I have been clicking my heals for weeks now, maybe I should get my ruby slippers checked out.
When we first arrived in Florida, after escaping Hurricane Katrina, people were friendly. They were sincere, kind and generous. Most of them had a fondness for New Orleans that they were glad to talk about. Our Floridian hosts described America’s romantic European city whilst flecks of sweet memories glistened in their voices.
We sat at dinner tables and smiled and listened to stories of wild nights on Bourbon St., fabulous dinners, hangovers, musical experiences and near criminal misses. None of these stories really resonated well with Sean and I, but we patiently listened. It is so common that people who “JUST LOVE New Orleans” when they visit, wouldn’t dare live there. If we stuck around for after dinner drinks, most people would tell us about why that is true also. Among other reasons, they most frequently listed crime, pollution, and corruption, poor education and heat.
We have absorbed comments like: “you’d be crazy to go back” and “this kind of thing never would have happened in Florida” and “why didn’t those people just leave?”. Honestly, I have no response anymore. I can’t really explain myself so that they will understand. I even feel like, having some of these people actually adopt my sensibility of this subject would be an indicator for me to re-evaluate my logic. However, I have made it a priority to explain my love of New Orleans to myself. After all, my stay there has not been entirely easy.
I can forgive people trying to wrap their minds around the guns, sneaker looting, rape, and murder. None of that makes sense at first glance. It frightens me that I think I might understand it now…at least conceptually. Regardless of these comments, and the truths that make them, I want to go home.
We New Orleanians withstand lives of perpetual heartache and outrageous joy. None of us are able to escape the tragic poverty. Not even those of us who live in fancy mansions in Audubon Place. It permeates everything.. Similarly, we live on the front lines of crime, disease, addiction, and a tragic education system guilty of many crimes including social genocide. I like this because you can never notice your fortune without being aware of someone else’s lack of fortune. It activates our sense of gratitude.
It is also true that a great many of us have lived in anticipation of “the big one”. Believe it or not, we have known for some time that a storm like Katrina was imminent. I am guilty of conveniently redefining immanency to mean…sometime within this century. Alas, like our fearless president, I have allowed my mind to define the global warming problem with the same logic. Denial or survivalistic optimism?
I digress.
I did mention outrageous joy. I love a city that closes down every thoroughfare in town for a few weeks every year to allow parades to pass throwing toys to children…and adults. Where else do grown adults get to dress up in glitter and dance down any street in the city with their own band? Come to think of it, why is that such a strange idea everywhere else in the world? Why is it that every other city in America forces the bars to close at 2 am, and doesn’t even let you walk around with a little daiquiri? I have lived in those towns, and I promise, it doesn’t reduce the probability of drunks littering the streets at any hour. Rules do not always insure safety.
In the years that I have inhabited New Orleans, I have shared many beautiful drunken sunrises with good friends, but that is not what I love about that city. In fact, as I slowly grow older, I have become quite fond of sober moments. In fact, Mardi Gras day is far better when your mind isn't so polluted that the colors and music are dulled.
I love the baton girls and the flambeau guys and marching bands. I love the spring afternoons, sitting in the park with an iced coffee and a friend. I love dew covered crepe myrtle trees and night blooming jasmine. I love being stuck in traffic at 2 in the afternoon, because some random second line is escorting a slow moving homemade convertible with a girl in a ball grown down a road headed to a crawfish boil. In reality, what I love the most about New Orleans is that it defies arbitrary social convention.
I am now in Florida, drowning in arbitrary social convention. The oppression is outstanding. I mean it, even at the Library. What I am learning is that I need that city, because everywhere else is lame. I really can’t make it sound smarter than that. I want to go home and sit on my porch and talk to my neighbors, ride my bike around town, take my dogs to the park, hear music, eat red beans on Monday, wear an evening gown to Pop-eye’s, and have a 4 hour conversation with everybody in the Rue, about nothing, over coffee and cigarettes. I am anxious to be somewhere that feels good, like I belong there. It is the one place that has ever felt like home to me. I went there by myself. I planted my roots there. I fell in love there. I want to live and die there.
Posts
