Elizabeth Ann Sanders

“Down the Road”. If you know what that phrase means, then you know where the place is and you already know the people who live there. You also know the people who lived there too-before Katrina, before an environmentally destructive oil spill, when there was still a high school in each town. And even if you live as far away as New Jersey and Texas, in your heart, you have never really left the place you will always call home, “Down the Road”.

Elizabeth Watson Amos was a native of Plaquemines Parish. She was born in Port Sulphur, Louisiana November 11, 1957. The second child of William and Dorothy Demandre Watson, she was fortunate in having two grandmas and the great grandmother she was named after, Elizabeth Hortense Michel, which her resemblance to was uncanny. Siblings are Rose W. Rousselle (Birney), John A. Watson and Cecile W. Miller.

There was the “grandma across the street”, in Port Sulphur, Dorothy’s mother, Lilian Michel Demandre, wife to Alexander Demandre, who made root beer lemonade of a summer’s afternoon. On special occasions Lilian would have one of the older cousins, usually PJoe or Merrile, hand crank a wooden churn of pineapple ice cream under the shade of an old pecan tree. On one occasion hidden among the pecan branches was another cousin who had shimmied up to the tallest branches to toss down green pecans among those who gathered round. Liz gathered up all of the pecan teasers after one landed on her blond head and shot them right back up into the branches to flush out the culprit Lil Harold, whose mother, Liz’s Aunt Helen demanded he come down right this minute. Knowing what he was in for, he started the descent, about half way he jumped down and took off running. Aunt Helen coolly took off her shoe and with deadly aim, threw the shoe and hit Harrold on the back of the head on a hot run. Liz most admired Aunt Helen for that particular skill too, she never missed.

William’s mother was known as the ‘grandma from Mississippi’, Rosa Bedwell Watson, wife to John Watson. Indoor plumbing and running water was slow to appear in the Watson household and Lizzy hated being given a Luzianne coffee can and scrape of paper and being instructed to make her way down to the fig tree. She did enjoy shucking corn to feed the chickens and picking huckleberries to be made into a delicious syrup to have with homemade biscuits in the mornings or anytime she wanted a snack.

She grew up riding her bike on shell crusted Sketcher’s lane, not to far from St Patrick’s Church, hanging out with neighborhood kids Dwan and Angela, graduated from Port Sulphur High School and first met her lifelong friend, Theresa Inabnet. As an adult, Liz lived most of her life in Empire, Louisiana and was married to a soft spoken, handsome young fisherman, Brian Amos. Though they did eventually divorce, they remained close friends. Their son Justin Brian Amos was the light, moon and stars of Lizzy’s life and his death at age 42 was a soul crushing loss she endured but never learned to live with. Lizzy continued to celebrate Justin’s birthday with a red velvet cake each year because that was her baby and it was still his birthday after all. It is difficult to think of Elizabeth being gone without thinking of Justin and the only thing which makes bearing her loss with a bit less pain is the thought that they are all back together. Time does not heal every wound.

A Marshmallow heart when touched by fire becomes toasty and black, revealing the marvelously gooey and even sweeter, creamy center. Elizabeth possessed such a heart and kept it well protected and hidden behind a bitch façade. She loved playing the part but fooled no one, least of all the people who valued her.

Elizabeth would give you a hard time because she could and she would give you a chance to prove yourself up to her standards and more than one chance if you were young and still needed it. She was not afraid of speaking her mind and did not abide laziness or sass.

Elizabeth was with her life companion, Ralph Johnson, when she died. They shared their lives with his granddaughter Jasi Johnson. Liz became Jasi’s ‘Granny’ by rite of love for the young child which only grew deeper and more abiding with the passing of Jasi’s birthdays. Lizzy’s steadfast devotion to Jasi was reciprocated and amplified. They were bound by love, bonded without the need for blood.

Please join the family in a celebration of Liz’s life November 9, 2024, at the Black Velvet in Buras, Louisiana at 11:00 AM.