Sunday, February 23, 2014 – Garden District and Paddle Boat Tour - Nope, Really NOMA

All sleep; snores permeate our lodging. Last night brought a thunderstorm with terrific rain. Keith woke briefly, concerned about the crackly sound.  The imp of perversity appeared in the bedroom corner, her eyes glowing with scarcely concealed merriment. “Tell him that the world is ending,” she whispered, egging me on. With great difficulty, I resisted her tempting, delicious charm.  To Bear, I responded only, “Rain, my love.” My behavior disgusted the imp, prompting her to scowl, disappearing with a foot stomp and an angry snort.

This Airbnb, not the best we’ve rented, lacks cookware and a functioning microwave. Grillwork covers every window. Come a house fire, we’re dead cooked meat. Our host asked us to close the blinds last night as “people could see in”. I’m not exactly sure why we should care that people could see in.  New Orleans and her residents seemed braced, anticipating a siege, perhaps appropriately, considering the impending drunken orgy of Mardi Gras. As we learned yesterday, anything not battened down and securely shuttered will be puked upon or stolen, perhaps both.

The torrent continues all morning. Bloodroot and Barkley finally rise.  The sky cries in endless, lingering streams. We leave the house around 11:45 AM.  Our agenda for today includes exploring the Garden District and a touristy Mississippi River boat ride on a steam paddleboat, naturally.  We plan to step into Samuel Clemens’s world. Bloodroot calls the boat place to make sure they accommodate cripples. “Definitely, sir,” they respond, “on the top deck only. We don’t allow cripples downstairs.” So there I would be in my wheelchair, out in the storm, jumping as Sven’s batteries short out.

Given the persistent, ceaseless deluge, we decide to stop by the New Orleans Museum of Art (NOMA) for just an hour. We read about an intriguing Civil War photography exhibit. We’ll limit our visit to an hour, wait for the storm to subside, then pick up the paddleboat tour. Who are we kidding here? Does the rain shower fill our heads with water, swishing our thinking about like the spin cycle of a washing machine?  We spent 15 hours at the Louvre!

(Once, long ago, Bloodroot and I did spend only an hour touring a Potato Museum in Blackfoot, Idaho.  I recall a glass case displaying the world’s largest potato chip, unfortunately broken.)

Ignoring hindsight, we shell out big bucks for an Art Museum ($60) and walk upstairs to visit the Civil War photographs. The exhibit rocks!  We wander through myriad extant tintypes, the medium surprisingly durable. The Civil War brought photography and made it affordable to the masses. People embraced the new technology believing that the photos would protect their loved ones. Relatives back home wore small tintype lockets as talismans. As Arthur C Clarke said, “any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic.”

The war produced a previously unthinkable number of casualties-unclaimed, anonymous bodies decomposing in a field or hastily buried somewhere. After the war, the federal government reburied dead combatants classifying over half “unknown”, inspiring the dogtags still used by the military today. A missing soldier could walk in the front door two or three years after a battle, the suspense keeping hopes alive and talismans treasured.

We also see photos of scarred backs, shackled children, and other mute but grim testaments to the horrors of slavery.

The Civil War, considered the first modern war, used new and advanced killing machines including repeating rifles (seven shots before reloading), Gatling (machine) guns, deadlier, longer-range, more accurate bullets (Minie balls) and railroads to supply everything. Unfortunately, expertise keeping soldiers alive lagged behind the military’s new lethal capacities. Eventually battlefield care of the injured improved, as people invented ambulances and developed better surgery. We see a surgical primer. Is it gross? Certainly, but still represents a major step forward from what had been before.

After the war came Lincoln’s assassination.  People expected posters and photos of the conspirators; the government scrambled to oblige.  “Hey, Booth died in a barn fire, he wasn’t hanged, was he?” The family thinks, the family puzzles, stirring their collective vague memories of history education. Keith reads the bottom half of the blurb next to the wanted poster – yes, Booth wouldn’t surrender, so the Feds set fire to the barn he hid in. At one point in my life, I would’ve read quickly everything in this museum. Now, my multiple lenses slow me considerably and I find that I skip a great deal.  This allows me to ask unintelligent questions with obvious answers.

Even now, Booth’s near success rattles me. He and his co-conspirators planned to take out the federal government targeting Lincoln, Vice President Andrew Johnson, and Secretary of State William Seward.  The war would still have been lost, having slipped far beyond the South’s grasp, but what evil the conspirators could have wrought!

At 1:45 PM, Bloodroot mentions that we should mosey on over to the boat, herding us toward the museum’s door.  Opening the door, the downpour nearly drowns us.  We dodge the endless cascade, scurrying back into the museum.  The boys opine, “Forget the boat!  The NOMA is way more interesting.” We choose to indulge in a leisurely lunch.  Following our relaxing meal, Bloodroot orders a cookie and a glass of wine. He devours his treats, all the while labelling us decadent.  Rising, we explore the museum’s small but nice regular collection featuring a few works by Monet, Miro, Picasso, and Degas. Rounding a corner, we discover the museum’s famous Mel Chin artwork.  The two-story bomb-shaped bamboo sculpture hangs in the main atrium, the only space large enough to hold it.  Called Our Strange Flower of Democracy, the piece solemnly reminds us that the Athenian democracy (the very first) sentenced Socrates to death in 399 BC.

Long before we’re ready, the museum surprises us by closing.  This seems to be the story of our collective lives.  We evaluate our options. After some discussion, we decide to explore the Garden District. Bloodroot drives around for a good bit, Barkley directing. Finally we park, exit Pearl, and begin walking. Not much really to report. Perhaps more blooms later in the spring.

Barkley and Bloodroot decide they want to live in New Orleans, for hipness and cool houses.  They plan to locate their new corporation here, Napoleonic code notwithstanding.  “Don’t worry, Mom,” they say, “We’ll definitely avoid the French Quarter.”

As a dutiful, concerned parent, I provide objections:

              1)  This place is beneath sea level.

              2)   June through September are god-awful hot.

              3)   You’re downstream of much of the country’s pollution – from the old steel in                   Pittsburgh to every factory and farm in the Mississippi watershed, not to                     mention the petrochemical factories.

The boys drop the New Orleans headquarters idea.  I must admit I don’t know if they buy my stupendous counsel or simply tire of arguing.

Bloodroot drives past Tulane and Loyola Universities, both adorned by graceful old buildings and massive oak trees. Near the universities, we see old houses, long and narrow, like doublewides turned sideways.  We head home.

Once back at the ranch, the boys cook.  We discuss the trip over dinner.  What does each of us hope to see? 

Bear:  Carlsbad, Big Bend, Vicksburg and Chalmette battlefields.

Bloodroot:  Sinkholes and Big Bend.

Barkley:  Sinkholes, Vicksburg, plantations and the George Bush Center.

Beaver:  Laura Plantation.

We turn in early.  Tomorrow, we drive out to the Laura Plantation, my sole manifest desire in this month long odyssey.  “Odyssey, that’s me,” murmurs Pearl sleepily.  “Goodnight Pearl!” we reply in unison.  After all, we remember while tumbling into the oblivion of sleep, tomorrow is another day.[1]

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[1] Scarlett O’Hara, last line of Gone with the Wind

Saturday, February 22, 2014 – the French Quarter, Drunk by Noon

Our New Orleans adventure begins with Bloodroot and Barkley returning to the airport to retrieve Barkley’s lost luggage. Keith and I take well-deserved showers.

Earlier, Toby, our Lafayette Airbnb host, worried about us visiting New Orleans.  “People are crazy drunk there,” he warned.  “Most of the Mardi Gras stuff is just silliness to entertain the ludicrously intoxicated tourists.  The chicken runs and the mud wrestling are the only authentic events remaining,” Toby continued.  After a pensive pause, stroking his beard with careful consideration, he added, “Well, they’re too wasted to really harm you – just make sure you aren’t puked on.”

Believing Mardi Gras to be a one-day celebration, we figure that coming into the city ten days early, we’ll avoid it. Right?  Wrong!  Plastered people stumble along in front of us at 1 PM, surprising us by remaining ambulatory.  Sven presents a confusing obstacle; staring glassy-eyed, most avoid tripping over him, if just barely.  “Don’t worry Beaver,” he purrs reassuringly, “I’m made of steel.  With my motor, we can take out any of these fools.” The intoxication increases as the day progresses, until being vomited upon becomes a distinct possibility.

Elbowing our way through sloshed people, we aim for the New Orleans Jazz National Historic Site (NHS). Our first crisis arises, not caused by the blottoids.  We have forgotten our National Park passports!   How will we get our novelty stamps now?  Bloodroot runs back to the car to retrieve the passports.

In solidarity with Bloodroot, Barkley, Bear and I exit the NHS. We can’t tour a museum without him!  We walk down the street and climb up onto the levee overlooking the Mississippi.  “Wow!  What a huge river!” Barkley exclaims.  Cruise-ship-size boats and tankers speed along the river.  The sun shines on the water, illuminating a wide commercial, industrial, riparian environment, nothing magical.  Dwelling eternally in my imaginary eco-friendly universe, blinders on, I had forgotten the Mississippi’s importance as our main shipping waterway.  Now forcibly reminded, I learn that the port of New Orleans is one of the largest in the world with 60% of North America’s farm products leaving the country via the Mississippi, while barges ship petroleum and steel back up.

We find it somewhat disconcerting to see a river ABOVE us, contained only by massive dikes and levees.  What if they break?  Unlike the West, we see no canyon walls allowing us to climb to safety.  No “up” exists.  The possibility of another Katrina terrifies us.

Turning back toward the city, we descend to the trolley tracks lining the river to watch the trolley cars go by for a bit. We search in vain for a streetcar named Desire. Wouldn’t it be cool to find a streetcar named Desire to certify that Tennessee Williams just hadn’t invented it? But no, no such streetcar: another fantasy cruelly quashed.

(Actually, New Orleans had a Desire Street Line which lost its trolley in 1948. In the mid-90s, San Francisco Muni leased the actual streetcar named Desire (number 952) from New Orleans.  Muni has restored and uses car 952 to this day, in San Francisco, not New Orleans.)

Bloodroot returns with the passports, ushering us into the Jazz NHS as a family. The site has lots of photos of jazz greats, none of whom I recognize, save Dr. John. I’ve seen Dr. John with both of my husbands. I remember the first one saying, “Look at that guy! He’s so fat he’s just asking for a heart attack.”  Ah, the irony of life!  My first husband died from obesity related cardiac arrest in 1997, while Dr. John is still alive and still obese. Bear and I saw Dr. John in Asheville in 2005, enjoying a great show.  Dr. John does always appear to be at death’s door.  Perhaps living below sea level at the water’s edge produces a certain insouciance toward life, heroin addiction aside.

For lunch we indulge in a New Orleans special called the muffaletta, sandwich meat on white bread with olives. We sit at a counter reminiscent of the Woolworth’s dime store of my childhood. My mom loved Woolworth’s; she ever fantasized about working the lunch counter. Mom struggled leaving her working-class roots behind, never entirely comfortable with my father’s financial aplomb. We all have our dreams; mine do not involve Woolworth’s. We see a signed photo of Bob Hope eating here with his wife Dolores, presumably after being pardoned for stealing cars in Cleveland. The sandwiches suck, but we enjoy tradition.

Nearby, we find the old New Orleans mint, which has been a museum longer than it functioned as a mint. Keith’s eyes glaze over as he gazes at coins to his heart’s content. Upstairs, we find an exhibit about the Preservation Hall Jazz Band.  Another room contains an auditorium where a jazz singer, unrelated to the Preservation Hall Jazz Band, regales us with tales of the jazz life. She’s not an inspiring speaker; we catch naps on the comfy theatre seats during the interview.

Onward! We wander the streets of the French Quarter watching gaily, garishly dressed people three sheets to the wind. On one street 20 people sing Christian songs unamplified, totally drowned out by a rock band playing Ray Charles. If the Christians could properly lip-sync, they could look like they were singing Ray Charles. Perhaps an improvement?   At least more people would pay attention to them.

There’s no recycling in New Orleans. The city doesn’t feel French, the way Acadian Lafayette did, just beaten-up, rode hard and put up wet. Every street sign labeled Bourbon Street has been stolen. I see a city dirtied by the filth of addiction. The French Quarter does have lots of brightly colored homes with ornate grill work. I ponder, would we like the city far better had we missed Mardi Gras?  But perhaps New Orleans only exists as a world of alcoholic overindulgence, no matter the time of year.

We become lost and wander through several tourist information (TI) places, all completely worthless. Unlike Europe, where the TIs dispense useful information, like maps in English of the city you’re visiting, the American ones exist only to fleece travelers by aggressively promoting overpriced tours.  No maps today.

At long last we find our final museum, another portion of the Jean Lafitte National Park. Having spent a great deal of time lost, we arrive only a bit before closing.  We meet the most engaging Ranger. “No one can wholly separate the myth of Jean Lafitte from historical reality. Jean helped Andrew Jackson win the war of 1812 in the Battle of New Orleans. Lafitte was also a privateer, a slave trader, and like all of us both good and bad – perhaps more bad than most.” The Ranger provides no satisfactory answer to why we have a National Park named after a pirate and a slave trader.

The Park Visitor Center has a great timeline showing when each ethnic group moved to the New Orleans area:  Indians, Europeans, Africans and lastly the Vietnamese, who arrived following the Viet Nam war.

“Does the Mississippi River want to jump into the Atchafalaya River?“ I ask. “Absolutely,” states the ranger, confirming my suspicions. “Given a good hurricane or earthquake, the Mississippi River will change her course, becoming one with the Atchafalaya. This would produce a new delta-built city somewhere south of Houma, eliminating New Orleans’ vital port. The Army Corps of Engineers has spent years working to prevent this.”  “Who do you think will win, the Mississippi or the Atchafalaya?” asks Bear. “I’m not a gambling man,” the Ranger responds, “but in the short-term I’d put my money on the Corps of Engineers, over the long-term, mother nature via the Atchafalaya will win.”

What has changed since Katrina?” we ask.  The ranger replies:

“We now have higher levees but nothing has been done to ameliorate the problems associated with living below sea level.

The Mississippi, courtesy of the Army Corps of Engineers, remains one large drainage ditch, her life-giving, delta-building sediment diverted into deep waters of the Gulf of Mexico.  Thus, New Orleans continues sinking. 

The world over, ocean levels rise.

No one wants to spend the money on a seawall as the English, Russians and Dutch have. The city remains a sitting duck awaiting the next big hurricane.

The French Quarter property retains its value due to its being both the most historic and highest land around. 

New Orleans will continue as it has until climate change reality in the form of hurricanes, floods and rising sea levels make it too expensive to be here.”

The petrochemical companies we saw back in Lake Charles have no interest in rebuilding the wetlands.  Is it cheaper to abandon the factories as they become untenable?  Or in the new classic move, will they wait for a disaster, be deemed too big to fail and let the feds build the seawall?  Considering the importance of oil in all of our lives, perhaps we should force building the seawall with federal funds, NOW, before a disaster occurs.

The Ranger locks the men’s room before closing time. Unfortunately, the women’s room has already been decimated by retching tanked-up morons. Assholes! Is there ever a thought for anyone else in inebriation? Does wiping out the only accessible restroom for miles matter? I find myself hating blitzed jerks even more than I already do, a feat and feeling I did not consider possible.

As the museum closes, we’re tossed out once again. We head back to our house to prepare dinner.

Relaxing after a wondrous repast, the four of us discuss Bloodroot’s cousin Drew.  Since it’s obviously our business, where should Drew go to college? Miami of Ohio offers an $11,000 per year scholarship, John Carroll competes with a full scholarship and Notre Dame costs $58,000 per year with no scholarship.  It’s 11:30PM in Ohio, but we feel that we must warn Drew about Notre Dame. Barkley currently lives in South Bend, having earned his MFA from Notre Dame. Barkley dials the phone.  For some reason, probably involving familial insanity, Drew answers.

“Drew,” Barkley begins, “people who graduate from Notre Dame are called Domers. If you get both a Bachelor’s and Master’s degree from Notre Dame, you’ll be a Double Domer and have two heads like Zaphod Beeblebrox.”[1] Barkley then regales Drew with tales of various infamous Domers. “Did you know that one Domer populated an entire sperm bank with only his own sperm?”  Questionable behavioral examples exhausted, Barkley returns to Drew’s life.  He continues, “Drew, do you know what you plan to do with your life?” Drew’s response, if any, is inaudible to those of us sitting about the table. Drew is brilliant and not very talkative. “Well, I did,” Barkley pontificates, “I went to college knowing I wanted to be the best writer ever! And you know what I am now? A complete failure!” Barkley thunders. “But I knew what I wanted to do!  That’s the difference between you and me Drew!”  I wish fervently for a tape recorder to record this spectacular Barkley rant. Even transcribing this part of the conversation, I dissolve into helpless laughter.  The conversation ends, we laugh a bit more, then turn in for the night.

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[1] Zaphod Beeblebrox is a comedic character sporting two heads in Douglas Adam’s Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy.