Louisiana

I really, really love Louisiana. Maybe because every single moment I have ever spent there has been wonderful. I have visited many times, with many friends and lovers. I have never been to Mardi Gras and only went to Jazzfest once. I prefer to visit when the city is not so crowded and it's easier to get a table at my favorite restaurants - a list that keeps growing and growing.

I do admit that a great deal of my time there is spent under various influences but New Orleans alters my state of mind way before that first bloody mary. Each state in this country may be different, but Lousiana is way different. If you've been there and you are a living, breathing, feeling person then you have felt the spirit that seems to rise from the ground in that place. I can only hope that all that spirit finds it's way back when the sun truly begins to rise again on the Gulf Coast.

My thoughts this week were about some of the people that made my time there memorable. There was the cab driver who picked us up from Frankie & Johnny's and on the way back gave us an improtu tour of the neighborhood, far more enjoyable than any of the official tours. Another bus driver - this time Lizz's cousin Christy flagged down one of those small luxury buses and asked the driver to take us from the Quarter to the JazzFest fairgrounds - and he did, singing for us all the way. I also thought about the gold toothed counter woman at Mother's who couldn't quite believe that I was going to eat a fried oyster po' boy AND a "Debris" po' boy (which is a po' boy made from the drippings off the roast beef cooked there at the restaurant - think of the most amazing pot roast and gravy hero in the universe and you might be doing this justice). Hey, it was my last day in town and they just don't play this kind of jazz back home.

If there ever was any doubt, Louisiana now owns the blues. Do what you can and learn what you can. The wake from the waves of this storm are going to be felt for a long time.