on a porch somewhere at sunset, hearing laughter drift through humid air, watching fireflies rise from the grass as the evening settles in.

For me, that place will always be Yazoo City.

When people speak about small Southern towns, they often focus on limitation. But what I remember most about growing up in Yazoo is closeness. A kind of warmth and familiarity that is difficult to explain unless you lived it yourself.

I remember long summer evenings that seemed endless back then. Children outside until the streetlights came on. Frequent visits to Mrs. Christmas’ house on MLK Drive, around the corner from my Grandma Edna’s, for snoballs (my favorite was Peach) or on a good day—when we had extra dollars, the infamous snoball stand, Sugar Shack. This is all while kids ran barefoot through yards. Family members dropping by unannounced because in Yazoo, nobody really needed an invitation to feel at home.

I remember front porches and large backyards.

Porches were where stories lived. Where adults sat talking for hours while children played nearby pretending not to listen, even though we absorbed every word. It was where wisdom passed quietly from one generation to another.

I remember church being more than a building. It was community. Celebration. Music. Tradition. There was something sacred about hearing voices rise together on Sunday mornings the kind of sound that settles into your spirit and stays with you long after childhood.

And the food. My goodness, the food.

Yazoo carried the kind of cooking that did not come from recipes as much as memory. Meals made by hand. Sunday dinners after church. Pound cakes cooling on counters. Greens simmering slowly on stovetops. My Aunt Frankie was the best cook I knew, and she knew it. Her pound cake was like no other. Only her daughter, Geraldine Claybon, could mimic it. My cousin Angie (Geraldine’s daughter) is as close as we’ll ever get to it again. Recipes that carry so much love, so much soul, so much “home” in every bite. I find myself still working to perfect the texture and taste. Cooking was an expressing love not through grand speeches, but through making sure your plate stayed full.

I remember Friday night football games and school events where the entire town seemed to show up. The pride people carried for one another. The way accomplishments felt communal as though when one person succeeded, everybody celebrated a little.

There was laughter everywhere.

Laughter at family reunions.

Laughter in beauty shops and barbershops.

Laughter at church programs that somehow lasted all day.

Laughter echoing through kitchens late into the night.

Even ordinary moments felt rich back then, though I did not fully understand it at the time.

And then there was the landscape itself.

The Delta sky looked different in Yazoo. Bigger somehow. Sunsets stretched wide across open land in colors that never quite seem the same anywhere else. After rain, the smell of earth would rise from the Yazoo clay—thick, rich soil that clung to everything it touched.

Back then, I did not realize how much those memories were shaping me.

Growing up in Yazoo taught me how to find beauty in simple things.

It taught me the value of community, storytelling, faith, humor, and resilience.

It taught me that people do not have to possess much materially to still give abundantly of themselves.

Most of all, it gave me memories rooted in love.

The older I get, the more I understand that childhood is not remembered through perfection. It is remembered through feeling.

And when I think of Yazoo City, I remember feeling held.

Held by family.

Held by tradition.

Held by familiarity.

Held by a community that, for all its imperfections, knew how to make people feel like they belonged.

That is the Yazoo I carry with me.

Not just the place itself, but the feeling of home.

I’m a product of the #YazooClay, and I couldn’t be more proud.