À bientôt

I went to dinner the other night with a friend who's conversations are usually light and fun, but we started talking about relationships and our mutual difficulties that we'd had because of the work we do. It made me wish I was staying longer or I'd taken more time to try and get to know her better, sooner. I think we could have could have

I'd told her that I was moving when I visited her in the little french quarter shop she worked in. She was taken aback and honestly; i thought she might be. I'd mentioned before that I might be moving, but I'd never broken it to her that I would be for certain, because I was always afraid it would spoil the mood. I like to see her smile, after all. When I told her I was leaving, her smile dipped a little but it wasn't ever really gone. It was replaced with one that said "That's too bad" and it really was. It's too bad that we'd acted all along like we had time to see where things might go, because we didn't.

I've been sick the last few days, staying in to get over the cold/flu/monkey pox that I've been suffering from. I watch movies and order takeout, surf the web and get a little work done. I mustered what little energy I have to go out to eat with a friend this afternoon, because I don't want to spend my last month here in quarantine.

I'll miss New Orleans, but I'm leaving for the right reasons and I know it's time to go.

This is where I live, but not for much longer. I'll be moving west in about a month. I'm trying to think of it as being the right thing to do, but that doesn't mean that it's what I really want. What I want is to stop the clocks and just lay here for a while.

L'aventure commence

"Would you ever want it to work out? Would you give it another shot and try again if she ever wanted to?", she asked me. She was sitting on my left side, facing me and I was staring straight ahead. Her knees were just barely touching the side of my leg. I know that my moving west immediately made some people think it was to be closer to my ex wife, so her questions aren't unexpected, her concerns valid enough that they should be laid to rest gently.

"No", I said, after considering it for a moment.

"No? How can you be so sure? Maybe if you saw each other it would be different?".

"I know because she's happy with who she is now. I'm happy for her, that she's happy, but neither of us wants what the other wants. If I met her today, if I came across her at work or even just out someplace and got to know her, I don't think I'd fall in love with her now, with the person she's happy being now. It worked out the way that it was always going to work out. We met at probably the only moment in each others lives when we would have given each other a chance, but it didn't work out and this is where we are now. "

"Do you think she wants it to work out?", she asked me.

"No. I think she wants to know that I'd try, but I really don't think she wants it to actually work out, unless working it out means that I fold everything I want up, pack it away and go live her life with her, instead of mine. That's not ever going to happen though, because I don't want her life any more than she would want mine."

"Maybe later in life, things will be different.".

"My life is now. By the time I reach 'later', it'll either be alone or with someone that I've met along the way, not someone that went off and lived their life and then wants me back after they've had their adventure. The adventure is the good part; if I'm going to have anyone in my life I want it to be someone that wants to share that with me.".

The waitress brought the check and I paid. We changed the subject to lighter things, distracted ourselves with little pieces of portable technology and tried to let the heaviness of the moment go before we slipped outside into the clear, crisp afternoon.

Mardi Gras day

It's been the Mardi Gras season here in New Orleans, which means a lot of different things. It means parades and costumes, the parody of current trends and observance of historic traditions. It means drinking and noise, it means excess that would seem shocking and all of it leads up to the Ash Wednesday, which is the first day of Lent. It's the feast before the famine and people revel as though it may very well be their last chance to do so. They make promises the week before about what they'll give up on Ash Wednesday and then pursue those things until it comes, with a ravenous hunger. "I swear I'm giving up drinking right after Mardi Gras..."



I've had a friend who leaves in what becomes an unreachable neighborhood (hi crime and too far/dangerous to walk from, no available cabs during Mardi Gras), so I offered to let her stay with me until Carnival was over. She works on Bourbon street, so she'd been meeting me in the quarter and then I'd walk her to work, but sometimes the cab situation would mean it would take hours for her to get here (with me waiting to go with her to eat or have a drink), so we just agreed she'd stay with me instead. After the first night I gave her a key, because she'd often not come home until nine in the morning and it was easier just to have her let herself in. She worked every day until Lundi Gras and then stayed with me so she could enjoy Mardi Gras without fighting to get back and forth. It was an fast friendship that we shared, she and I, despite how unlikely it might have seemed that we would. We went to the parades together, she came with me on a Noisician Coalition march and we stayed out late, drank, ate gluttonously and had fun together.



Mardi Gras day we stood on Canal street and I did something I haven't done in well over five years and probably closer to ten: I ate a Lucky Dog. I'm normally opposed to the very idea of them, but there was something about seeing a parade early in the afternoon, putting together costumes, having drinks, chasing down doubloons from Rex that made the indulgence of a Lucky Dog seem not only acceptable, but almost necessary to really have had the full experience. Oh, and we touched the Saints superbowl trophy and hi fived Sean Payton

We stood against the metal barricades, waiting for the floats to pass and I smiled, my belly full of gluttony, that I was back in New Orleans, that this time I was experiencing Mardi Gras as a reveler and not just as a bar owner waiting for it to pass. I looked down and saw a little girl with the most piercingly blue eyes that I'd ever seen, smiling at the beads she'd just caught and it gave my smile further reason. The sun was in my eyes, but I didn't mind. The crowds were thick, but that was ok too.



I looked up and saw a float passing, one with a Venetian Carnivale theme. I thought of people in Venice, sharing that day with us on the other side of the world and it made me feel connected to them because of all the places in between that don't celebrate the way that they do, the way that we do. It made me sad for a moment, to think that I'd planned on living in Europe this year, celebrating in Venice on this day, but it passed because i was in New Orleans celebrating it and really, that's pretty wonderful.




The end of The night brought another tradition; the clearing of the streets by police when Mardi Gras Gives way to Ash Wednesday and Lent begins. The come through on horseback, clearing Bourbon street. It's the only day, the only time people are told to leave and they do so in typical New Orleans an impressive cavalcade of mounted police.

Parades

This photo was taken at the Saints victory parade with no flash. It is, of course, completely impossible to get a still photograph with all the commotion, the surging of the crowd, constant movement, but that’s sort of what I like: all the motion.



Elly, petting the horses of New Orleans mounted police on Bourbon Street near Iberville after we'd managed to get through the crushing crowd and back to relatively safe distance from the people that had come by the thousands to see the parade. She's wearing her grandfathers WWII army coat to keep warm and she swims inside of it, it hanging loosely on her lithe frame.

Carnival

One of the biggest differences I've noticed about this city since I've returned post-Katrina is that people are more apt to celebrate rather than feel they are above it. I recall distinctly the moaning and groaning of a lot of locals who didn't seem the slightest bit interested in Mardi Gras celebrations, but now; it's a different story. People plot their costumes in advance, chart their hours to make it to their favorite events and put forth an almost Herculean effort to make sure that they are a part of it. It's one of the better changes I've seen, this coming together.

spring is coming, I can smell it

What passes for winter is slowly letting go of New Orleans and spring is coming earlier here than it does in the northern state that I grew up in. It's warm today, so I went for a walk in short sleeves and still managed to work a bead of sweat on by brow. I walk fast, wearing headphones, listening to music (lately I've been stuck on Saltillo, particularly A hair on the head of John the Baptist ) looking around at the world without lingering on the faces in it. Sometimes people will tell me after the fact that they've seen me blur past them, unable to get my attention while I've been on these afternoon walks and in my excitement for this fair weather I'm sure that I'll give good cause for these comments today.

I can smell the spring in the air. I can smell the difference in the scent of the rain, smell the old wood swelling in my old apartment, smell the earth renewing it's offerings of annuals & perennials. I can smell the plaster and paint relax after the brief period of cold.

I opened the floor to ceiling windows in my office and saw a tiny green lizard wander inside a few steps before retreating. He took a fly that hadn't fared the winter so well on his way back into the sun and soaked up the last few remaining rays before it started raining.

Today I'm that little green lizard, taking the spring before it's time, soaking up the warmth and the sun, because that's what we are meant to do after the winter passes.

the miles between you and I

"You should go, if not for anyone but yourself", Frederic said in his thick Montréal accent. We were sitting at an empty blackjack table at the Palms, out of the smoke and away from the noise of the bar where everyone was gathered. We'd been talking first about my meeting with the owner of his company, about the fact that he and his girlfriend were expecting and then the conversation shifted to discussions of where we were, if I'd seen her, if I planned to. He's smart, successful, kind and I have the utmost respect for his opinion and his advice. I'd already been leaning toward going regardless of the outcome, but he gave me the final push that I needed to make up my mind, see it through.

I travelled to San Francisco unsure if I would or should visit with her; it was an uncertainty compounded by the fact that when I'd mentioned the idea to her in the past she'd responded favorably but always got skittish and became suddenly unavailable when it came time to actually plan things (she's since admitted that nervousness has often been a huge factor in this).

Frederic had suggested I see her because at very least I'll have been able to say that I tried to bridge the cavernous gap between us, whether it actually happened or not. I'd sort of felt like as a matter of principal I should try too, so I went but made alternate plans for the free time that I'd have while I was there, just in case.

She texted me with the address of a bar; someplace between where she lived and where I was staying. I went outside and found the street but with no cabs available in the first few blocks, I just decided to walk. It was just brisk enough that I was thankful for the velvet coat, but not cold enough for the leather gloves. I walked at a fast pace, feeling like I was cutting through the night on a collision course with something big but unknown. We exchanged messages back and forth while I made my way there and I saw her standing outside when I was half a block away. She walked to the corner and met me; we hugged for a long time. It been the first we'd seen of each other in half a year, parting just after the divorce.

She looked good. For a while after the divorce I'd worried awfully about her because I knew she wasn't taking very good care of herself, but she looked good when I saw her, like herself again. We walked inside and ordered drinks, taking a seat in the window while complimenting each other on how we looked.

We spent hours together, talking about our lives as they are now, the relationships we've had since, trying to right a few wrongs and close some of the distance that had grown between us. She admitted that being frightened that things would be worse had caused her to sabotage some of my previous efforts to see her this way. We promised each other we'd try harder.

The next day I was booked out on a late flight and when it was cancelled, it caused me to have to spend another day in San Francisco. We went out to dinner and for a drink again that night and it was lovely; spending time together that wasn't overwrought as the last few times we saw each other were.

I'm happy I made the trip, took the time, saw her again. I'm happy that we could look each other in the eye and part ways better than the way we had the last time. I'm glad that we are on good terms for the first time in ages. I really, really hope that it stays this way.

bright lights

I thought it would be strange, difficult going back to Las Vegas after the way I left it, the time that's passed, who I am now. I thought perhaps I'd have a moment that was like vertigo when I realized I'd lived another life there, but that was a lifetime ago and it wasn't like revisiting your old high school, but rather more like moving through a room that you were made to wait.

I stood on the fifty-seventh floor looking out at the lights and I thought they were beautiful and was happy to see them again, but I didn't have the feeling that they belonged to me like I do when I look out a place that I really love. I didn't feel like the mountains were mine or that I possessed the stars. I didn't feel like it was my city, just a city that I admired somehow, faintly.

When I look out of the tall windows in my own New Orleans bedroom, I feel that the city owns me. I feel like it's laid a claim on me that I've taken comfort in, that I've allowed, encouraged, appreciated. I feel like New Orleans is standing just behind me with an arm draped around my neck gently, whispering in my ear softly that I should stay, that even if I go, I'll just want to come back and that no place will love me quite the same.

I'd thought when I was in Las Vegas I might slip into feeling that I'd gone home but I passed by the place that I used to live and hadn't even considered that I had until it was already behind me and out of sight. I've never come to New Orleans and neglected to look.

Even though I see the contrast, plain as day, it makes too much sense at the moment for me not to go and there are only selfish (maybe even irresponsible) reasons to stay. I won't go back to Las Vegas; I've had that life once before, but I'm on my way west, soon.

Do you need winter to enjoy summer?

We walked briskly down Bourbon Street, convincing ourselves that the cold wasn't nearly as bad once you started moving, generating heat. We are both northern people, grew up in the same state and are accustomed to a cold that's actually much colder, but somehow it seemed worse in New Orleans than it had in Detroit.

We charge past tourists, around the metal barricades that prevent cars from crawling down the street at night through the crowds. We fly by policemen on horses and through traffic on cross streets. We suffer the cold as people try to lure us inside bars, restaurants, strip clubs with a promise of heat that makes me think of the summer when they promise the cold and everyday when they promise cheap booze and dancing.

She's wearing her grandfathers green wool military issue coat which is large enough to accommodate two of her inside of. Her knitted cap is pulled down to just above her eyebrows, which are also knitted (from the cold). We stop in front of the club that she works in and I hug her goodbye. The light inside is pink and it glows on her cheeks, which are red. She turns quickly and walks inside and I shove my gloved hands in my pockets and retrace my steps.