Donya Knudsen

Born on October 16, 1962, to Rose and Norman Knudsen at the hospital in Franklin, Louisiana she would grow up along the Berwick-Morgan City corridor. As a young girl she and her sisters, Karlyn and Marieva, would travel to Guatemala and Honduras accompanying their father who had connections to Seventh-Day Adventist communities in Central America. These were maritime experiences that she would talk about with great animation throughout her life. It was clear that it had created an intense awareness of the magic that exists below the water’s surface and the world that exists outside of the United States.

She became a mother at eighteen and then again at twenty raising two daughters, Krystal and Amanda, with help from her mother for the next ten years. She supported herself as a waitress and a bartender until she met me, Temple Causey, her husband for thirty-one years at Landry’s Restaurant in Morgan City in 1989. We would move to New Orleans the following year and were married at St. Stephen Church on Napoleon Avenue in 1992. Her daughters would join us that year and we set off on our journey raising a family. Miss Knudsen continued to work in the restaurant service industry for several years while we established ourselves financially. She ensured that both her daughters, Krystal and Amanda graduated from Ursuline Academy classes of 1998 and 2001 respectively.

As the nineties came to a close, she committed herself to a change by taking GED courses in order to complete her high school education. She earned her certificate and registered in the Mortuary Science program at Delgado Community College City Park Campus. She would graduate with an Associate’s Degree (honors) on December 14, 2001, and then apprenticed at Leitz Eagan and Lakelawn funeral homes. She became an accomplished embalmer with a passion for ensuring that people looked their best on their journey away from the earth. Encountering an intolerance for the chemicals associated with her profession she quietly retired to a life at home.

In 1999 she would become a grandmother to Anya Washington and then subsequently to Ava Judge, Arabella Pierlas, Charlotte Pierlas, and Frankie Pierlas. Anya and Ava are Krystal’s daughters and the Pierlas ladies are Amanda’s daughters.

Miss Knudsen would live in Halifax, Nova Scotia during 2007. She had an interest in the Titanic and was able to visit the final resting place of the souls that had perished as part of that 1912 incident in the North Atlantic. She also visited Peggy’s Cove an exposed fishing village on the coast and was witness to the ferocity of the ocean as it rolls into North America. She and I traveled to Grand Pre, the embarkation point of the 1755 Acadian expulsion—a people who had refused to support a conflict between France and England and suffered the consequences when the battle was concluded. The trip north and then south going home was accomplished in a red Isuzu SUV and included stops at Graceland, Boston, New York, Niagara, and of course many interesting detours along the way. From 2008-2010 she was with me in Jakarta, Indonesia while I was on assignment there. She would experience Bali, Sulawesi, Krakatau, Singapore, Vietnam, and China. Her voyages as a young girl in Central America had made her a fearless traveler. Upon returning home that same year she was part of a week-long Caribbean cruise sponsored by her mother-in-law, Ruby Causey, where she visited Jamaica, Grand Cayman, and Cozumel.

In 2012 she opened a vacation home rental business at our original home on Brainard Street and successfully managed visitors until the 2020 Covid pandemic shut down the travel business in New Orleans.

As part of her celebrations of becoming fifty years old, she did an Alaskan cruise in 2013.

On June 19, 2023, she passed away. She was sixty years young. From all that has been told here, she had lived large.

So that was the timeline. Perhaps a little more interesting than most, but not enough to describe who she was. Miss Knudsen had a way of understanding people that no one else did. She was empathetic to those who were not walking along the main road. People she knew were influenced by her willingness to accept them as they were. She additionally had a deep connection to animals that was an extension of the kindness that was manifested towards human beings. Her animal friends included cats, dogs, and birds. She claimed her Weimaraner, Gretchen Brown, was a kindred spirit. She had a fascination with monarch butterflies and honey bees. Her ability to converse on a million subjects at great depth was notable. If you were listening, a whole universe of alternative ways of going about things became apparent. Her knowledge and understanding of cinema and literature were a wonder. Her home was filled with books both normal and strange that further contributed to her openness to all that is. She, more than any was a fighter. She could absolutely get in your face. Life was not her better. She battled for what she wanted and often achieved her objective. She was beautiful, funny, sensitive, and smart. She was a hero to many who knew her. People will remember her energy, tenaciousness, and insight. Those that encountered her are better people because of her. Finally, she had a deep faith in God and the afterlife. She had a clear understanding that there was something out there beyond this world. It was a place of great beauty and great love. Hearing her describe it was inspirational and offered hope.

My wife Donya Knudsen was a bright light.