Meet a Character: Brenda and Charles Dixon

Have you ever gotten busy in a jacuzzi? Scored in a burbling whirlpool tub?

I may not have gotten lucky at Mamie’s Cottage, but I encountered Brenda and Charles Dixon’s jacuzzi tub at my 444-mile walk’s critical juncture. Seventy-five miles meat-grindered my feet. A couple of my toes were purple-verging-on-black. Joints screeched. Tendons wailed.

My body almost convinced
my mind it couldn’t go on.

Charles gave us a tour of Mamie’s Cottage, but I never left the bathroom. Once he showed me the jacuzzi tub, I let Dad and Alice learn about the rest of the place. Gas logs in the fireplace. A fridge stocked with provisions. Furniture that supported Dad’s weight. And of course, the inner workings of the television.

As soon as the door clicked shut, I opened the floodgates and plopped my abused limbs into hot water. I’m surprised I didn’t burn up the motor, alternating sore feet, cramped knees, stiff ankles and creaky hips in front of the jets.

Given the volume of
my moans and sighs,
Alice probably wondered
who was in there with me.

I’m glad I dragged myself to the Dupree House for breakfast, though. Brenda makes slurp-worthy fare, and Charles gives an entertaining tour of their plantation home just steps from the Natchez Trace. It’s fitting that Mamie’s Cottage sits alongside it.

It wasn’t always so.

Doctor Dupree, the original owner of Dupree House, decided to adopt a child and share his wealth with someone in need. His four children welcomed a sister, a girl named Mamie. When her adopted father died, she and her mother moved to a tiny cottage in town. Miss Mamie lived there until she died at age 90.

Her cottage was threatened with demolition in the 1990s, but Charles and Brenda rescued it. They paid to have it dismantled piece-by-piece and moved to the grounds of the Dupree House, uniting a daughter’s home with her father’s once again.

Sometimes, we make memories
by forging connections with the past.

Mamie’s Cottage is five miles from Raymond, Mississippi and twenty miles from Jackson. If you’re cycling, a short path leads from the Natchez Trace to the main gate. To take advantage of Brenda and Charles’s hospitality (and jacuzzi), click HERE to reserve through Natchez Trace Travel.

Have you ever found
the right place
at the right time?

The Huffington Post calls it “one literary ride you don’t want to miss!” What are you waiting for? Read Not Without My Father: One Woman’s 444-Mile Walk of the Natchez Trace. Be inspired to Make a Memory of your very own.

Click to read a sample of Not Without My Father

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