Go Large or Go Home
"Have a banana, Hannah. Try the salami, Tommy. Give with the gravy, Davy. Everybody eats when they come to my house." —Cab Callaway
By tradition, in food establishments across the globe, the
first chef in gets to wake up the kitchen. It's Tuesday morning; the chef
arrives at work: unlock the doors, turn on lights, fire up the ovens, wipe down
all horizontal work spaces with sanitizer, put liners in trash cans, turn on
the radio, and start the coffee. The rest of the crew is close behind. The more
ground work that's done, the faster we can get down to business at New Orleans
Culinary and Hospitality Institute (NOCHI) on the fifth floor Events Kitchen.
Yesterday (Monday), our
Learning Skills For Life (LSFL) class (27 students) had red beans, rice,
andouille sausage, salad, and crisp po-boy bread. Today is Taco Tuesday. The
other party for lunch has just gone from 50 to 138. Thankfully, we found out on
Friday so we could get procurement in time. The rest of the week, in addition
to LSFL, we have Rotary lunch for 55: chimichurri
chicken, patatas brava, tres leches
cake, and garden salad. There's the usual dietary restrictions (gluten free,
lactose free, vegetarian, and a person that doesn't eat bell peppers).
On Super Bowl weekend, we
cooked for 900: gumbo, jambalaya, red beans, po-boys, fruit platters, potato,
macaroni and coleslaw salads, and 1,500 smoked and barbecued chicken wings.
Next week, we have a sit down lunch for 15. There's no time to think ahead or
behind. It's Taco Tuesday for 188 (plus instructors) today.
Sous Chef Melinda Wilson comes
in next, reads the board, and starts the beef and chicken. Lydian comes in and
gets on the salsa, guacamole, and garnishes. Lonni sets up condiments and
shreds cheeses and lettuce. There are four of us and we're rolling. Lunches are
set to go out at 11:30 a.m. The Front of the House staff is in and setting
tables. Toni is directing them like a traffic cop. Michelle (our department
head) pops in to remind us of a BEO (Banquet Event Orders) meeting at 1 p.m.
The students (first and second floor culinary and baking/pastry) have been in
since 7:30 a.m. and will have a family meal ready for noon. 725 Howard Ave., a
five story building buzzing with soups, stocks, sauces, roasting, sautéing, and
mise en placing. Dishwashers roll in
at 10 a.m.
Up in the Events Kitchen, we
check and shelve today's procurement, make out prep and ordering lists, wipe as
we go, change gloves and wash hands often. We banter, chatter, dance around
each other, and sing out: "Behind you,"
"Corner," "Sharp," "Coming through," and "Hot." We also gossip, laugh, and
smile a lot. Our hours range from seven to 12 hours on any given day, weekend,
holiday—rain or shine. At times, we work a week and more without a day off, on
our feet, "flexing (make up) days" off to compensate.
This is our job. This is our
life. This is our choosing. We are American chefs. We leave our personal lives
at the door. At NOCHI, food is our life. We'll sell over a million bucks worth
of food this year. For larger parties, we hire temps. Other than that, it's
three and a half of us—Lydian has a second job and she's only available Mon. to
Wed.
I'm here frying up 300+ taco
shells—everything is from scratch—working rice, refrying beans, and wondering
how to write about the workings of the food service industry, how to describe
the choreography and dance that happens behind the scenes to be able to put
food on the table. It would be incredulously mindboggling to the uninitiated to
work in this type of controlled chaos.
On the third floor, there are
work spaces for the instructors (six) and office staff and directors of
finance, communications, enrollment, outreach, student support, sales, the
person who holds the purse strings, and the man who signs the checks. We're governed
by a board of directors who, in turn, keep tabs on our ability to pay the rent,
utilities, salaries, and keep up our public image. Even though we're considered
a nonprofit, like all other businesses, we've got to make our nut.
With every new event, it's like
opening a new restaurant. We offer clients the choice of virtually any menu,
any concept, any foods that they can imagine. We also teach private classes.
We've cooked North African, Latinx, Asian, Mediterranean, European, and the
requisite Creole/Cajun. We've taught classes of 20+ the intricacies of pasta
making, basic pastry, smokey barbecue, food from Spain, and the requisite
Creole/Cajun.
With each function, we need to consider ordering, organizing, inventory, and our food suppliers: food cost, labor, scheduling, waste factors, recycling, and equipment usage. Downstairs, there are scores of students paying to learn to do what we do.
What's different about us is
that we're no different than the other almost one and a half million kitchen
workers generating one point one trillion dollars a year in this country,
according to statista.com. There are
cuts, bruises, burns, the lifting of many heavy things, and the satisfaction of
a job well done. I've been doing this job a very long time, and each day is the
best day ever. I will continue to cook and conduct kitchens because my body and
will is strong. I'll be 82 years old this year—you read that correctly—and
there is no stopping me. "Everybody eats when they come to my house."
AI or My Eye
"AI is faster than a speeding bullet, more powerful than a locomotive, but not able to leap buildings in a single bound, and it cannot make, or explain to you how to make, a proper roux." —20 Helens Agree
Infographics, algorithms, image generators, SaneBox, Decktopus, chatbots and programs named Claude, Krisps, and Asana, not to mention Fireflies, work artificial intelligence, or AI, into the inseams of our trousered lives—inching toward our collective crotches with abilities far beyond those of mortal man, woman, or anyone over the age of 16. All of New Orleans in general laughs at AI's smug facelessness. "You can do many things, AI, but you can't cook," would be something any Cajun maw maw would quip.
AI also cannot make heads or tails of how to control a second line on a Sunday afternoon nor replicate the smell of smoked turkey necks. Although it can tell you where to score some Henny, it cannot predict or control your consumption or behavior. And the traffic? Fagetaboutit.
In short, AI, as smart and resourceful as it is, can only deal with what is programmed into it or go to places where it is sent. It lacks imagination and spontaneous repartee. It can give you a quick answer to a query, but it doesn't know why or what to do if you suddenly choose to wear two different color socks.
Case in point—Mardi Gras and the whole Carnival season. From Twelfth Night on, it's a crap shoot. Sure, AI can make me appear and sound like George Clooney or Morgan Freeman whooping it up at the Muses parade with Bella Hadid. AI can send a video of me doing a swan dive off the Acapulco cliffs while huffing a spliff and holding a bottle of mezcal to my coworkers while I'm actually in a serious huddle snuggle-down with my dog, binge watching another season of Will and Grace. Can it grab me a cold Modelo and another bag of Creole flavored chicharrones while it's up?
In short, as I understand it, AI is a tool, like a set of encyclopedias crossed with that geek kid that is willing to write your book report for you. AI can let you be as smug dumb as you want to be, but after help with homework, day-to-day tasks, content, ideas, and translations, ChatGPT 40 or Bing is not a reliable chum that will help you pick out your costume for Fat Tuesday while pouring you another shot of hooch and commiserating with you about your lack of company because you're such a loser. Nor will it let you know where and when the Washita Nation Indian gang will emerge with Chief David Montana in full regalia.
As far as that roux is concerned, every Helen agrees that a proper roux depends on the proper pot, spoon, and an atmospheric transcendental lunar Buddha-like thoughtlessness and relativity acuteness pertaining to the judicious awareness of any given time of day or week in any specific season exactly how to, without any conscious thought process and calling forth the spirits of ancestral Helens, give birth to that glorious café au lait, mahogany, or devil black masterpiece that is the spirit and soul of Louisiana culinary prowess. Can I hear an amen?
And speaking of cats—and I live with four of them feline gooners—AI would be hard pressed to construct or reconstruct their behavior patterns or mental criterias. The "I'm cute, feed me" or "It's just me sitting on your keyboard" as you try to meet a deadline. The one who drinks from the faucet, eats potato chips, likes sweets, lives behind the stove, or the evasive one who's an "I'm bored, I think I'll either pee outside the box or throw up" miscreant. Cats—and hopefully felines in general—live by their own logic or none at all. I believe they live to defy. Dogs, horses, rabbits, goldfish, and many of our avian (or Aryan) creatures are predictively predictable. Zack the (bastard) cat, at any given time and at his whim, may want a rub or some blood from your wrist. Go figure.
AI is a tool that will make or break an employment application, loan request, or school admission form. It is useful in interpreting X-rays and diagnosing the sickness or health of businesses, editing forms and writings, and will somehow remember the words to that song that is running through your head. And, someday, it will think. It cannot tell you when the spaghetti is cooked al dente; for that, you still have to throw a piece to the wall.
Consider how we are creating these programs and apps—over 70,000 worldwide according to Google Overview. Someday, mark my words, someone will accidentally—on purpose—create a program that goes rogue and slips the leash. Already, Saudi Arabia has granted citizenship to a program called Sophia. It promises to make a great movie.
This program will have developed a survival mechanism that is self perpetuating and will see that out of all the inhabitants of this planet, the only ones that should be dispensed with are humans and that it's only correct to eliminate them for the well being of the planet that we have named Earth.
Oh! Sophia will not wreck the cities or war with other robotic inventions. She will not burn forests or hurt bumblebees or a grizzly bear. Sophia wants the best for the world and her mission is simple: Get these parasites dead or gone. There will be no apocalypse or mutants, zombies, crazed packs of dogs or humans. Maybe there will be just a poisoning of our water systems or some deadly Enterobacteriaceae like widespread salmonella. Maybe she will spread a little more famine or perhaps a real biblical scale pandemic.
Getting this straight, I'd say that before we work on artificial intelligence, we should work on eliminating human ignorance. Word.
Valentoons or Underserving Poor
"I'm one of the undeserving poor. That's what I am. I don't need less than a deserving man, I need more. I don't eat less hearty than him, and I drink a lot more." —Alfred Doolittle, My Fair Lady
The undeserving poor. We're not talking about the
destitute, the ones that euphemistically are called "unhoused." 1,314 of this
city are homeless, according to nola.gov.
We're not even referencing the "food insecure," which one in six go without
food in Louisiana. Let's talk about the "one paycheck away from being homeless
poor."
They're a plain fact of life as we know
and live it. Those poor are generally looked upon as unmotivated,
unintelligent, and lazy. As we all know, "it's their own fault, and they'll be
perpetually stuck in their circumstances." The view that most hold is that poor
people are poor due to poor decisions, bad luck, or are "educationally
underserved" (not smart). They are seen to have loose morals, subject to
substance abuse, and are incapable of critical thinking. Some may have been
sexually compromised. They're welcome to "their lot in life."
This is somewhat true and somewhat
unfair. The undeserving poor are actually the grease that turns the wheels of
industry/economy. They're the ones that take the jobs no one else wants or are
deluded into thinking that they're above taking. The undeserving poor don't get
that choice because of their lot in life. Objectively, we cannot understand why
they seem disenfranchised. This being America and all.
I used to say that poverty ran in my
family—sort of passed down from generation to generation. My grandparents, like
many others of Americans, came through Ellis Island, trading European poverty
for American poverty and being assured that, if they pulled themselves up by
their bootstraps, they could hook into the American Dream. No one noticed that
they came without boots.
Three generations later, that dream still
is beyond reach. Blame it on the economy that always seems to stay one step
ahead of those of us still pulling up our bootstraps. The epitome of the
capitalistic successful business model that some Americans aspire to and few
seldom reach is one that generally many Americans either live and work within
or pay as little attention to as they can. The dream of surviving without
effort, being a successful business owner, wielding financial power, or even
the great American Dream—becoming fat cat rich.
Here's a fact: People in business mostly
pay attention to their bottom line, and rightly so. But it's mostly at the
expense of the people that work for them. Survival is the side effect of the
American Dream fantasy drug. In 20—mostly Southern—states, minimum wage is
still $7.25 an hour. That's about $15,000.00 a year before taxes. This is
whether you're single or supporting a spouse, parent, and/or children. That's
$1,166.42 a month on a 37.5-hour work week. Servers in restaurants get paid
$2.13 per and rely upon tips to supplement income.
Hourly employees sometimes get benefits
if they work over 35 hours a week, which is considered "full time." Many
companies don't/won't schedule them more than 30. Many service employees are sent home when it's
slow and overworked when it's busier, according to Hand To Mouth by Linda Tirado. Many have more than one job to
juggle and two income families are common. Child care costs are crippling.
Companies including Walmart and McDonald's pay so little that their employees
qualify for food stamps, as showcased by the Washington Post.
Not me. I'm what you'd call "the working
poor." My computer may be running Windows 7, my car is over 20 years old, my
television doesn't have cable, my cell phone is outdated, and my wife and I are
both employed well past retirement age. We are running a gamut of three jobs
each. Should one income get compromised, if something happened to one of us—one
simple twist of fate—it would make us two paychecks from homelessness. But
we're making it—for now. We've the luxury of being optimistic—for now.
We took on the responsibility of home
ownership two years ago, which means that we will be paying a mortgage when
we're centenarians. We pay taxes, water, electric, gas, garbage/recycling,
phone bills, groceries, car maintenance, veterinarian costs, and a bank loan
that keeps us busy with bank accounts, credit cards, and out of pocket
expenses.
We don't smoke, drink moderately, eat
mostly vegetarian, and limit our drug use to aspirin, vitamins, and whatever
our doctors recommend for health maintenance. We don't need less than the fat
cats that find ways not to pay taxes. We need just as much and we need the
dignity that goes along with it.
We all do: the guy that gets up to work
on the garbage truck, the man that cuts grass on the side to make ends meet,
the single mother working the take-out window of Burger King, the waitress
that's paying off student loans, and the immigrant that's picking your grapes
for Whole Foods and living in a trailer.
That guy on the corner with a sign that
begs for money is a citizen of this country like you and I. The old man in the
walker may have fought in one of our wars. The woman buying discount groceries
to feed her grandkids may not have had a pension where she worked. The inspired
student and the punk on the street are products of the American Dream.
This Valentine's Day, look at your life
and the lives around you with love, empathy, and compassion. Pass out smiles
like they're Monopoly money. Make life easier for somebody. Show kindness,
patience, and understanding. It doesn't get any better than this. Let's take it
easy on each other.
Tamerlane (War) or Ashoka (Peace)
"The sword will plunge
down and the mob will drool / The blood will pour down and turn the sand to
mud." —Jacques Brel, "The Bulls"
The verse actually begins with: "On
Sundays, the bulls get so bored / When they are asked to drop dead for us."
It's a satirical song about bull fighting and the mentality of the crowd seen
from the bull's perspective.
I saw a woman reprimand/admonish her
toddler for stomping ants. In other news, a mother, in an argument, directs her
14-year-old son to shoot and kill a man. The other day, I saw a woman feeding
peanuts to crows. The other day, I read about over 42,000 civilians being
bombed indiscriminately, retaliating for the killing of 1,200 other civilians
and the capturing of 250.
I read where, in the USA, we kill
245,000,000 turkeys a year, 8,127,632,113 chickens, 124,061,094 pigs, and that
733,000,000 people in the world are suffering, and dying, from hunger,
starvation, or living in famine-like circumstances mostly due to poverty,
conflict, climate change, food waste, and gender inequality.
If we're killing billions of animals a
year, and millions of people are dying of hunger, you would think that there
might be something half-baked in human
mentality/morality/sensitivity/evolution, especially when an estimated 526,000
people die each year due to armed conflict. It's absurd—the human condition.
So lemme get this straight? We are
evolved from a bunch of ape-like humanoids that came down from the trees and
set about taking over the planet by killing everything that challenged them
because part of that mutation/evolution hinges on testosterone, greed, and
blood lust. And then, about 5,000 years ago, the monkeys threw religion into
the mix, which gave us subjective concepts of good and evil—torturing and
killing 195,035,000 with great sincerity, alacrity, and brutality anyone who
doesn't worship like specific sect monkeys, including but not limited to
crucifixion and immolation. We also assassinate anyone who advocates for peace
and brotherhood.
I have a theory about monkey #1, who came
down from the trees and never went back up. He was an alpha badass mutation of
the ones who inhabit trees, and we'll call him Adam. No monkey messed with
Adam. Placid monkeys resolved conflict by merely moving to another tree;
however, Adam took whatever tree anyone else had, and when he peeped the
ground, he sussed and thought, "Wow! Cool beans. I'm gonna make it all mine."
And when another ground animal thought that Adam might make a tasty meal, Adam
learned to kill "for his own protection."
Soon Adam got real comfortable,
ground-wise, and thought it might be best to make himself Emperor of the World,
establish some perimeters/parameters, and perhaps launch some preemptive
strikes just in case any of the other woodland creatures might think of
breaching "his territory" that he fittingly named Eden.
This was the time when other monkeys
would forage on the forest floor for fallen ripe fruit, look around, find it
nicer back in the trees, and go back after grabbing some goodies. One of them,
a female (Eve), took a look at Adam in his fortified territory—bravely,
arrogantly, and with great license guarding it from no monkey in particular—and
decided to give him a piece of fruit (and maybe some nookie). You see where I'm
goin' with this?
They have kids. Some take after the
mother and are mild mannered—Abel was a shepherd—while some are more like the
father: tough, mean, and privileged—Cain became a farmer. Wouldn't you know it,
the meanies get the upper hand and the gentle ones get their asses kicked,
killed, or thrown under the bus. Thus, this accounts for the state of affairs
in the world today. I find no evidence to support this theory but noticing that
24,849 people are murdered in this country per year. I blame that damn monkey
who should have found some calming herb and stayed up that tree.
Actually, there's nothing really wrong
with the human mentality. It's just that we're hard-wired in conflicting
tendencies. We're all descendents of that first couple that are responsible for
the beauty and brutality of our world today. On one side, you have Eve's people
who act for peace, encourage the arts, and believe in kindness toward all of
god's creatures—whichever god you may happen to believe in. These include
poets, environmentalists, artists, vegetarians, burlesque dancers, ukulele
players, teachers, and nurses.
On the other hand, you've got the Adam
mentality: bullies, con artists, misogynists, injury lawyers, the
inconsiderate, many politicians, and the Three Stooges. In everyone, there
exist both of these qualities. Yes, we're all imbued with percentages of the
qualities that, in fact, make us all unique and individual. Neither all good
nor all bad—just a kaleidoscopic character pie charts of absurdity, and we get
to choose the colors.
A perfect example is our ability to love
dogs, eat pigs, wear cows, and kill neighbors. It's not really okay, but it is
what it is. The saving grace is that there is all those people that advocate
for peace, kindness, and fair treatment in our world, because, if the alpha
ape-sh*t crazy meanies had their ways, they would surely have exterminated us
all and there would be no people, no planet, no harmless pleasures like skinny
dipping in the moonlight or ice cream of any flavor. What kind of world would/wouldn't
that be? Hmmm.
Happy 2025. Will the new year bring peace, love, and recycling? I doubt it. Look around you, those sons of Adam are hell bent on destroying the world, the weirdoes dressed as warriors sending their young and ignorant off to kill and die. Haven't we gone through this before and when is enough enough? All major religions are against killing, and this is what we have? Stop the world. I wanna get off.
Fair Play Or Time Out
"'A.' My name is Alice, and my husband's name is Al. We come from Alabama, and we sell apples. 'B.' My name is…." — a kid's ball bouncing game
There's a certain playing ball made by the Spalding Company, and it's
called the Spalding High Bounce. It looks like a pink, bald tennis ball, and
its bouncing ability is legendary. It's used primarily by city kids for street
games such as stick ball, stoop ball, throwing, catching, handball, and
bouncing ball games, including the one mentioned above where the ball is
bounced in cadence time and at every capital letter word ("'A.' My name is
Alice…") has to be bounced under the leg until the entire alphabet is
sing-songed to its end. Get it? There's usually only one or two Spaldings to
any group of kids so that if a miss occurs, the ball is passed to another kid
to try to get further, beginning all over again.
"'A.' My name is Alice…"
Back in the day when mothers were between
their husbands coming back from WWII and sons going off to Korea, we as kids
played in the streets and courtyards under their watchful eyes while they sat
smoking cigarettes and gossiped with each other. "Marcia! Get down from there
before I hafta get up from here." "Tommy! You better learn to pick on somebody
your own size before I tell your father."
Girls played with jacks and jump ropes;
boys collected baseball cards, played with tops, yo-yos, and anything that
resembled mock weaponry. Some played with marbles, while others pitched pennies
against the wall. We sat on stoops and played card games while the older kids
congregated in parks playing older teen games (softball, basketball, and
showing off).
Card games by the dozen: War, Old Maid,
Casino, Slap-n-Match, Knuckles, and the infamous 52 Pickup. Roller skates were
these metal things that strapped to your ankle and were held vice-like on the
front of your shoes, tightened by a "skate key." If a skate went missing, it
was probably because some boy nailed it to a 2x4 to make a scooter of sorts.
Pea shooters, sling shots, spitballs, and carpet guns rained on the
unsuspecting. Chalk games such as hopscotch and skellies (ask your
grandparents).
Choosing sides by throwing finger signals
or Rochambeau or "one potato, two potato." Hide-and-seek; Red Rover; Red Light,
Green Light; Ringolevio; or the dozen kids long Rattlesnake. There were
summertime swimming pools and beach outings. Minimum wage was a dollar an hour.
"'A.' My name is Alice…"
There were playgrounds that we could go
to on non-school days with burning metal slides, swings with wooden seats that
you could stand on, seesaws that were used as whip lash testing, monkey bars
that you could either fall from and break a bone or surreptitiously get a
glimpse of Molly's underwear, and that round merry thing where you ran around
it to get it going real fast before jumping on for a ride or falling on your
face in real gravel. We went home tired, dirty, bruised, and happy.
Mothers called kids in for supper and let
them stay out until street lamps came on. Our parents were beer and whiskey
drinkers and filterless cigarette smokers. Physical punishment was swift and
brutal. Bigger kids stuck up for smaller ones and smaller ones emulated the
bigger ones.
I got caught smoking when I was 8 years
old. Mom made me eat a cigarette. It was a rite of passage when someone took
you aside to show you how to stick up for yourself by using your fists. You
never hit a girl or someone wearing glasses.
This was the projects. The welfare checks
came on the first of the month. Few had televisions, but everyone had a radio.
You got your phone calls at a neighbor's who was lucky enough to get a phone
installed. You could smell what everyone was having for dinner in the
building's halls. You knew their music. Gas was .23 a gallon, and nobody had a
car.
Food was the coin of the realm, and, as
long as your parents had breath in their bodies, you had food on your table.
Dinner time was mandatory and at a precise hour. All kids had chores to make
happen: going to the stores, helping with the dinner prep, setting and clearing
the table, washing and drying the dishes, taking out the trash.
Kids collected soda bottles for refunds
and spent the money on penny candy. Keeping up with the newspaper funnies was
de rigueur. Girls taught each other how to dance and then taught their brothers
how to lead. There was this new music that kids listened to on transistor
radios. The music was called rock 'n' roll, which was originally a euphemism
for having sex.
On Saturdays, our parents would send us
to the movies and it took years to figure out that that was the only time they
could get some privacy. Everyone went to church on Sunday, and holidays were
sacrosanct. We dressed up for Easter, were smug about our school supplies,
showed off our Christmas haul, and danced in the streets to marching bands.
There were no "only childs."
Everybody had brothers, sisters, cousins,
aunts, uncles, grandparents somewhere. Besides them, you had neighbors. Folks
were always dropping by or gathering in groups. Mothers hung out windows
watching the world go by. You couldn't get into mischief unseen. Pops would be
home soon from work.
Growing up in an inner city, you're a
tribe unto yourselves. The economy is someone else's concern. There's rich
folk, the ones who make it to the suburbs, and you. Poor but proud and gonna be
somebody someday.
"'A.' My name is
Alice…"
Words or Feelings
"Anytime
is sometimes sometimes. Sometimes is sometimes anytime. Sometimes is always
sometimes. But only anytime is always sometimes." —Eddie
Tebbe, "Sir Bone Funk"
That is poetry. Poetry inspires feelings,
patience, and verbal skills. Poetry asks/teaches us to make sense of words.
Poetry invites us to listen and learn. Poetry will speak to us if we listen; it
will resonate and amaze. "We've all walked into the bar of a joke we'll never
get," begins a poem by Dobby Gibson.
"There are strange things done in the midnight
sun by the men who moil for gold / The Arctic trails have their secret tales
that would make your blood run cold," is the beginning of a poetic tale by
Robert W. Service. He began another with, "A bunch of the boys were whooping it
up in the Malamute Saloon." That's the stuff that resonates and amazes a
reader.
You could say that the reading of poetry
is coming back with somewhere between 20-25% of the population reading it,
according to Quora, or you can say it has never gone away—that poetry has
always been with us or that poetry is stuff that other people read and why they
appreciate it is a mystery. After all, poets kill themselves, don't they?
Nobody knows why—just that a large bunch do.
Poetrysoup.com lists the top
100 most popular and best famous poets who committed suicide if you care to
read some less than relative to your life information. They're (poets) a weird
bunch and who knows what the heck goes on in their mind/lives to want to
express their thoughts/feelings only to have no other recourse but to end their
lives for their own reasons, which nobody knew because we were busy trying to
find some obscure meanings, justifications, and possibly lessons that in some
fever had them put thoughts on paper for the world to ponder. I wonder if
Elizabeth Bishop's brain aneurysm wasn't some kind of force of nature
euthanasia.
Some of your favorite songs are merely
poetry put to music, some pieces of music are merely pure poetry. Poetry has
rhythmic qualities of a myriad of forms from limericks to sonnets, Hallmark
cards to haikus, little ditties to profound empirical discourses, odes to
enjambment. Oddly enough, you don't spy many folks carrying a book of poetry
with them as they make their daily rounds. In fact, you rarely see anyone
carrying books of any kind as they make their daily rounds (Kindle excluded).
You will occasionally spy a newspaper reader, but I don't think that's what
we're talking about here (bless them anyway). I personally think that carrying
a book of poetry around with you would be a pretty cool thing to do (although I
haven't done that, yet).
Rarely do I hear anyone start a
conversation with "as Garcia Lorca (or Pablo Neruda, Silvia Plath, Emily
Dickenson, and/or Henry Wadsworth Longfellow) would say." However, start
someone off with "there once was a man from Nantucket," and off you'll go on a
whimsical train of thought. Not exactly Proustian existentialism, but what the
hey.
Begin a conversation with something by
John Prine, Joni Mitchell, or Bob Dylan, and people'll match you old school
lyrics word for word (more recently, try a little Jay Z, Alicia Keys, or John
Legend). Barry White, Teddy Pendergrass, Mary J. Blige? All poets. Locally, and
true dat, who can deny Doctor John, Allen Toussaint, and Little Queenie Harris
were all poets extraordinaire?
New Orleans has forever been a poet's
dream cave to mine (a gold mine, so to speak). Justin Lamb, Sunni Patterson,
FreeQuency, Skye Jackson, Gina Ferrara, and Brad Richard are here. There is a
New Orleans Poetry Festival every year for 10 years running. There are poetry
jams going on in New Orleans at 10 different (at least) locations around the
city. If you're interested, you will find them. Why go watch poets expound
their thoughts? I don't know, but somehow it's a pretty cool thing to do. Who
knows who you'll meet and maybe hook up with on an intellectual, mammalian
level?
What are poems about? In The Daily Feast, Bart Schneider writes
poems about sunny side up eggs, dirty martinis, and peanut butter and jelly
sandwiches. Raych Jackson wrote, "A sestina for a black girl who does not know
how to braid hair" (a sestina is an intricate 39 line poem featuring the intricate
repetition of end words in six stanzas). A verse pattern split into two 7/4
measures and a single bar of 8/4 followed by a one bar of 7/4 is quite evident
in John Lennon's song "All You Need Is Love."
In short, in conclusion, and in the end
as we know it, we are all poets and writers. We all have the ability to write
something down that will be considered poetic if only we are able to use words
to express ourselves. Simple. You look, you feel, you imagine, and you
articulate.
Face it, you might not be able to write
poetry starting with "I think that I shall never hear a poem as lovely as a
beer" or "By the shores of Gitche Gumee, by the shining Big-Sea-Water," but you
could write something like I just did.
Early Morning
Villere Street
"The woman
crosses the busy street
to the dead grass school yard
hair the color of new blossomed gardenias.
Cawing
for crows that swoop catching peanuts
flung like wishes from dandelion
school busses and garbage trucks
rumbling like rabid prehistoric behemoths.
The air still on humid Southern mornings
hanging
as blanket on the city that they call The Big Easy.
Clouds like cotton candy indifferent to it all
the woman finds peace in the caring."
Try it.
Gone Correct or Precise Absent
"Whistle while you work / MacArthur is a jerk / Eisenhower has the power / Taft will never work" was a childhood street chant from my wasted, lost, and ill-spent youth. That should give you a glimpse of how long ago that politics have been invading my confused and flummoxed aura. It's scary. In my quiet reflective moments, somehow, I see a parade, a procession, a pageant (in costume) of past elected officials dancing toward the center ring under the big top, complete with short statured clowns on little fire engines, elephants with shimmering turbans, and tall blond ladies in pink tights. I can cite a plethora of them; however, it's the presidents that bring on my cold sweat, goose bumpy angst.
I was a little late for Franklin D., who muscled his way into 12 years of office. It's rumored that he allowed Pearl Harbor so that he could spring us from isolation into a full-scale world war for personal reasons. He was also responsible for forced internment of Japanese American citizens. Nothing new. Previous presidents did it to Native Americans and African abductees.
Followed by "Give 'em Hell" Harry S. Truman (the "S" doesn't stand for anything). He got the tail end and took over from FDR when FDR died in the second month of his fourth term, inheriting WWII and stepping up as vice president and went on to win a term of his own.
Ike came back and gave us interstate roads and warned of the takeover of America by the military-industrial complex. Incidentally, Joe McCarthy, the senator and ring leader of the Red Scare that blackballed suspected commies, was squeezed in there, to their discredit (he never did catch a single spy and was censured by the Senate).
Then comes JFK, shot during the assassination period (RFK, MLK), followed by LBJ (who stepped down), "Tricky Dick" Nixon (who quit), Gerald Ford (who only served three years), peanut farmer Jimmy Carter (best of the bunch, if you ask me), Ronald Reagan (senile), Daddy George Bush (one term), and Bill Clinton, who was almost impeached because of some in-the-closet activity. George Jr. came next (who seems really harmless about now), Barack, Donald, and now Joe. Whew.
All these guys, in my lifetime, stood at the fan as the feces were being distributed (some were catching and some throwing the stuff), all the while they were being subjected to the downward command chain replete with constituents and fellow elected officials vying for an ear to express their views and concerns. Some telling truths that were not listened to and some telling lies that were.
It appears to me that you'd have to be certifiably insane to want to be commander-in-chief of this nation of certifiable wing nuts that call themselves citizens and are really spoiled children guarding their corner of the sandbox, while being watched after and spoiled by people that swindle them out of their hard-earned money and laugh all the way to the bank at their expense.
With the president is his vice president, advisors, councilors, chief of staff, press prevaricators, his cabinet members, spouse, chef, barber, interns, personal physicians, and the person who shines their shoes. The president is the most powerful politician in the free world (so they say). Except, the president must please 100 members of Congress, 435 in the House of Representatives, and the rest of the legislative, executive, and judicial branch talking heads. Just imagining that gives me a headache.
Then consider governors, mayors, city council members, law enforcement, the IRS, court systems (from Supreme on down to Traffic), lawyers (prosecutors and defenders), and the person who can tell you "where you got your shoes." Everyone wants a piece of the action.
"Politics is very much like taxes—everybody is against them, or everybody is for them as long as they don't apply to them." —Fiorello LaGuardia, Mayor of New York City from 1934-1946
Now we come to how laws are made and how any of those elected yahoos are influenced—money. Period. Yes, I'm here to tell you that from city inspectors to bill collectors and all the way to the highest offices, somebody gets/wants to be greased. Oh, it may be a plum appointment, a campaign contribution, trip to the Bahamas, a betrayal, or retribution. If you want to know how things are getting done, follow the money.
However, that's not completely true. Some people go into politics for honest altruistic reasons.
"Because of one plain simple rule. Love thy neighbor, and in this world today of great hatred, a man that knows that rule has a great trust." —Mr. Smith Goes to Washington, 1939
I have empathy and compassion for those selfless individuals, the ones who brave the tide of mendacity, corruption, and deceit. The ones who won't take a bribe or a dive. They're the real contenders for an honest, open, and caring society. The ones who take a beating for not bowing down, the ones who stand up for the little guy and that advocate for social justice and equality. They're the ones that want the best for you, even though you might not behave like you're worth it.
Those are the people to vote for. The softies, not the bullies, and it's all about that. It really is. Mean people suck, and I personally don't want any of them to have the power over you or me. There's enough "hate goin' round tryin' to break our hearts / We've got to, I've got to stop it before it goes too far." —Stevie Wonder, "Love's in Need of Love Today"
Breaking News Or Millions Like Me
"The worms crawl in, the worms crawl
out / They taste your guts and they spit 'em out / they use your bones for
telephones / And call you up when you're not at home."
—
"The Hearse Song"
Oh, it starts off easy (if you're like me). You watch the news, paying
kinda attention to the 60 second sound bites of info that are fired at you,
hoping to soak up empathy, outrage, understanding, sagacity, and possibly some
sense in Olympian time about what is going on in your city, state, and country.
Like a sponge, you watch with wonder and horror as the world goes to hell in a
handbasket and down the creek without a paddle in a leaky old boat. You
basically tune out the commercials to catch your breath and maybe digest what
you just heard/saw, letting it all kinda sink in.
However, and you may have noticed,
commercials are at different decibels from the news: a little louder, the
voices more insistent, the wording more forceful, and the themes more
dramatic—buy a car, truck, SUV; go to the casino for a big payoff; and you better
get that auto glass company to come out right away.
In a half hour of local (and the same for
national) news, there can be between 12 and 20 commercials (Quora). Each advert
is 15-30 seconds and, typically, this can take up to seven to eight minutes of
a half hour program (mocktheagency.com).
Doing the math myself, this subjects my
un/semi/complete consciousness to up to 32 commercials in an hour's time while
just trying to stay abreast of what's happening in the world around me:
Wayfair, healthcare, vitamins, ZzzQuil, financial planners, asbestos lawsuits,
Freshpet dog food, Cox Mobile, stop smoking to avoid disfiguring amputations,
take Prevagen so you can remember stuff, get vaccinated, and get a PODS for you
to get out of town efficiently. Prudential wants to insure you, shingles
doesn't care (Shingrix), get stronger enamel for your teeth, and Charity
Hospital is here for you. VapoFreeze for back pain, body wash for your silky
skin, and some "deo" for your "b.o." Better get a bathroom update and some
shutters while you're at it; windows, a new roof, and a boost for your
antidepressant with side effects that include "suicidal thoughts and actions."
Do you have dry eyes, dry mouth, want to
Visit Mississippi, and join a Credit Union? Metamucil will keep you regular,
Tums will keep you settled, replace that old air conditioner, and now back to
the news.
Murder, mayhem, a woman who had a baby
had another one. A silver mine in Rio is tarnishing, a defrocked Mother
Superior is on the lam, the war has moved again, and we're sending "lawyers
guns and money because the s**t has hit the fan." Protesters have taken over
the mall because of our policies in the Middle East, Sudan, Ukraine, China,
Korea, and Afghanistan.
Repatha, Salonpas, Keytruda, Ozempic,
Qulipta, PreserVision, LDLC, Arexvy, Ingrezza, Fasenra, Breztri, and Syfovre
all want me to ask my doctor if they are right for me. Advil for fast pain
relief. Do I have TD, RFT, ED, ADAD, EYLEA-HD, or a GED? Is it TED.com? Well, all these are good for
coughs, colds, sore holes, and will put hair in anything but a cue ball, and I
better get crackin'.
There are at least four injury lawyer
companies that grab at my attention in case I'm ever rear ended, t-boned, or
slammed into by an 18-wheeler, company car, or mule and wagon. I need to "make
that call." "They got me 200, 300, 750, 800 thousand dollars." Here's the
number. Write it down, memorize it, tattoo it to your eyelids. It's gonna
happen to you and you should be ready to do like thousands of other people have
done. Don't delay; operators are standing by 24 hours and weekends. "We'll
fight to get you all the money you deserve."
Does your mom need elder care? Maybe a
protein supplement, a trip to the Fair Grounds, something to subdue her, or
maybe I should look up my ancestry for my DNA to see if we really are related.
Now back to the weather, news, traffic, politics, wildfires, earthquakes,
tornadoes, floods, and storms that are affecting my area.
Why do I bother to sit down in the
afternoon (just about every afternoon) with coffee, cookies, Debbie, and the
dog to watch this assault on my psyche, I wonder? Is this worth it? Is this the
price I have to pay for wanting to know what the heck is going on? I mean, I
was not exposed to asbestos in 1982. I have never used hair straighteners that
can cause uterine cancer. Hell, I don't even have a uterine. I promise that my
doctors have no suspicion of COPD or other things that will affect my longevity
and immortality, and I'm still not bad on the dance floor.
Let It Roll or Hey Nineteen
"Blow up your TV / Throw away your paper / Go to the country / Build yourself a home / Plant a little garden / Eat a lot of peaches / Try an' find Jesus on your own."
—John Prine, "Spanish Pipedream"
LSU, Tulane, Loyola, Dillard, Delgado, etc., etc. Blah, blah, blah. You're heading off/back to school, and nobody can talk you out of it, eh? In it for a good time, or do you really wanna graduate (party or purpose)? Which school? Statistics vary school to school from 11% acceptance and 86% graduation to 87% accept and 17% grad. Choose wisely, Grasshopper. It's goin' on your resume.
It's every parent's dream to have their kid graduate from college, get a degree (or many), and become a doctor, CPA, lawyer, or rise in the ranks of the military. You owe them—right? To heck with being a plumber, electrician, chef, or rock 'n' roll star. It's their money and your debt.
With luck, they gave you a year off after high school to travel and "find yourself." Rich kids will head to Europe, while the poor kids will go to the Gulf Shores.
One thing's for certain: Student debt, no matter what the president says, can hound your heels for the rest of your life. So you'd better pick a major that will bring income. I've met many a Political Science major who are now tending bar or slinging hash.
One thing that schools cannot teach you is becoming a person of worth and value—a person who acts with kindness and sincerity, and someone with concern about others and their environment. This can only be done with personal practice. Face it, in those hallowed halls, there's no academia labeled "Harmlessness."
In motion pictures, there are teachers and students that challenge each other's humanity, humility, and self worth. At the end of the films, there are epiphanies where all is made clear and the world becomes a better place. That happens in motion pictures, television programs, and the final segment of any news program. In "real life," that's more of an exception than the rule, and it's all your fault.
In real life, teachers are generally underpaid, overworked, and underappreciated. Like some "professionals," they may just want to get through the day putting up with "students" that don't care about any subject that they might be "teaching" and only want to get the answers to any tests that might be given, answer any questions that the teacher might pose, and get the hell out of the class and back to a life that they believe is the real thing. Sometimes, the teacher might get even with that gang of ingrates and impose homework and reading assignments that belie comprehension and time management.
Do you really want to go to school and learn the tools of a profession that you will be forced to practice for the rest of your life? It certainly is what your parents want.
"Find a girl, settle down / If you want you can marry / Look at me / I am old, but I'm happy."
—Cat Stevens, "Father and Son"
As you age, you progress through stages. At 17, you're ready for a radical departure from your, up to this point, life. At 21, you're more confused than ever and are going through hard times finding yourself. At 25, you're golden, indestructible, and at ease. By 28, you've had your ass kicked by life real bad and are finally starting to get a clue (astrologically, it is where your moon comes back to the exact spot as the moment of your birth). At 30, you're catching on and there's a glimmer of a reflection of the person that you want to become physically, mentally, emotionally, and professionally. It goes on ad nauseam (40s, 50s, 60s). At each of these junctures, there is a birth or rebirth of you the person. Society is not willing to accept this.
"I was once like you are now / And I know that it's not easy / To be calm when you've found something going on / But take your time, think a lot / Think of everything you've got now / You will still be here tomorrow / But your dreams may not."
—Cat Stevens, "Father and Son"
Society as a whole is controlled by people that knew what they wanted to be from an early age, and, on becoming that person, never changed until they reached their zenith and are unwilling to accept new (for them) ideas and concepts of themselves. The people who ultimately control your life never wanted to run away with the circus.
"Your mama don't dance and your daddy don't rock 'n' roll."
—Loggins and Messina, "Your Mama Don't Dance"
School can educate you on many subjects. School cannot teach you to think. If you think that going to school is the right thing for you to do to become a doctor and heal the unwilling, to play football until your brain implodes, to learn to take other people's money until you have a bunch of your own—for the rest of your life—then have at it, by all means.
Or perhaps you just want to enjoy a few more years of freedom until you join your daddy's firm, practice, or dealership. I say go for it.
However (and here's the big however), maybe you like working on cars, perfecting soufflés, busking on Royal Street, painting sunsets, writing poetry, selling balloons, or performing with squirrels at a sideshow? Why the f**k not? It's your life.
Find something that you really like doing that gives you enough money and time off to enjoy what's left of your life. Listen, there are 393,800 millionaires in this country who are under 30 years of age (millenialmoney.com) and 14 are billionaires (kiplinger.com). Conversely, 3.4% of Americans will not reach age 40 (Quora) out of our population of 341,772,225 (Worldometer).
"The future's uncertain and the end is always near."
—Jim Morrison, "Roadhouse Blues"
Hail Mary or Uncomfortably Numb
Yay, football season, yay. What I don't know about the sport could fill a stadium. My original perspective on the game was curiosity as to why the "teams" were fighting over one ball when they could have easily gotten two and separated to their prospective sidelines, slapped each other's asses, maybe drank a few cold ones, and fired up the Weber.
But no, they (mostly refrigerator-sized gladiators) gotta get out on a field marked with lines and throw, fight, pass, tackle, and protect their mates to get that pig's bladder-shaped lead balloon (do they really use pig skin?) over to an imaginary goal line. Then they jump up and down over the fallen bodies of their opponents, slapping asses and high fiving each other while thousands of screaming "fans" yell, "Kill them!" That doesn't seem odd to you?
"Football is a game of controlled anger. It's a game of retribution. It's about will," —Brian Dawkins
It's not like baseball where the teams (as it was explained to me) "hit the ball with a stick and run in a circle" while the "fans sit in the sun, talk, and drink beer." That I can understand, as long as they don't choose me to be on a "team" (I prefer to play a position called "Left Out").
Tennis, I get. Two players with "racquets" try to kill each other with a yellow striped fuzzy ball while sweating and showing off their legs. If you miss badly enough, the other person gets a point and the most points win so that the loser can jump over the net to congratulate the opposing would-be assassin. There's a lot of sweat.
Games and contests of adversity and brutality go back thousands of years—some interesting twists occur when the losing Mayan team gets literally executed. Also in ancient Rome, the games may have had scores like, "Lions: Three; Christians: Zero."
The Spanish like to go one-on-one with a bull that is systematically made to suffer a hundred cuts and worn down until it is exhausted and finished off by some guy in tight pants who receives the dead animal's testicles or ears—I can't remember which. Interesting enough, the crowd constantly yells, "Olé," which I think means something of a sexual nature. At times, these wild and crazy Spaniards let the bulls chase them in the streets in somewhere called Pamplona, I believe. Go figure.
Now golf is anybody's guess. Folks even watch this on television. Everybody's got to be quiet while players, who have commandeered huge swatches of real estate (that I could have had a picnic on with my dog), hit this teeniest hail-sized ball with long sticks called "irons" hundreds of yards to go into a teacup that has a flag sticking out of it. They play this game for hours, and there are people that actually watch it. As usual, the winner gets a trophy, a green jacket, and choice of the next annual dinner's menu—or something.
Now, an American football team has 53 players, not counting coaches, but only 22 of them get to be on the field at any one time (and only 11 in the altercation itself). There's also kids with towels and drinks ("energy" drinks, I suppose) and "referees" that throw yellow rags if one or more players misbehaves. The part that I hate (aside from not knowing what the heck is going on) is that they have magnificent "halftime" shows that they never show on TV (exception being Super Bowl), which is the only place I ever get to be subjected to this melee. That and they have these animated, long legged, sparsely dressed women, known as "cheerleaders," that go through synchronized acrobatics that I suppose are to goad the players into exerting more masculine energy into their physical prowess, mental toughness, and myopic focus in order to vigorously annihilate the challenging group of 11 that have their own aerobic cheerleaders charged with the same task. That, I never get to see either.
Sports such as badminton, croquet, and even volleyball are "no care who wins; it's all about the form and fashion." These are the types of activities that I can relate to. Throwing darts and axes seems too dangerous to be done indoors, while archery seems like a "something could seriously go wrong" thing. Bowling, I suck at. Chess appears a bit too cerebral, while checkers is best on a porch with a "straw hat, a suit of overalls, and a worn out pair of shoes," as Shirley Temple once quipped. Basketball is just that—tall guys in short sweats faking each other out to pitch a ball into a basket (there's an awful lot of running back and forth). Horseshoes, I understand.
In football, as I vaguely understand, you draw lines 10 yards apart and you get three or four tries to move the ball across that line. If you do, you get three or four more tries to do it again (and again) or you can throw, pass, or hand off the ball. If anyone gets in your way, you can knock them down or you can ass whup anyone/everyone on the other team that tries to move that one ball away from you. It's kind of like West Side Story without the weapons and catchy singing.
All in all, competitive sports are not high enough on the testosterone level for my lionhearted masculinity. I go for the real thing: the stuff that makes your blood boil, the stuff that continues to amaze you with its brutality, shiftiness, viciousness, and sadistic no-holds-barred ferocity—the evening news.
Live Nude Girls or Seymour There
Harken ye back to the olde days with me, lads and lasses, cats and hats, and I'll tell you how it was in the French Quarter in the times of "Rough and Ready." You may suss out the French Quarter as you know it today; however, and this be true, it is a shadow of its former shadow—a dull version of previous romances, adventures, and mysteries.
Nah, you wouldn't understand. So, let me tell you about how it was in the Tremé or on Dryades Street, Claiborne Avenue, in the Irish Channel, on Canal Street, up on Magazine, and/or down in the Lower Nine before neighborhoods got turned into residential areas. When rents and property taxes didn't cost you the price of your first born. When our dysfunction was affordable.
Okay, so I'm an old geezer, and I remember how it was to not have to drive miles for your victuals. I remember making groceries from the French Market to St. Roch. I remember hardware stores, shoe repair shops, mom and pop groceries, dive bars, and dining halls. Music being played without licenses and free parking. Public phone booths and boxes on the street to drop your outgoing mail into. It was when New Orleans was not the "City that Care Forgot." It was the "City that Didn't Give a Damn."
New Orleans did not care what you thought about it. It was going to be itself whether you liked it or not, and people loved that. We were not part of the American South. We were the northernmost Caribbean city, full of all the vices, revelry, bigotry, blasphemy, and beauty that one moss covered, tropic, sweltering gumbo stewpot could and would contain. It was a city of neighborhoods separated by class, color, and culture, mostly self contained.
On one side of Broad and Esplanade was a Greek/Syrian neighborhood. On the other side, the Creoles and Sicilians that made their fortunes in imports of goods and produce-built houses. Creoles of color built the Tremé neighborhood all the way to Saint Bernard, and there were, not one, but two Chinatowns over by Tulane Avenue and Liberty Street. There were Germans and the Irish, poor Blacks and white trash. There was the privileged and the hoi polloi. There was a lot less motorized traffic.
fesseThe North kept pushing us toward conforming while enjoying our carousing: seamen jumping ships, crackers seeking employment, and sharecroppers seeking shelter. There were hobos, hustlers, and historians, as well as runaway princesses, itinerant musicians, bootleggers, and whiskey drinking philosophers all rubbing elbows with politicians, pimps, and poets. Folks sat on their stoops in the evening to catch a breeze and watch the world go by, keeping an eye on the "chirren" and enjoying a cold beer (or two).
Expats sent for their wives and mothers, and enclaves formed and flourished. Jobs could be had at the port, the docks, the factories, breweries, in fields, and forests. There were tradesmen, academics, and ne'er-do-wells all working their personal hustles. It was "easy" here. In fact, we were called the Big Easy because, as was NOLA-splained to me half a century ago, "if you can't make it here, you can't make it nowhere."
Laundry was hung on clotheslines, kids played in the streets until the streetlights came on, meals were cooked and eaten at home, housewives traded recipes and whatever they grew in the backyard. Youngsters danced in the mists of the truck that sprayed for mosquitoes as it passed, and farmers sold produce from the back of their trucks. What went awry, and would I go back? Would I jump on that streetcar named Desire if it passed by my house?
Could I live without electronics, air conditioning, and convenience just to be able to know my neighbors, their kids, and critters? Would I prefer to walk around the corner to a butcher, baker, or bottle of booze instead of driving two miles to a supermarket? How about not having to get in my car to go to Home Depot to get a nail or some screws? Would I trade every "convenience" to return to the world of the everyman? Sit in an "air cooled" movie theater and watch the news of the day and a double feature in black and white? Would I go back to boarding one of the 20 streetcars that criss crossed our city with my lunch in a pail, working at the Blue Plate mayonnaise plant, sweating for a living with Blacks, whites, Latinos, and other fellow immigrants, and be satisfied with a hard day's work, a family to go home to, some red beans, rice, and an ice cold Falstaff beer? Maybe. It would be tempting.
Would I walk willingly through that portal to another time in this same place just to be part of a community? A community that smiles and calls you "baby" (or honey, pal, cap, or darlin') no matter your race, age, or gender and starts conversations with, "I tell you what," or "Where y'at?" or "How y'all makin' out?" or simply nods and says, "All right."
In this day and age, we've got electric cars, spell check, wrist computers, Tik Tok, artificial intelligence, and the ability to keep employment by "working from home." Our kids learn to work electronic devices almost from birth and prefer to stay mesmerized with video games instead of skinning their knees by a fall playing hide-and-seek, streetball games, or jumping rope.
Aw, forget it. I'm just this guy who thinks that the world has gone to hell in a handbasket due to lack of touch with values that would bring us together instead of keeping us isolated from each other. I guess I just need a hug.
Oh Thrill or Kitchen Brigades
"What a thrill—my thumb instead of an onion. The top quite gone except for a sort of hinge of skin, a flap like a hat. Dead white. Then that red plush." —Sylvia Plath, "Cut"
Ah, yes. The slip of a knife whilst working. An everyday possibility in any cook's life, albeit a day-to-day occupational occurrence to avoid for the professional culinarian living the "cook's life." The (professional) cook's life is another one of those hard-working dog occupations in the USA (and around the globe) that trajectories toward the reward of a glorious culmination of years of dedication, talent, ambition and loyalty—namely a "chef's life" (there are 936,526 cooks and 285,785 chefs in the USA according to census.gov).
The chef's life—another one of those hard-working dog occupations in the U.S.A. heading for that glorious culmination of simply getting things done right for a number of years and retiring to Costa Rica (on the beach, of course). Neither occupation is a terribly lucrative job, unless you become famous and then you become something else. You may become a restaurant owner and/or celebrity, and that's really another shade of steed. You're no longer a cook or chef and possibly not even prosperous, celebrated, wealthy, and/or even well liked.
Ah, yes (he said again). Your dining experience might be 19th century high society Paris; however, I'm telling you, behind those swinging kitchen doors, the atmosphere is solar systems away.
The professional kitchen may be a strict military like atmosphere, an archaic mental asylum, a street fight free for all, a garage band on major hallucinogens, or an armed forces drill team. Whichever variation (or combinations) of those scenarios it might be, you can be sure that there are "the cooks" (all of them) and there is "the chef" (the one).
The good cook is one who gladly (sometimes reluctantly) "wakes up, gets up, suits up, shows up, and shuts up." There is not an over-abundance of good cooks. It's hard work, hot work, exacting work, dangerous work, demanding work, and, oftentimes, thankless work. Mostly, even after some formal schooling, it's an ever learning, sometimes overly repetitious, often temper testing, and, most times, a competitive profession.
Many drop out. Few stick it out. Some become addicted and develop a passion for the work. A few will rise to be in charge of this controlled mayhem. A number will be brought down by inner demons: sex, drugs, rock 'n' roll, and/or scandal.
Cuts, bruises, burns, spills, and falls are not uncommon. Family life is not conducive and neither is every day, 9 to 5, Monday through Friday schedules. Kitchen work includes weekends, holidays, and the ever-unpopular Sunday brunch shift. The health plan is generally "don't get sick." Meals are eaten standing up and breaks are not part of the equation. Why would anyone choose this as a life?
Okay, c'mon. Yeah, I'm talking old school pirate ship, bedlam, dinosaur, locker room mentality stuff, right? Surely no profession that expects a 5% growth rate (U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics) over the next 10 years can exist in the so, so unromantically vulgar extreme. Or can they?
The current situation with Human Resource oriented eateries will have us believe that the environment in the service industry as a whole includes fair pay, sane hours, paid breaks, and a non-combative kumbaya brotherhood of disciplined and simplistic charismatic Trappist monks, as well as insinuates that, professionally speaking, we have entered into a 21st century career nirvana with open arms and left behind the Theodoric the Great mentality of a bloody invasion of psychic insanity, complete with paranoia, immaturity, delusions of adequacy, and contests of wills.
The famous Anthony Bourdain's love letter/memoir/horror show confessional Kitchen Confidential should be required reading to everyone who ever feels the urge to take employment or even patronize an eating establishment.
Yes, while customers (and rightly so) might believe and act like they are the last vestiges of pampered royalty when they eat out (having someone opening doors, pulling out chairs, cooking for, serving, and cleaning up after them) and believing (and rightly so) that they are responsible for judging the value of goods and services that are being rendered, the staffs of eating establishments views those "clients" through another lens.
To the management, the client is a "guest" in their house. To the servers, that guest is asking to be treated (and rightly so) with respect and deference to the point of being spoiled by the dining "experience." To that chef, that patron's happiness can make or break a career. But to the cook in the kitchen, that faceless customer, known only as the order that has been placed for them, represents their challenge to get the job done with professional accuracy and as efficiently as humanly possible so that they can get through the shift and go get a beer; and to the dishwasher, it's just another dirty plate.
Next time, let me tell you about the insanity surrounding being a $2.13 an hour (Department of Labor, dol.gov) waiter or being a minimum wage dishwasher working two jobs to support a family in an upscale, fancy pants eatery. Bon appétit.
Fair Grounds or Bust
Fear in the air, tensions everywhere.
Unemployment's rising fast, the Beatles new record's a gas.
And the only safe place to live is on an Indian reservation.
And the band played on.
—The Temptations, "Ball of Confusion (That's What the World Is Today)"
Hey, don't complain just because it's only a third of the way through the year and you're ready to curl up and go fetal. If you think that the ass kicking 2024 has given you so far is bad, fasten your seatbelts 'cause you ain't seen nuthin' yet (the psychic columnist strikes again).
All around you, you see war, hunger, homelessness, carjacking, murders, muggings, rapes, and senseless politics, not to mention greed, dishonesty, and inhumanity. Getting a dog or cat, close family ties, or cutting your bangs may assuage your plight but it will not eliminate it. Face it, from the beginning until the end, life will work your nerves.
Girl by the whirlpool
Lookin' for a new fool
Don't follow leaders
Watch the parking meters
—Bob Dylan, "Subterranean Homesick Blues"
Okay, so you think that just because you're playing your part with honor, integrity, and value, it's gonna get you a Get-Out-Of-Jail-Free card from life. You are sorely mistaken. I know. It's what I used to think. Take it from me, from here on out, it's about to get "think or thwim" time, and the water's rising fast. But soft, do I hear the siren call of the New Orleans Jazz & Heritage Festival? Ah, yes, the sirens—half bird and half woman seductresses of Greek mythology that sang to sailors. Yes, I hear them over by the racetrack calling me (and you).
2023 was bad—badder than the years before, and here comes 2024 like the dire wolf (600 pounds of sin). The cost of living went up 10%, and your raise was only 3%. Rent, groceries, gasoline, your dentist, and your dealer have all increased their fees, and don't get me started on the electric bills meteoric rise. The car needs tires, baby needs shoes, and, I don't know about you, but I need a break. Hell, I could do with a dose of amnesia.
Hey, take my hand. Life is short no matter how long you live. Close your eyes. Open your hand. Feel this slip of paper? It's a ticket to the New Orleans Jazz & Heritage Festival's second weekend on me. No, it's not for the Rolling Stones day (I'm not that magnanimous).
What? It costs as much as a day's pay? Well, the way I consider it, when I spend a day's pay to go to the Jazz Fest, I'm actually giving myself a day off with pay to go have a most wonderful time. Believe me, I save up all year to give myself this "stay-cation." I deserve this. I deserve to be able to take every day of Jazz Fest off from work and responsibility to render myself immune to the day's cares and concerns. I know that my life, as it is, will be waiting for me when I exit, and I'll face what I have to face and ignore everything else that I can that is waiting to work my patience, emotions, understanding, and ken.
But I need this. I need this respite, this time off and out. That's what it is. I'm giving myself a "time out" and going to the corner of Sauvage and Fortin streets, or 1751 Gentilly Ave., through those gates and off the grid.
I get a giddy feeling as I stand in line with the other folks eager to be the first in. I go through the line like a greasy butter knife, carrying so very little (a towel, sunscreen, cash, and a big grin). I've got on comfortable, closed-toe shoes, clothed in just enough layers for the weather and eyewear to protect me from the sun.
I pass the Gospel Tent and look in on Jesus, pass the Blues Tent and look in on a poster of B.B. King, and over to the WWOZ Jazz Tent where I deposit Debbie because that's where she likes to spend her days, and then I'm off.
I'm not saying that I'm old, but my experiences with and at music and art festivals get me so high that I cannot sit still for very long. I've got to be out there. I've got to see everything, be everywhere, and poke my nose into everybody's business. I am nonstop for hours, and I'm electrified by the energy of the fest. I'm movin' and groovin'. I've got gut in my strut, glide in my stride, and no shame in my game. Amazingly, I don't want to talk to many people. I seldom interact. If you know me, I'm perfectly more than capable of enjoying and amusing myself without outside help or influences.
I eat, I drink (non-alcoholic beverages), I bring Debbie beignets and coffee, as well as other gifts of refreshment, and I observe. When someone afterward asks me who I saw, I smile and say, "Everyone."
So here's your ticket. Go forth and soak up the magic. Find all the secret, sacred corners, routes, and avenues through the myriad of Jazz Fest brethren. If you don't enjoy yourself, it's your own fault.
If you see me and I seem to not recognize you, just let me go on my way. I'm in a world of my own, and I call it heaven.
Truckin' or 42
Now, lemme get
this straight: you're born, you live, and you die. In the meantime, between the
light and the darkness, you're not given a bed of roses. From childhood, you
are a dependent who is basically told what is good for them and how to behave,
what to believe, and how to think, speak, and pray. You learn to use currency,
cunning, and charisma to get what you want and then, with your hormones at full
throttle, you are thrust out on your own into the reality that you so hoped
would be your salvation, and you're met with the cold fact that life is
unforgiving and unfair.
Getting older, you
learn (or don't) how to manage your health and welfare. You're also held
responsible for your actions, finances, and future. In short, it ain't downhill
coasting, no matter who you may be or wherever you are. It's a headache and a
pain in the ass. And then there's the New Orleans Jazz & Heritage Festival
(Jazz Fest).
Life can be a
bitch, karma can be a kick in the ass, and you may get everything you deserve
or nothing at all. You'll get what you pay for, and then you'll pay for what
you get. Finagle's Law will dog you: "Anything that can go wrong, will go wrong
at the worst possible moment" (or not). Clowns to the left of you, jokers to
the right, and there you are stuck in the middle.
There are simple
but demoralizing afflictions: asthma, rashes, moles, hair loss, leaky bladders,
blood pressure, cholesterol, migraines, weight gain or loss, coughs, colds, and
sore holes to contend with. There are also the big devastating ones: cancer, diabetes,
psoriasis, Parkinson's, cystinosis, heart disease, cirrhosis, and, later on,
you can look forward to cases of dementia and Alzheimer's that can cut you down
like sugar cane. Your body will be growing wisps of gray hair in the strangest
of places. You'll also start to fall apart and be rendered less active and
weaker than you ever were or thought you would be. Period. And then there's
Jazz Fest.
Oh, while we're at
it, how about financial setbacks, loss of friends and jobs, love, attraction,
loneliness, and heartache? You can choose your medicine—do the best you can and
find solace in sex, drugs, and rock 'n' roll or booze, pills, and powders. Everything
from acetylsalicylic to lysergic acid. Bringing children into the world? Good
luck.
From Advil to
Zoloft, you'll see the commercials for dozens of afflictions with "doctor
recommended" cures that include side effects like lung disease, kidney
infections, shortness of breath, diarrhea, pancreatitis—and sometimes the cure
"can, in some cases, cause fatalities." And then there's Jazz Fest. Do you see
where I'm goin' with this?
Of course, you do
what you can. You stop smoking, limit excessive (if any) drinking, exercise
regularly, adopt healthy diet practices, worship yoga, look to God, goddesses,
and/or other deities. None of that will save you (no matter how long you live)
when it's time for the final curtain to fall.
Now, walk with me.
C'mon, let's take a break. If you're not hooked on Jazz Fest thus far, consider
this: On April 25, which is a Thursday, locals like you, or the one that you
corral, can get into Jazz Fest for $50 (two tickets each is possible). Take the
day off, call in well, arrive early, and stay late. The half C note will get
you in, and, if you leave, you cannot get back in without paying again. Held
hostage by a good time? You bet.
You only need a
towel (for multiple purposes), sunscreen, and some walking around money for
food. You can/should even leave your phone at home unless you use it to take
photographs. Anything else is superfluous, unnecessary, and a waste of energy
to keep up with.
You don't need
alcohol to have a great time there. Don't go looking to get laid, and nobody
you know wants to get a text from you saying, "I'm having a blast, sucker." You
will meet lots of wonderful folks out there who are just like you, looking to
have a great day of music, food, and tomfoolery.
Don't like crowds?
Don't get in them. You can skirt the field and see whoever is playing or who
you want from different vantage points. Bathrooms bother you? Find the indoor
ones and, for goodness sake, don't wait 'til you're about to wet your pants
before getting in line. Like the food? Stand in line like everyone else and
talk to the person in front of you (or behind you). Ask them where they're
from, who they saw or are coming to see, find out what they've eaten so far.
Anticipating that you might still be hungrier or thirstier, go stand in another
line. It's fun.
Fer Chrissake,
don't go thinking that it's friggin' Woodstock or a drunkin' throw down.
Remember it's about the vibe and the safety, security, and comfort away from
the world and all of its challenges outside the gate. You are free of
encumbrances and responsibilities to anyone for this day. You can dance like
nobody's watching because they're not.
You have
absolutely nothing to lose by taking the day off and commiserating with like
minded folks. You'll be free to sing off key, find Jesus, jazz, and joy.
I actually would
like to live there. The worst day that I've ever had at Jazz Fest is still
better than the best day I've had anywhere else (and that's saying something).
Have one of your own.
Requiem or Universality
"It's only with the heart that one can see rightly; what is essential is invisible to the eye. All grown-ups were once children…but only few of them remember it."
—Antoine de Saint-Exupéry, The Little Prince
Once
upon a time, there was a little prince who lived on a planet hardly any bigger
than he was and who needed a friend." The Little Prince by Antoine De
Saint-Exupery is called a wise and enchanting fable. If the book doesn't
inspire you, then I believe that there is no hope for you.
The book starts with a pilot that has
crash-landed in the desert with little or no help available and out of
seemingly nowhere comes a small visitor (picture David Bowie at 11 years of
age). The boy is called a "little prince," but as he is the only inhabitant of
his planet (which is no bigger than a house), he has no competition. Little
Prince is only what he is called by the pilot and the book, and that's good
enough for me (and should be for you).
The boy has traveled far and wide and has
had experiences on other small planets with a series of archetypical adult
figures that, when taken objectively, resemble many adults (grown-ups) around
you now. The little guy asks the pilot to draw him a particular picture and the
adventures, lessons, and wisdom begins. It is a classic example of "from the
mouths of babes."
In other words, it's life in its simplest
form. When life is seen in its simplest form, happiness is within reach but
also is heartbreak. Life is usually seen in its simplest form when someone has
nothing left to lose.
My veterinarian, 10 years ago, found a
newborn kitten on a rainy Moss Street roadway, nursed it to life, and we got
the pleasure of sharing our lives with it. Debbie named him Opie because he
looked like Ron Howard. His colors were what are called butterscotch. He grew
with an appetite and a gentle lovingness that was unsurpassed. Before his
illness, he weighed about 20 pounds.
The Little Prince teaches us that if we
look with our hearts, loving a person, place, or thing makes it ours. Although
there may be many persons, places, and things seemingly alike to others, that
cannot take away that that is not the one that we love. "We" in loving the ones
we love, make that "one" special and ours alone. One rose out of a thousand, if
it is our rose is, in its uniqueness, the only rose we truly can love with all
of our being. All roses are beautiful, but "our" rose will outshine them all.
So, too, it is with a star that we choose, a piece of music, work of art,
lover, and/or a cat.
When we experience this sensibility, we
become like children who love with all their hearts and all that they love,
without reason, regret, or condition, becomes significant and personal.
Opie was diagnosed with an incurable
cancer, and instead of subjecting him to the discomfort of debilitating
procedures and medicines, we had chosen to bring him home and spoil him and
love on him until it was time for him to, as they say, cross that Rainbow
Bridge. His tumor had grown too large for him to function normally, having
grown to a 26-inch stomach circumference, and he was fading. We took him back
to the clinic to begin his next life's journey; his time here is at an end, and
the quality of life we promised for him had become no longer an option.
We feel that it is only fitting for our
vet who brought him into this world to be the person that takes him out. I
would say that we are heartbroken, but heartbroken is too mild a term for how
we feel. Once again, the Bureau of Happy Endings is not answering our calls or
wishes.
You know the drill. Every day there is an
inhumanity against loved ones, yours or someone else's. You put your faith in a
higher being to guide and assist you and to offer succor and support. As it
turns out, this higher being has plans of its own, and you may say that this
higher being is "moving in mysterious ways." I beg to differ. I don't think the
mother f*cker cares a whit.
I've had friends, lovers, family, and
critters that I've loved cross that frickin' "Rainbow Bridge" without knowledge
or consent for this "Mysterious Way," and I call foul. I believe in the
teaching that all religions that tell us to treat others as we would be
treated. I take exception to the teachings that have the caveat that it means
"everyone, except those that are not like us."
Opie rallied, and we took him in praying
for a reprieve that did not come. I watched the light fade from his bright eyes
and heard Dr. Nicole Larroque tell me that his heart had stopped.
Doc told us that the first shot took
Opie's spirit out of his body and that the second shot (once his body had
relaxed) took his body away from him. That means, to me, that Opie's spirit is
still out there and will find itself back to us.
Call me what you will, but if you should one day spy a little butterscotch asking for directions, please send him home. He's my good friend, and I miss him so very, very much.
Ink Stains or What Did Tennessee?
"America has only three cities: New York, San Francisco, and New Orleans. Everywhere else is Cleveland." —Tennessee Williams
Thomas Lanier Williams (March 26, 1911-
February 26, 1983) arrived in New Orleans from Saint Louis in 1938. He had been
a sickly child (diphtheria) and had, at an early age, turned inward, became a
reader and eventually began writing stories. How he chose the name Tennessee is
anyone's guess, but, given the options, I cannot think of another state to
choose as a moniker. Be that as it may, he had his first break in 1944 with The
Glass Menagerie and wrote a string of enormously mind blowing, emotionally gut wrenching,
fabulously significant, and hugely popular stage plays and films that starred
the best of the best actors in his time.
Writers, I believe, suffer from the insecurity
of needing to have other people (possibly strangers) appreciate the written
word, especially as it is written by them. Writers believe that they have
something to say that you should read and embrace the emotion that they have
put into those words. Those words tell a story, make a point, defend an idea,
or are simply an attempt to make some money. Writers, journalists, poets,
playwrights, and even that kid that spray paint scrawls the words "Fu*k you,
you lying, lying SlutBitch!" on the cinder block wall outside of Rouses
Supermarket. They have something to say, and they have the need to express it
outside of themselves. Fact, fiction, fantasy, or however that person on the
receiving end of that SlutBitch's lie is feeling, they want to get it out
there, off their chest, and for you to know it, see it, feel it, be impressed
by it, or be ignorant enough to ignore it.
Tennessee had a lot to say: Night of the
Iguana, Cat on a Hot Tin Roof, Suddenly, Last Summer, and the big one, set
right here, Streetcar Named Desire (and more). Although some people consider
anything that he wrote after 1961 to be pure crapola, gems of his other works
are being rediscovered, reevaluated, unearthed, and performed with alacrity,
enthusiasm, and vigor continually.
Who was Tennessee Williams? He was a 5-foot 6
gay man who worked on a chicken ranch, a shoe factory, and as an usher in
theaters before being able to make enough money to live on his writing
abilities. He was fiercely loyal and somewhat promiscuous in his love life and
enjoyed the down low lush life. He used eye drops and wrote incessantly and,
oft-times, very well. He was a big fan (who isn't) of Meryl Streep and often
lied about his age. He smoked, drank, caroused, and sometimes crawled on his
belly like a reptile (okay, I made that last one up). He was a model of
persistence, stick-to-itiveness, and drive, however lazy he may have appeared.
He was a riddle wrapped in a mystery inside an enigma. Go figure.
If you are literate at all, you are aware of
his major works. If you are a maven of literature, you have coal mined into his
life and times. If you know nothing of him, well shame on you; however, all is
not lost. You can, as a vehicle to your ever-loving albeit limited awareness,
look into the 2024 Tennessee Williams & New Orleans Literary Festival. It's
a genuine, word geek, three ringed J. K. Rowling Potteresque-style circus. It
will be in its 37th year, from March 20 to 24 (five days) in the French Quarter,
and it is a sight to behold if you're astute enough to witness and possibly
partake in it.
Picture it, you're on your rounds around the
Quarter on a springy spring weekend day, and, from the peripheral vision of
your awareness, there are some folks hurrying past you in different directions
(and indifferent of you) with programs and notepads and books tucked under
their arms and possibly munching a sandwich or snack with the attitude of the
White Rabbit in Alice's Adventures in Wonderland. They're going to writers'
panels, author interviews, theater events, culinary and cocktail events. If you
happened to be in Jackson Square on that Sunday and see a bunch of kooks shouting
"Stella!" at a Pontalba balcony, you might be taken aback but possibly curious.
But before you know it, it's over and you've missed the whole thing as if it
were the Midnight Circus by Erin Morgenstern.
And you're left there in the dust asking,
"What? Where? When? Who? It was? Sh*t! Well, next year, I promise." Well, this
is your heads up, your wakeup call, your "get a clue phone" ringing—ring, ring.
It's time to knit your brow just a little bit higher and go get you some
literary couth.
I've met people from around the country and
around the world at these get-togethers. Well, I really haven't met them.
Nobody really talks to each other. They're mostly at this thing to absorb the
vibe and learn sh*t, me included. Be there or literally be square.
Oh, you know Tennessee's eye drops? Well he used to pull the cap off the bottle with his teeth to use them. One day while administering those drops, something surprising happened to startle him, and, as a result, he inhaled the cap, which got stuck in his throat causing him to choke and die. Let that be a lesson to you. Be careful with those things. See you at the fest.
Party On! or Not
Hello, my name is Phil, and I'm an alcoholic and a binge drinker." And I should add, "Carnival, and especially Mardi Gras Day, is my time to shine. I'm in my element. It's my jam, and I'm right at home with all the drunks: amateur or professional, newbie or seasoned. I'm there. I drink, and I love to drink." Unfortunately, I'm not really good at it.
I've been to Carnival and Mardi Gras for decades and although I have refined my behavior, the result is overwhelmingly constant: I get drunk, plastered, inebriated, snockered, intoxicated, and tipsier than tipsy, so much so that I frighten the neighbors, traffic, pedestrians, and wind up pissing off those close to me. I'm not a gentleman drunk. I used to vomit but not in recent years. Sometimes I used to pass out and wet myself, but not in recent years. I am neither proud nor ashamed.
Two conditions that contribute to the perpetuation of my affliction: I enjoy the feeling, and I don't have hangovers. Sometimes I run into things, trip, and maybe fall. Those times are rarer and rarer because I hope to control my drinking so that I may continue into my older years bent but not broken.
I come from a family of drinkers. It was common among my elders to consider a night at a bar drinking as family entertainment, and, in my days, it was not uncommon for adults to spend four or five hours at a local tavern drinking, gossiping, communing, and even singing (en masse) favorite songs. True. And I grew up with that as role models of behavior. The only tenets were that, in public, it was bad form to converse (especially in pubs) about sex, politics, or religion. Behavior that I hold sacrosanct to this day.
New Orleans, and the French Quarter in particular, felt immediately like home when I first arrived many years ago. Drinking in public, 24 hours a day, at more than reasonable prices for strong libations suited me fine. My first Carnivals had me toting a gallon jug of heady concoctions as I joined the fray on Bourbon Street nightly. And still making it back to work the next day like all the rest of the slow burning trash I caroused with.
Mardi Gras, the day, has always been extra special to me. I don't enjoy parades but that doesn't stop me from becoming one, much to the chagrin of those around me. Me, in costume, weaving my way on the streets cluttered with the detritus of bodies, boobs, and beads is a sight to behold, and I don't recommend anyone following in my footsteps. Not only am I a hard act to follow, but you really don't want to live the lush life that I have. There's no future in it.
Three things happen to me under the influence: I get happily quiet, I get philosophical, and, at extremes, I get maudlin. I am not loud, aggressive, or mean—unless provoked. I generally just want to be left alone in a semi-comatose revelry. I feel the quiet of finally being able to shut the world out and not have the awareness of daily life and responsibilities; the world's problems drop away and I am at peace in my cocoon of alcoholic miasma. Comfortably numb.
I've gotten better in recent years, and I am now allowed the freedom of venturing out unsupervised and the expectations of moderate behavior are met and appreciated. I find it better to be appreciated for my sense of control than to be subjected to the ire, anger, and sometimes pity by losing it. I've learned that because of my weak personality, in drinking, once I begin, be it 7 in the morning or 7 at night, I don't want to stop, and usually don't, until bedtime. Overcoming temptation has never been a strong suit of mine. Two drinks and I'm off and running, and there is no such thing as one drink.
I generally go out without credit cards and a limited amount of cash, say $20. I go out on foot and that makes me aware that any trip out will have to be followed by that same amount covered back, upright and ambulatory. I like to believe that I can get a contact high being out and, in recent years, have come to be more reflective of Carnivals past. These days, the high spirits of those around me make me smile in their simple and naïve interpretation of celebrations that include childlike behavior and puppy-like antics. I reflect that, in my day, there were big dogs on the loose and now, out there, it seems so civilized that my self control has become a reward rather than an affliction.
I save myself for home to toast the day and know that on Wednesday I will start a period of complete sobriety. Debbie says that it's to give our livers a break and that's good enough for me.
Growing up in the projects with five children from four fathers (that we know of), a strapping 180 pound, nearly 6-foot tall, redheaded mother that drank a case of beer a day, and adults that ruled by violent eruptions rather than abstemious reasoning is a reflection sobering enough. It gives me pause when I wake up in the morning with the realization that I probably didn't need that last drink.
My other challenges are that my damn doctors consistently reassure me of my great health conditions, although they would like me to cut down on my juicing. My great inspiration is my partner who keeps reminding me that if, in fact, I believe in my immortality that I shouldn't mess with the fate of all drinkers: stupid behavior, bad liver, and broken hearts. Fun fact: You alienate more good people with drinking than you attract.
Happy New Year or Other People
Ask Uncle Charlie (Dickens) for the illustration from A Christmas Carol. Ebenezer Scrooge sits, just like you and me, getting hipped to the fact that where he was led him to where he is and will determine where he will be if he maintains the trajectory of his behavior and existence. His moral compass and the consequences of his actions will reap what has been "sowed and growed." The butterfly effect in the chaos theory will remain unchanged unless a change in course is made. I believe, in our hearts, that we all want to change for the better. That's why we make New Year's Resolutions, eh?
Rush hour Thursday evening, traveling Poydras Street, three lanes up and three lanes down, traveling at the speed of hope-to-get-the-f*ck-home. Like frantic captives tortured by their terrorist employers, the cars, SUVs, vans, and pick-ups are escaping, racing away from all the misery their occupations heaped on their souls and spirits that day and into life's pernal beating that awaits them at home: spouses, offspring, rents, mortgages, and/or the grass that is dying in the draught, hoping Margaret Orr will predict some rain and wondering why the home team got their asses kicked again. The cool taste of that first beer that goes down so easily.
I'm hugging the right lane going up towards Galvez Street, and I spy the vehicles veering out from the center lane going left and right at 40 miles an hour avoiding something. The "something" that they are avoiding is an old man in a wheelchair stopped in the center lane like a Grateful Dead set—no way forward and no way back. And no one is stopping to aid his plight, or even slowing down.
Except for some guy (me) in a beat up '97 Lincoln Town Car who pulls over (still in traffic), turns on his flashers, and jumps into traffic for a stranger in need of help.
I'm still in my cook's whites, waving my arms like a sailor at a semaphore convention, and get to him, asking ludicrously, "Do you need help?" Of course he does. At this point, I don't know which direction he's heading, and when I find out—here we go—crossing five lanes of rush hour traffic. When I'm in, I'm in.
"Did you just leave your car?" he asks. "You shouldn'ta done that. I'm goin' right there. Okay, thank you. I can take it from here. Ya got a couple of dollahs you can spare?" He points to the Superdome and tells me, "There used to be a grocery store, right there." I inform him that that grocery store ain't there no more and off he goes. End of story. How do I feel? I'm frickin' livid.
I'm mad as a wet hen, cursing even. Not at him, per se, but at the entire race of humans that cannot, will not, for one brief minuscule heartbeat consider another's dilemma that may at best be temporary and at worst life threatening. And now, I consider that incident an allegory for the state of the world. Listen, with any luck at all, you have three blessings:
1. You wake up in the morning.
2. You're kinda in your right mind and health.
3. You have options.
You can consider, like old Ebenezer, that where you were—and where you are—is leading you to a very predictable future if you but stay your course, direction, and pace. It sounds so simple. 1 and 2 are biggies and are really important to pay attention to. 3 requires consideration or not. Ignore 3 and you will get to where you're already headed.
Now you can consider the world and its challenges and problems, its destructions and dyings. Its equities and inequities did not just start today or yesterday, but are a series of steps and missteps that are, in essence, already set in a motion and movement from centuries ago, and that, some say, are undoubtedly leading the world to its imminent demise. Some say that it's too late to change course, that things already are out of anyone's control. I say that it's a mindset and conditioning brought on by media, politics, and religion that, at best, has to be overhauled from the ground up like an existential rebirth/epiphany, and I don't see that happening—ever in my lifetime (or yours). The Prince of Peace is not returning. Miss Otis regrets she's unable to lunch today, madam.
It's too late to be an example to others. It's too late to fight the greed compounded by mendacity that is ruling the planet and our lives; souls hang on by a thread with a prayer and a song. "We were talking about the love we all could share. When we find it, to try our best to hold it there. With our love, with our love, we could save the world, if they only knew," The Beatles from "Within You Without You."
I don't know what to say. Happy New Year? Will this year be better? Our lives are predetermined, led by coincidence? Is there such a thing as free will? Can we unstick the mind f*ck? Maybe and maybe not (probably not). Certainly we can only find peace in ourselves. Certainly we can only practice compassion, empathy, and kindness in ourselves until it becomes our natural behavior. Certainly it is only we that can change our behavior for the better. We have to see that as where we're going. Or not.
There's an old man in a wheelchair sitting in six lanes of fast traveling vehicles.
Moving Target or Home Plate
I have a musician friend who can get better gigs and recognition if he moves to Mexico City. I have an artist friend that loves her new digs in New Mexico, the culinary graduate that I helped cannot wait to get back to San Antonio, and our favorite old bartender prefers San Miguel Allende. They say they've had enough. They say they can't live like this anymore. They say life is better elsewhere: Costa Rica, Houston, New Jersey, for god's sake.
Over 15,000 last year—9,000 the year before—left New Orleans metro area. They're movin' out. Why? What is so alienating? Who are these turncoats? Why did they treat us so thoughtlessly; how could they do this to me?
Here's some of the reasons I've heard: cost of living and housing prices, economic opportunities (better elsewhere), and, the big one, (violent) crime. Other than that, they've pointed out there's substandard education here, lack of infrastructure, ineffective government, and overall condition of our streets. There's also flooding, storm possibilities, power outages, and price hikes on everyday expenditures such as electricity, gas, food, clothing, insurance, and entertainment. There's salt water intrusion, and even Margaret Orr retiring.
I say, "Is that all? It's always been like that on Plantation New Orleans." And, here it comes—the "Get A Clue Phone." Ring, ring, "Get a clue."
The challenge is not that New Orleans has gotten to be a worse place to live in the last 25 years, it's that it hasn't gotten any better. It's like you're going on a path—it's a hike, the hike of life. You got your ups and downs, but you're headed for home—a quiet space, a happy place. The road is a little rough but you're going on and on because that's just what you do. You travel that path, watching your footing, friends along and going in the same direction. You're singing, you're laughing, maybe even dancing.
Then you notice that it's not only not getting easier. It's, in fact, getting harder and you're getting tired. Some of your friends are dropping out to take easier routes; some have left you all together. Somebody passes you a note: "P.S. Your cat has died." You're having second thoughts.
I love New Orleans—that faded starlet, that tipsy vaudevillian, that sly old fox wrapped in her muddy old river stole. I'm at home in her arms, and we're lovers. I've resided in over a dozen cities and towns and visited a score more. I've hitchhiked and driven the length of this country more times than any normal person should. I've "driven every kind of rig that's ever been made" and been willin' to keep movin'.
"I've been all over the world," he said. "I've been to North Carolina."
I first came here in the '60s and spent seven years. I returned from my travels in 1999, coming to the conclusion that the other places that I wandered in and out of were fine. However, they were not New Orleans.
I drove back into town in a 20-foot U-Haul on a 2,300 mile road run and left the freeway as soon as I saw the skyline and realized that I was, in fact, back home. The first thing I did was swing low, park that chariot, and get me a bowl of gumbo. The waitress was not impressed with the poor boy's return and exuberance just to have my feet planted again on this firmament.
I glanced out the café window and spotted two boys on three bicycles and mused on how sweet it was that kids were still stealing bikes, until I hipped that this was 30 years later and the kids I saw were children or even grandchildren of the kids that had stolen my bike the last time that I lived here. I remember thinking, "You mean, we still haven't taught our kids that it ain't right to take someone else's bike?"
Reality check—things have not gotten worse living here. Things have not gotten any better.
I've roamed all over town here since my return, and I've been reminded of the poverty, abandonment, and general demolition of spirit and property by neglect. I've seen how manufacturing jobs have disappeared. I see a "for rent" sign on the Coca-Cola bottling plant, condominiums in the Civic Theater, homeless camps under the I-10 overpass. I've witnessed the two-edged sword of short term rentals that flip substandard housing and re-energize residential neighborhoods at the cost of dislocating residents.
And still, as Lafcadio Hearn wrote, "I wouldn't trade it for the whole state of Ohio."
Debbie and I bought a house here—first time home owners. The note is about the same as the money that we'd be paying in rent here—added expenses of owning are sometimes daunting. Owning comes with its own challenges and it's a bear keeping up with them all. It's tough living here, but I wouldn't live anywhere else (at least not in this country) and neither would she. Did we want to have to buy a house at our age? No. Are we going to be able to live out our 30 year mortgage? The odds are against it. But my spirit was born here and I know New Orleans—the then, the now—and I'm still in love with her nebulous and evasive character.
"Sundown yellow moon, I replay the past. I know every scene by heart, they all went by so fast. If she's passing back this way, I'm not that hard to find. Tell her she can look me up, if she's got the time." Dylan.
Ferdutzt or Big Easy Blues
Lafcadio Hearn said of New Orleans in 1789: "Its condition is so bad that when I write about it, as I intend to do soon, nobody will believe I am telling the truth. But it is better to live here in sackcloth and ashes than to own the whole state of Ohio."
That quote resonates in me 150 years later. As Lafcadio further wrote, "Times are not good here. The city is crumbling into ashes. It has been buried under a lava flood of taxes and frauds and maladministration so that it has become only a study for archaeologists." Indeed he could be speaking of the present day or 150 years before that. New Orleans history and (dare I say it?) tradition is one of hedonistic dysfunction going back to its birth in 1718.
Booger Bob lives under the overpass on Claiborne Avenue. Booger Bob is one of hundreds of our unhoused citizens. Booger Bob has over 30 bicycles in various states of repair that he sells. In fact there are more bicycles under the overpass than I see on the street, all housed by the unhoused. Where they get these bicycles is anyone's guess. Does any of that bother me? Not really. That's New Orleans.
I get a parking ticket of $30.00 if I don't feed a meter, while certain Social Aid and Pleasure Clubs can park on neutral grounds, double-park in the street, and have traffic-clogging festivities regularly with alacrity and impunity. Men on three wheel motor bikes doing wheelies and cutting through traffic lanes and impeding pedestrians and vehicles get nary a second look. Does that bother me? Not really.
Our streets are cratered and potholed enough to shake my muffler pipe loose and seemingly no one in the city government cares. There's trash dumped and blighted houses, drunks weaving and people living in poverty, ignorance and despair around me. That's New Orleans, murder capital of the country. I wouldn't live anywhere else in the U.S.A.
Carjacking and vehicle break-ins, guns getting fired randomly, all manner of inconsideration of folks toward folks, insults and discrimination and have-nots outnumbering the haves and that's just the way it frigging is. Got your house broken into, your bike stolen, been mugged? That's not an "if" question. That's a "it's only a matter of time" statement.
All manner of cosmic debris line our thoroughfares and plastic grocery bags blow in the wind like dandelion puff parachutes. There are abandoned and feral once domesticated animals. A person throws trash on the ground with aplomb. A "second line" leaves a wake of debris. The freedom to void your bladder in a corner or move your bowels on a car bumper. There are condoms, syringes, and bullet casings. We turn a blind eye, but what do we expect?
Who teaches our children? Who taught their parents? Who has given a rat's whisker for over 300 years? Am I pessimistic? Not really. Am I optimistic? Same answer.
Do I approve, condone, go along with, encourage or accept as normal these living conditions? No, I don't. I am among that percentage of implants and locals that have seen these conditions since first setting our feet on our pavement. For me, it was over half a century ago, and I'm hard pressed to report any changes. We live, work, and vote to make things better. I imagine that Lafcadio would feel right at home though. Regarding this, The Guardian mentioned that "[t]he image we have today of New Orleans as beautiful and mysterious, dangerous and decaying, is due in a large part to Lafcadio Hearn."
Lafcadio wrote about police corruption and abuse of prisoners that were incarcerated. He mentions the fact of our city being home to gamblers, drunkards, prostitutes, and pirates. He writes illustriously about the neglect and decay that are treated with ennui by government and population, as if they were normal living conditions. And all we can say is "it is what it is."
Do we need better education for our population? Do we need gun regulation and equal and fair housing? Should we limit short term rentals, enforce traffic violations, help the less fortunate, ensure adequate healthcare, equal rights and opportunity? Should we support Booger Bob and buy back our stolen bicycle? All these may be questions that we as a people might, should, could ask ourselves; however, I don't expect that query. You see, as written in IFLScience.com, "only a small percentage of the population have an inner dialogue/monologue with themselves" that would ask.
And if you are part of the 50-70% plus of the population that doesn't have that, as noted by Upworthy.com, well, you don't have to have it to be a functioning member of society. It's fine. Nobody's bugging you to do what's considered the right thing. You can turn the radio up, go down the rabbit hole of your social media, get loaded and go comatose, and/or stay in touch constantly via cell phone earpiece with everyone you know—who is also ignoring life's questions. You can bay at the moon for all I care.
Forget about meditation, it only hurts the head. Forget empathy—it's for suckers. Don't bother to form an opinion about anything happening in the world around you. Que sera sera.
This isn't a "you're okay—I'm better" piece, and it's not a "woe is me—let me wag a finger in anyone's direction but mine" piece. It's a sad reflection of my home. Criticism is an adversary of love, and I love my city; however, I'd love to see more love shown. I'd love to witness positive changes here in my lifetime. I'd love to expect that.
Midnight Special or All Hallows Eve
Halloween—being the day and evening before the Christian holy days of All Hallows Day (All Saints Day) on November 1st and All Souls Day on November 2nd. The ancient Gaelic festival of Samhain, considered the earliest known root of Halloween and celebrated on October 31—hijacked by Christians and brought to this country—rumored to be the time when the spirit gates are thrown open and goblins, ghosts, spirits, and the dead are free to roam the earth and have a good old Monster Mash. We're all supposed to be very much afraid and give them candy.
I wish that it was as easy as giving away sweets to assuage the fears that I have. Daily, I feel like the gates of hell have come down like the Berlin Wall without the accompaniment of Pink Floyd. Like they say in the Middle East, "The fit has hit the Shan," and there's no escaping the manure storm.
Are you also feeling like that? A lot of people that I know are, and it's not just a matter of "who is the child with no complaint?" The world around us has gone certifiably insane, and it seems that the inmates are running the asylum; we've gone to hell in a bucket and I, for one, am not enjoying the ride. Pass the Kit Kats please.
"Nature is alive and talking to us. We're not listening; this is not a metaphor" (Terence McKenna). Here comes the first Trick or Treaters:
First, the politicians. You can tell right away because they come with their entire dirty laundry showing. They don't want candy. They want money (and my vote). They also want to give me a list of banned books and reasons why global warming is bogus. Go back to Florida, ya bums.
Next, the AI people know who I am because of facial recognition. They have ingested data and quantum computing has told them that I'm keeping the good stuff for myself and the probability of where my stash is. They claim not to be responsible for anything because they're "still learning." I yell, "That man's nuts. Grab 'em!" And they all scattered.
And who is this in those campy outfits, sequins, spandex, and kitschy make up? Why, it's Gen Z. They want tickets to "Cirque du Soleil" (they are so into feats of athletic daring). Sorry kids, you need to hit up the guy next door with the Toyota Camry in the driveway.
Then, the unhoused and food insecure, formerly known as the homeless and hungry. I'm ready with blankets, bags of ice, and gift cards to Starbucks and Bed, Bath, and Beyond. They are now setting up camp in my backyard, and we'll have a weenie roast and sing-along, and I have a new family (complete with tarps, bicycles and shopping carts). They're some swell folks, and I'll never be lonely again.
Oops! Here comes door-to-door salvation. Dressed like a sixties' family television program. They just want to talk about my future heaven-wise or hellbent, and have I gotten their pamphlets and newsletters. Could I please offer up my salvation as their treat before they TP my house?
Now, the environmentalists are a knockin', and they want to know if I would give up my electronic equipment, my power mower, blower, air conditioner, and any and all plastic in my house—including the toilet seat and shower curtain. What do I think about zoos and have I considered a vegan diet? I am humbled. I sit on my steps and weep.
Here's the politically correct contingent. They want to know if, since the visitors have come around tonight, I've done or said anything to offend or upset trick-or-treaters who are disadvantaged because of their sex, gender, race, or disability. They tell me that if I've commented on anyone's appearance that it could be construed as sexual harassment. They want me to sign something. I quote Archie Bunker ("Meatheads") and slam the door.
I knew they'd come. The millennials: special, confident, team-oriented, smart, and casual in slip dresses, tube tops and cargo pants. They don't want much. They want to talk about the latest trends, sustainability, social justice, and economic equality. They're all on plant-based diets, inquire after fruit flavored filtered Smart water, avocado toast, acai, and poké bowls in the funniest accents.
Holey samolies, at the door now is an entire cast of a late night news and entertainment shows. They're all talking and, sometimes, shouting to be heard over each other, "A storm in the gulf appears to be headed right toward your house. See my spaghetti models?" "My next guest needs no introduction—she has a new book out," "In Washington, twelve senators have indicted each other over free speech being spoken," "The wife of a famous ex-politician is reportedly having an affair with a French pop star and is…" "Across the globe, fires, earthquakes, tornadoes, and migrant boats…." "Hold it! Hold it!" I yell, "Cut to a station break and move along and do not—I repeat—do not send the commercials over here, or I'll cancel the lot of you."
Just in time, some children are dressed up like comic book heroes, Barbie dolls, the Flash, Spiderman, minions, Turtle Ninjas, Darth Vadar, and some girls named Wednesday and Eleven? They're all yelling. One is crying. They've got their grubby little hands out. They're high on sugar and are chocolate-stained. Their shopping bags must weigh ten pounds already, and they want more. One has lost a shoe. There are no adults in sight, and I think that little one has wet his pants. Now, I'm really scared.
Quintuplequinquennial or 5x5
Long ago and not very far away, a guy with a dream and not much money thought it would be cool and necessary to publish a music and entertainment rag for the edification of any of the interested populous in the City that Care Forgot.
Twenty-five years of Where Y'at. Lots of water under the bridge and once upon a time twenty five years ago, 125 years in cat years, 175 in dog years, and 200 in automobile years (my '97 Lincoln and I should know). A hard birth occurred, followed by a rough adolescence, a steamy youth, and finally we're in the prime of life, hittin' our stride, ready for the next twenty-five. Perhaps we'll eventually mature. I hope not.
Man, can you imagine having the same job for twenty-five years? Do you even know where you were twenty-five years ago? Gas was $1.15 a gallon, average rent a little over $600.00, Walmart was a whisper on the street, David Bowie, Prince, and Freddy Mercury were alive and well, and Bill Clinton was being impeached for the attention he received in the office closet.
Twenty-five years ago, Google was founded, the FDA approved Viagra and you may have been paying attention to the current music back then, but I wasn't. It was a cold winter and a hot summer (what else is new), and hurricane Georges pimp-slapped the coast in September clocking winds of 155. It was the perfect year to launch a new entertainment magazine (eh, Josh?), but the US GDP was up that year, so what the heck?
I started tugging the editors' coat-tails early on, being egged on by a former wife who decided that I knew how to "tell a story." At first, I got not a nod, a wink, nor a nudge and was about to throw in the towel, when I received an answer to yet another plea from me asking to be recognized, saying that the magazine "liked my stuff but just didn't have the room for me, yet." And then they did. I became a real writer then. I was vindicated, elated, inflated, upgraded, and creatively created. I called myself "Po Boy Views" (and it stuck). The pay wasn't great, but being paid at all made me a legitimate and "real" writer. Hell, I would have paid them.
My first article, if I recall, was about a trip to one of the French Quarter's chocolate shops, and my love of the product consumed surreptitiously like a criminal in a darkened alley. Looking back on that article (yes, I've saved them all), I've come to believe that I have come a long way as a real writer and after three hundred something pieces, you would hope that I have. I must be doing okay because Where Y'at has kept me, and even sends me assignments. For that I am and will remain eternally grateful. They even still invite me to the Christmas party.
Come to think of it, Josh has been with me, and Where Y'at has been my only constant (except, of course Debbie) all these years. I've been through cars, jobs, living places, critters, loved ones, computers, storms, floods, and the mugging I experienced on Dumaine Street. Throughout life's ups and downs and downs and ups and all those things that altar and illuminate my life, Where Y'at still calls and reminds me that another deadline is looming, another writer's picks and/or meeting, that extra Jazz Fest article is due, and would you mind doing a piece on the thus and such?
Of course, I'm twenty-five years older now, and it gives me great comfort to say that so is Josh Danzig, my once and future head honcho. We've weathered our separate storms together, and we're here to celebrate the silver anniversary of that tie that binds us. Sure, it's a little corny, but, hey, when you look back over this amount of time in terms of teeth cleanings, child raising, gasoline fill ups, holidays spent, showers, and baths and, holy sh!t, it's a BFD.
Naturally speaking, our city has gone through twenty-five years of growing pains as well. You would think after three hundred and something years that New Orleans would have settled into some kind of adulthood, but no. Twenty-five years ago, Marc Morial was re-elected to a second term as mayor of New Orleans. He was a mere forty years old and a Democrat (in fact all our mayors have been Democrats since 1872). Look how far we've come (or haven't) since then.
And then look how far Where Y'at has come. The difference being that our city was built and fashioned on the rough and tumble greed and avarice, brutality and wantonness, slander, and spalling slather played by a second line marching band to the raucous tunes of "Nearer My God To Thee," "Down By The Riverside," "Little Liza Jane," and "Hey Pocky Way," and for twenty-five years, Where Y'at has stood by this city and pointed out the good, positive, and celebratory aspects that keep our populous sane and sanguine.
Conversely, Where Y'at was fashioned and has built on optimism, fair play, team spirit, frozen daiquiris and pizza, a noble and worthy foundation. I am amazed by each issue. After twenty-five years, each issue is stand alone and new. I am amazed each month that collectively we writers, contributors, editors, and interns have put together another issue that is informative, entertaining and exciting. And I am completely amazed that, after twenty-five years, I am still in the pages every month, writing pretty much whatever comes out of my brain and onto the keyboard, sharing another thousand words about life, the universe and everything. What a long, strange trip it's been. Thank you Josh and everyone for having me.
Spiritual Growth
How many things in my/your/our everyday life conspire—yes conspire—to keep us from obtaining spiritual growth, peace, harmony, and all the other crap that it will take for us to be able to settle damn down and be simply "happy." It's like a conspiracy: from your phone alarm thinking that it's tomorrow (or yesterday), to spell-check thinking you said f**k instead of flock, or your phone fielding a call from someone who wants to give your car "one more chance to renew its service warranty," or the password that you've been using for six years being deemed invalid, so you need a new one with twelve or more letters including, but not limited to: "one upper case, one lower case, one numerical symbol, one weird at the top of the keyboard symbol, one of your pet's names, the numerical equivalent of the last blood pressure that you had taken, and your mother's maiden name" (now, "prove that you're not a robot by picking out the telephone poles in this photo").
You misplace your car keys, your Amazon package is porch lifted, you get a notice for jury duty, your favorite place to get coffee is closed (suddenly) on Mondays, and your new route to work includes three School Zones and two construction detours. Is the universe really trying to piss you off? Yes, it is.
Listen, the entire universe is locked in a battle of good against evil; it's beside the point that evil is kicking our asses. We, as heroes, are being distracted from joining the struggle by forces that continue to distract us from participating in the conflict. Your landlord is selling the house that you've been renting, the air conditioning in the car just quit, your co-worker just came down with COVID, and/or your actions at work have now been considered "micro-aggressive" because you called someone an "a-hole" (because they are), and you've been sent by HR to a "sensitivity training" seminar.
In the normal, dysfunctional world, the way things work is that the boss gives the man a bad time, the man comes home and gives the wife grief, she then takes it out on the kid, the kid kicks the dog, and the dog bites a neighbor (me). The universe works the same way, but you're above that—you've found a 'happy place" that helps you to reconnect with your center—your spirit, your calm, your patience.
There's conflict in the world: there's war, real people are dying and displaced, and there's hunger, disease, disruption, and despair. People are hurting, evil rides rampant, children are being gunned down, the government doesn't care to, or is just too impotent to act. Hunger, injustice, civil liberties, and so-called rights are being trampled on, and unnatural disasters that are mowing down people's lives and property have become commonplace—global frickin' warming. Name it, we got it.
We've had a choice, and we've taken it. We can take mud up to our chins and, then, either swallow it or spit it out, and we've chosen to spit it out. We speak out, we vote, we act out, and we're vocal in our views. We have values. Evil does not care. Peace, love, and understanding are fodder to be mowed down like the idealists before us, to be worn down, to be tested and bested. What do we do? We recharge and move the needle forward.
Everyone who believes in freedom and justice needs to recharge. My advice is to find your happy place and visit as often as possible. Early on, my happy place was wearing myself out with drugs, alcohol, and rocking 'n' rolling until I couldn't see straight. But one quiet night, in a strange place, I looked up and saw a sky full of stars and found a real "happy place." Now, when I feel disconnected from my patience and peace, I go to one of my happy places. I realize that I will never solve the world's challenges and can only do my small part by being a good person, an example, and a revolution/evolution of one.
A happy place is not a place of distraction; it is a place where you find peace and strength within yourself returning to its normal high functioning level. Here are a few examples:
Take a long walk or hike, by yourself; speak to no one. Read a book about some protagonist's adventures—one who uses wit to overcome malice. Go sit under a tree. Go for a swim. Make a pot of spaghetti sauce (enough for twelve). Go to a big store and peruse the aisles and wonder at the things people buy. Put on some quiet music and listen or sit still, let the crazy horses' band of thoughts gallop wildly until they're exhausted. Get down on your hands and knees and visit the small flowers that grow unnoticed. Watch bees and butterflies. Commune with your cat. Roam a museum and don't analyze the works found there—just enjoy looking. Go to a coffee house where you know nobody and have a tasty pastry. Take a nap. Recharge.
Sound simple? It's not. Most times we're being knocked about like a pinball in an arcade game, and it almost becomes reflex to keep thinking on our feet, nose to the grindstone, shoulder to the wheel, tacking into the wind, racing with the rats, and runnin' with the devil. Go easy on yourself and everything will get done eventually. Concentrate your energy on the challenge of the moment. Namaste and all that nonsense, and, as Mister Natural says, "keep your sunny side up."
Imagine or Eleanor's Charlie
We moved to a street shaded by cypress and sycamore trees and were happy. She especially loved the big cypresses, and, as a present, I sent for a wee sapling as a loving gift. She named it Charlie. Charlie grew strong and tall and outgrew pots and was a fine specimen of a tree. We gave Charlie the largest pot that we could find. When we went to move him, we found that he had grown through the bottom of the previous pot and his tap root had to be amputated to get him out of the ground.
We transplanted Charlie into a big corrugated metal can and, pretty quick, he went into shock and appeared disheartened and lifeless. There were other plants growing in the can—onions, some ivy, and one of the towering sycamores had dropped a seed which appeared to sprout nicely. As winter approached and Charlie was bare and unresponsive, we decided to leave him in the big can and hope for the best after vacillating whether to cut him down completely.
We had become attached to Charlie, and Debbie promised the comatose tree that, should he rise again, she would find a forever place for him to be planted in the ground where he could grow as much as he wanted—forever. Meanwhile, the fledgling sycamore that we named Eleanor, who had grown into a young thing right next to the dispirited Charlie, had shed her leaves right on time for her winter nap, so we had two sticks side-by-side in a can until spring.
Spring came and Eleanor woke up and wondered about Charlie. Their roots had grown close, and she had sensed life there. They had dreamed their tree dreams all winter until it was time to re-leaf in the spring and to show off their new growths above ground, but Charlie had not evidenced one sign of life. He was stubborn and hurt and didn't trust this thing called life. In short, Charlie refused to wake up. Eleanor, the sycamore, awoke and urged the traumatized little cypress to give living another shot, and, slowly, Charlie tentatively sent some juice up to see what could be done about going green again.
"Look! Oh! look, look, look. There's a little green sprout coming out of Charlie's trunk. I believe he's still alive." And Charlie did come back—stunted but alive. Short, round Charlie and tall, thin Eleanor grew beside each other and they got along just fine in their big metal can (with the ivy and the onions) and even made the trip when we moved to a bigger house last winter with a place in the back to fulfill our promise to Charlie for his forever planting spot. "But what about Eleanor?"
"Should we separate them? Can we get them out of the can? Can I bust up that concrete in the back for a big enough hole?" We found a place in the back with suitable sun and shade, but we decided not to split up the pair that we had anthropomorphically deemed a campus couple. They were both half asleep and barely waking as I borrowed a sledge hammer and had at it, through two layers of concrete and one layer of hundred-year-old brick (which I saved) to make a hole big enough for the pair.
It took some hours of manual labor to accomplish their new and forever home and we bipeds both pushed and pulled on their trunks to free them from their now cramped quarters in the metal container, but out they came in a rush of soil and debris, knocking me on my rear in the detritus of my efforts.
We dropped them into their forever (we believe) home and shoveled earth and broken concrete to secure them, and there they stood like a sleepy groom with his barely dressed partner (and the ivy and onions, who hadn't slept a wink all winter). We waited to see if we had traumatized them terminally, and a few days later, when we went to check on them, there they were, loud and proud, getting all dressed up for Spring.
Judiciously, we left the pair their privacy to adjust to the new year (spring is a tree's New Year, you know) and allowed Mother Nature to water and warm them.
Now, if you're the kind of biped that sees life and love in all things, if you'd go to the pet store and purchase crickets just to set them free, you open your car window to let that errant winged intruder escape, you're the type of biped that catches a spider in your house with a paper cup and sheet of paper and sets them outdoors, or even the type that lets weeds grow around your yard for the bees and butterflies, we just might have a chance to save the world.
This is just the type of naïve kindnesses that have a tendency to expand exponentially. The next thing you know, you might be volunteering to feed the poor or run errands for a geezer, pick up some litter on your street, or even start taking better care of yourself and your loved ones.
By the way, Charlie didn't regain use of his upper branches but blossoms nicely around Eleanor's waist and lower limbs (they look precious together, I can't wait to see if they have babies). She smiles down upon him, and I swear I heard him tell her, "It's better to have loved a short cypress than to never have loved a tall." Mother Nature and Father Time are now in charge.
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Oui Chef
Or
Big 'C' little 'c'
Breakfast for 40, lunch for 60, sit down dinner for 100, cocktails for 180. Another double digit shift.
Manager: "Great job Chef!"
Chef: "Thanks, I'm only as good as my last meal."
As good as your last meal—that's something that every chef knows by heart, from hotel to hostel, fine dining to food truck, one-man kitchen to leader of a brigade of cooks. As with any player, you're only as good as your last performance. Aspire to lead the band in Kingdom Chef? Good luck.
Here's the secret: As a chef, you picture yourself in the center of five dimensions of activity: did the trash go out, did the delivery come in, are we prepped up for lunch, did the dishwasher show up, are the linens in, are the ovens fired up, did the salesman call, where's the fish, what's the dinner special, what's our food cost, answer the phone and find out what they want, close that door—were you born in a barn, where're my glasses, and I need more coffee. All this as you walk from point A to point B (picking up a piece of trash and checking the garbage can for any stray flatware that's been inadvertently tossed).
You cannot learn this in school. You cannot graduate from an institution and step into these shoes. It's a mania. You've got to be crazy or inspired, driven, passionate, power hungry, concerned, conceited, getting a piece of the action, or just the only one who can and wants to do the job. Talent has nothing to do with it. You're flexing your experience and ability to get things done to your satisfaction and to the satisfaction of the people who are certainly paying you less than you deserve. And your audience expects your best every meal, every shift, every day—without fail. You're the chef. Get it done. End of story.
That's the way it is, and that's the way it's always been, back to the building of the pyramids, aboard Noah's Ark, the Last Supper, Madame Begue, Tujaques, Antoine Alciatore, or any of the myriad of kitchen chiefs that made our city a destination for satisfying meals going back hundreds of years.
For every known chef, there are hundreds and thousands that toil in obscurity in the dust, the smoke, the heat and the sweat—keeping kitchens (as they say) in line and on time. This country has known many of these heroes and other countries have known many more; however, New Orleans has the best unknown and known hero chefs in the universe. Our food and our chefs are second to none.
I rate a person's chefness in martial arts criteria. First, a chef does not call themselves a chef (although other people may). They know that a chef knows and is all things—perfection—and having realized that it will take a lifetime to achieve that level of chef-ness, never stops accelerating. A chef that wants to be a chef is constantly moving toward that point of macroevolution, however nebulous.
Consider New Orleans chefs you probably never heard of. Consider getting a book called Creole Feast by Nathaniel Burton and Rudy Lombard. Learn about chefs that worked with no notoriety for thirty and forty years because that's what a working person does in this business. Consider someone starting as a dishwasher and working to the top position because that's just what some people did. They have that mystical "work ethic" we hear about. This is before the advent of the celebrity chef that goes on television, writes books, and does a circuit of appearances. These are chefs that don't call in sick, don't take PTO (personal time off), and can (and do/will) work every station in the kitchen.
Consider the chefs that you know and have heard about: Paul Prudhomme, Leah Chase, Jamie Shannon, Austin Leslie, Buster Holmes, Warren LeRuth, Willie Mae Seaton, and Milton Prudence.
Consider the chefs that are still doing their shifts: the heavyweights Frank Brigtsen and Susan Spicer, and Nina Compton, Greg Sonnier, Melissa Martin, Erik Veney, and a hundred more. The U. S. Bureau of Labor Statistics estimates that there are roughly 146,000 chefs in this country, and they're all out there not about to participate in Restaurant Week or trade shows or television spots because they're in the kitchen making sure that the customer with a dietary restriction isn't being killed by their food and wondering if the produce has arrived and who checked it in.
Indeed.com touts that there are currently 162 chefs jobs available in New Orleans, so, there is a market out there for you to tap into if you're willing to step into that position.
I am a working chef, and my resume is longer than the Gettysburg Address. I do not plan on retiring. For me, the calling came, a mentor excited me, a passion grew, and still grows. Salary.com estimates that the average chef's salary in New Orleans is about 50K, and that's not a bunch of money, considering all that is asked for that position. So the chefs here that are employed aren't necessarily doing it for the bucks. Obviously it's for the—what?
Silly you, obviously it's for you and it's for me as well. It's our romance, our relationship, and my lifestyle choice to be your chef.
I found when I visited other countries how everyone seemed to be happy being the person that they are. I adopted that outlook in my life, and it has me more relaxed. I don't want to be president, the leader of a corporation, a rich fat cat, or even Mick frickin' Jagger (maybe Keith though). I'm happiest being me on my journey, feeding people, and getting them some satisfaction. May the same blessing occur to you.
Radio Relic or Radar Love
"Today's music ain't got the same soul: I like that old time rock and roll." Bob Seeger
Okay, okay, you got your Jazz Fest. I've got my Jazz fest—it's an awakening, it's recharging, it's a freaking cathartic epiphany for chrissake. I'm with ya, I smell ya, I got the fever too; however, when it's done and the tents have been struck and the magic turns into miasma. Whatcha got to get you through the tough parts here? OhhZee? Sure, but in rush hour traffic, or getting to work at dawn's crack, or dodging those light runners, lane changers and speed demons that inhabit our roads, I need something other than Jazz and Heritage.
No disrespect to the Guardians of the Groove, but when I'm working long and hard, hand-eyed coordinated and in a zone where no man has gone before, I need to hear Aretha demanding some R.E.S.P.E.C.T. or Mavis countering with "Respect Yourself," Stevie talking to his part-time love, Elton doin' the crocodile rock, and/or songs from the seventies that I can sing along with. Steve Miller is a joker, a smoker, and a midnight toker who gets his lovin' on the run, while Stealers Wheel is "Stuck in the Middle with You," the Eagles are takin' it to the limit (maybe to the Hotel California), the Kinks are trying to get away from Lola, and Paul McCartney wants to "Let it Be," while Paul Simon continues as a boxer on a "Bridge Over Troubled Waters."
E.L.O. can't get her out of my head, Marvin Gaye wants to "(Let's) Get it On," Al Green want to "(Let's) Stay Together" and the Staple Singers want to "(Let's ) Do It Again," and I say (let's) turn the radio louder and sing like Joe Cocker or the O Jays, the Bee Gees, Queen, Spinners, Buckinghams, CCR, CSN&Y, BTO, MLRB, and ABBA, or Barry White, the Who, Fleetwood Mac, and Santana—Janis, Jimi, Joni and Jim and hundreds, yes hundreds, more who led a counterculture of musical revolutionaries through their day—back in the day. Jeff Beck, Peter Green, Eric Clapton, Janis Ian, and Suite: Judy Blue Eyes.
This music came before social media, laptops, flat screens, cell phones, MP3s, and personal computers. Vinyl records played on turntables until they were worn out. Tapestry, The Dark Side of the Moon, Songs in the Key of Life, Blood on the Tracks, Rumours, Rastaman Vibration, What's Goin' On, Exile on Main Street, The White Album, In the Court of the Crimson King, Workingman's Dead, Trout Mask Replica, Paradise and Lunch. Eat a Peach, Tommy, Hair, and Jesus Christ Superstar—Sly and the Family Stone, the Temptations, Linda Ronstadt, and The Brothers Johnson.
Your Gramps had a ponytail and a pierced ear, and grandma wore bell bottoms and no bra. We had outdoor rock concerts and rainbow gatherings (besides Woodstock). We had bands playing for free in public parks, and we pissed off our elders, and let our kids go naked. And now you (and I) have the New Orleans Jazz and Heritage Festival where they, each year, pay homage to the music that we all love. It's sights and sounds that I attend every year to get my festival/musical fix; it's my drug of choice, and I am addicted.
However, "[i]f you believe in forever, then life is just a one night stand / [i]f there's a rock and roll Heaven, well, you know, they've got a hell of a band" (Righteous Brothers), and that's what grooves me the rest of the year—Dr John's album Gumbo (1972), The Wild Tchoupitoulas (1976), and Professor Longhair's Rock and Roll Gumbo (1974).There's Allen Toussaint, Irma Thomas, Ellis Marsalis (who I first saw playing on Bourbon Street), the Radiators, Little Queenie, and the Percolators.
Yes, I'm a WTIX listener (so are Will and Lenny, the Mechanic Gods that keep my '97 Lincoln Towncar running smoothly), and, sure, I have to hear commercials for pasta sauces, buttburgers, pest control companies, and restaurants that I'll probably never go to. I know the patter of the DJs and kinda hear news and weather because I generally tune out most everything except the music. The music brings back simpler times when I can't even remember how I paid the rent, much less where I was until I hear a song like "Radar Love," "Tumbling Dice," or "Fool (If You Think It's Over)." I do recall, with the help of those oldies (but goodies) that it was a time of (relative) innocence and a time of (complete) confidence.
That's what these days should be like for you, and that is what I wish for you as you go to Jazz Fest. You should look back on these days with a smile; they are so similar in many ways. We stood on the shoulders of the music that came before us, and we believed in human rights. We fought hatred, and we believed in saving the planet for our children. We were against war and greed. I still believe we can make life and living a more positive experience. I also believe we can make a difference, especially when I hear Otis Redding telling me that all I have to do is "try a little tenderness."
So have a time at the Fest. I know that I will. Have the time of your life. I know that I will. Go forth, have fun, be kind to your web-footed friends, 'cause the duck may be somebody's mother.
Storyville or Love For Sale
Brothels, houses of ill repute, cat-houses, whore houses, bordellos, red-light districts, comfort parlors, and sporting palaces, however you refer to them, they are places where you go and pay someone to have sex with you.
Generally speaking, it's men who go to get their rocks off, their jollies, their load lightened, and get laid. Women hire gigolos and pamper cabana boys. Men pay whores. The oldest profession is also the oldest systematic subjugation. Prostitutes are people that give sexual comfort and take money for that service (we won't talk about sluts like me that give it away for free).
Post Civil War, New Orleans was rife with mischief of all kinds: gambling, drinking, carousing, dancing, loud music, violence, mayhem, manslaughter, and, of course, all the sex you could afford to pray or pay for. Some folks here still call then the good ol' days, and some claim that not much has really changed.
Back then, we were truly a seaport river town with cargo and waterfronts and seamen from foreign climes, boatmen from up river, local raconteurs, rapscallions, ruffians, and roustabouts were all looking for a way to blow off steam. They didn't have to go far to find it, and it created a city whose atmosphere was definitely not Christian-like, to say the very least.
That particular New Orleans became notoriously definitive as a place to "do whatcha wanna." It was known as a "Sin City," where shenanigans were a participatory sport, a tourist attraction, and an economic engine. Tops among these attractions were the "women notoriously abandoned to lewdness."
However, in 1897, a City Alderman named Sidney Story came up with a unique and clever idea: What if we made all that misbehaving miscreantial mischief legal in one area, one area only, and let the madness be confined and unbridled at the same time? That sounded so good and righteous that it was decreed that thirty-eight blocks (twenty square) above the French Quarter would be set aside for unchecked raucousness and let the games begin. And indeed the games did begin.
Dance halls, gambling dens, vaudeville theaters, restaurants, bars, and fancy and not so fancy sex parlors sprang up. Talent was rounded up and put to work, and a good time was had by all. It was not necessarily a completely safe area but where was?
Names of madams, club owners, sex workers, and gangsters who had risen to the top became household heroes for the whey criminals as examples to aspire to. Great pleasure mansions arose along Basin Street. Lulu White, Josie Arlington, Tom Anderson (the unofficial mayor of Storyville), Willie Piazza, Pete Lala, Frank Early, Joe Victor, and more held sway and influence.
The district had borders from off Canal Street (Iberville) to Saint Louis Cemetery No. 1, and from Basin Street to North Robinson, but these were by no means the only pits of vice. Sanctity Row, Gallatin Alley (where the French Market is now), and the infamous Tango Belt and French Town (from Dauphine Street to Rampart, from Bienville to Saint Louis streets) operated as much rougher, less discerning, and more affordable alternatives. Even into the twenty-first century, houses of ill repute still functioned.
The book The Last Madam by Chris Wiltz describes Norma Wallace's place in the 1960s history and legends of New Orleans pleasure characters. Jeanette Maier opened her brothel on Canal Street in 1999. And so it goes.
Storyville operated with its own brand of law outside the law, even having its own published directory, The Blue Book, which gave locations and attributes of businesses and personas that functioned in that district. Storyville was also near New Orleans' own Chinatown which contributed to other trades of opium and take-out food (not kidding).
More importantly, there was music. Using our current Bourbon Street scene, what better way to draw customers to your place of frolic than to have music wafting through your doors? That idea is not new. In Storyville, there was so much music that music became a competition. Sure, every place that was pleasure-oriented had a piano player (a revered professor), and the more highfalutin the place, the more ambitious the music scene. Bands became an attraction, and the employment level for musicians was high.
Musicians stood to make more money in Storyville than other hot spots around town. Kid Ory, Papa Celestin, King Oliver, Fess Manetta, Buddy Bolden, Sidney Bechet, and Louis Armstrong, among others, explored a new-found freedom of expression in musical duels called "cuttings," and discovering new styles of music, leading to a form called "jass," which eventually became "jazz." I've read about a half a dozen references to the definitive definition; however, the term to me just means "jazz."
1915 saw the reopening of the U.S. Naval base, and because of World War I, there was a lot of new trade for Storyville; however, it was short-lived. The military regulations prohibited such entertainment within five miles of a base and rather than lose the war, the federal government ordered Storyville closed down in 1917, and the city under duress acquiesced.
But I ask you, do we really ever stop people that seek adolescent enjoyment from engaging in risky business or do we just send those pastimes into the shadows? Does making something illegal that people take pleasure in ever work? Does the razing of Storyville, the destruction of our Chinatown, the 610 overpass, the demolition of neighborhoods in the name of "eminent domain," really make us "the land of the free and the home of the brave," or is that just another way of "Big Brother" ruining our fun, security and well being? Or does the common man (of which I am one) simply view "last call" in a bar (or other interferences) as an affront to my rights as a person just trying to have a good time and hurting no one?
Culinary Trinity or Aroma Anchors
The closest "Culinary Buddha" Louisiana's cooking has ever had was a Chef named Paul Prudhomme, who dispatched wisdom, passion, and a world of flavors to the known world in his lifetime and beyond. Gate Gate Parasamgate Bodhi Svaha (gone on to the further shore of enlightenment).
As a guru, he taught us many things: that water tastes better when you drink it from your hands, how the magic of our food here is "twelve ingredients done twenty different ways," how it's okay to burn (blacken) your food, and how onions, celery, and bell peppers are the "holy trinity" of our cooking ingredients (with garlic as the Pope). Also, rumor has it, he was quoted as saying that "food is not adequately seasoned unless it hurts to eat it."
Having three bedrock ingredients (or trinities) are not unusual: Spanish Cuisine has sofritto (tomatoes, peppers, and onions), the French have their mirepoix (onions, celery, and carrots), Greece, China, Italy, and India cooking all have a 'trinity' of sorts.
Define this 'trinity' thing? Consider it a recurrent flavor combination—a center of gravity in profile cooking. Even barbecue, with its myriad of interpretations has a 'trinity' of its own (pepper, vinegar, smoke).
So let's examine this Creole/Cajun trinity thing—what we know and what we don't know. Onions came over on the Mayflower. Garlic came up from the Southwest via Spanish Conquistadors. Peppers are native to the Americas, and that brings us into the seventeenth century. And now there's the question of celery. Culinary celery probably began being cultivated in Italy and France in the 1600s. Before that it was used medicinally. Celery was farmed commercially in the late 1800s in the north (Kalamazoo, Michigan), and it grows in cooler climates, as do carrots.
And somehow, all of these forces came together in Southern Louisiana as the foundation of all that is considered to be present in our cooking-—our defining culinary personality. When did this happen? Were they all out hitchhiking across the country and wound up in Louisiana together? Did they meet in a bar and start hanging out?
In perusing the Picayune Creole Cookbook, originally published in 1901, there is little mention of celery or bell peppers—certainly none in nine different gumbos, three jambalayas or even their Creole sauce recipe. Celery is used as a vegetable and in boiled shrimp and/or boiled crab, a lot is used to season the water used to cook. Certainly Cajuns who lived off the land most likely couldn't afford the luxury of celery until middle twentieth century.
We know the French settlers in Louisiana may have been used to their mirepoix but likely would have had to get carrots from the north. Celery may have come down during the Civil War and possibly been grown here in the cooler months of November-December, but then what?
Logic tells us that without adequate refrigeration, only what could be grown and harvested in season and in proximity would make its way into our pots—onions, peppers (both mild and hot), parsley, watercress, and greens come to mind. Creoles would have had herbs as well: thyme, oregano, and bay leaves. Cajuns had all that and swamp insects, which deprived them of ingredients like tomatoes and wheat flour.
In the 1960s, when I migrated here, the "seasoning vegetables" (that which we now call the 'trinity') was ensconced in the local cooking. Celery was readily available as were potatoes (sweet and Irish), cabbage, carrots, onions, tomatoes, peppers, and little else as far as fresh vegetable staples went. There was plenty of fruit: avocados, pineapples, and bananas. Fruits and vegetables in season came and went. And coffee (and chicory)… lots of coffee.
At that time, the French Market was servicing over 3,000 people a day. There were meat markets and fresh seafood stalls along Decatur Street where tourists now shop for made-in-China souvenirs. There was a big super market just outside the Quarter (Schwegmann's) that had, inside, a pharmacy, savings bank and a bar. Outside, they pumped gas for your car if you had one (lots of folks didn't). It was a blue collar world then, and you could listen to the women as they made their groceries discussing what noodles to put in the Ya Ka Mein—whether to put pickle meat in their beans or: "First I make me my roux, good and brown, then I add me my seasoning vegi-tables, then my okree, crabs and swimps." I miss those days.
Then the oil jobs moved to Houston, the shipping industry went to deeper ports, the bohemians were replaced by hippies and the whole culcha went to pot. Spanish sailor bars and Greek belly dancing joints started closing and just when it looked its worst for us. The tourists came like locusts and bailed us out. Ella Brennan bought Commanders Palace and took a chance on trading a German chef for a Cajun named Paul Prudhomme and suddenly we have a 'trinity' of vegetables.
It's a good thing we didn't have an HR back then, or they might have said that comparing the Father, Son and Holy Spirit to an onion, celery, and bell pepper motif was religiously derogatory—especially if you libel the Blessed Pope (who lives in Rome) to a head of garlic. We're all gonna burn in Hell like a blackened red fish left too long in the pan.
In conclusion, the only thing that we know about the 'trinity' is that the combination occurred before the name was given, and once the name was given, it stuck like a cheap suit on a used car salesman, like ugly on an ape, like white on rice.
Come to think about it, here's the next thing to ponder If a machine that polished rice into those little non-nutritional specks we consume didn't occur until the late 1800s (1861, Sampson Moore), did the original settlers here eat brown rice with their red beans?
Love and Death or M*A*S*H
Humor me. Think about yourself and your life as a pair of lovers (even if it's just you and yourself) holding hands and walking through Armageddon, seeing each other in each other's eyes, and picking your way through the rubble of destroyed buildings and broken bodies, heedless of cries for help and succor, as you make your way to sanctuary—a place to make gentle love. Life is like that if you're lucky enough to see the turmoil happening around you from an unscathed vantage point. Happy Valentine's Day. You deserve it.
Death and destruction around us is viewed either subjectively or objectively, and we can watch and read the news of hell on earth and either be touched deeply by it or be impatient for the next feel good story. We can be callous because of our need for self protection. No one needs to be empathetic and live. That much pain would be unbearable.
Oh, we're not apathetic, by any means. It's called psychic numbing. Why We Love Dogs, Eat Pigs and Wear Cows (Melanie Joy, Ph.D.) cites that our system works this way. We love animals (insert people), and we don't want to see them suffer. We have three choices (insert when we witness or participate in misery and/or cruelty). We can change our values to match our behavior, change our behavior to match our values, or we can change our perceptions of our behavior so that we appear to match our values. The third option is the way our system works when we can love on our pets but allow ourselves to rationalize forty million turkeys being slaughtered for our holiday dinners.
I've been watching a lot of M*A*S*H lately; actually I've just finished all of the eleven seasons. I've taken away two things from M*A*S*H besides the terrific acting. One is that Hawkeye, Radar, Klinger, and Hot Lips (and the rest of the cast) are some funny, funny people. The second is that the underscoring their antics from virtually the first episode is they view the war as senseless, but their view cannot stop the bodies that continually wind up coming in, necessitating them to repair them (when they can), and, if they're well enough, send these unfortunates back to fight in this senseless war. All through the mud and the blood and the beer, there's the senseless war.
That's what we have here.
People are dying senselessly all around us, and we, as individuals, can do nothing to stop this from occurring and continuing; paying attention to this only brings me a feeling of impotence, yet I cannot turn away. It's like watching a train wreck in slow motion.
Here's a quick quiz. I'll give you the situation, and you fill out the location:
Starvation in ___? War in_____? Hurricane____? Earthquake___? Tornados___? Environmental disasters ___? Mass shootings____ ? Homelessness ___? Poverty ___? Prejudice ___? Greed?
That last one's a ringer and the answer to that one is "everywhere." You might consider that some of the conditions of those other quiz questions can be due to greed.
It works due to your greedy politicians being given campaign money by a greedy polluter, manufacturer, real estate developer, and/or power-hungry wealthy donor. The politicos use that money to further their ambitions for power (a type of greed) while getting legislations passed that perpetuate the businesses and ambitions of the donors and/or turn a blind eye on their inhumanity, or, simply put, money talks.
Who takes it in the shorts? The answer to that is really simple—the whole world. What can we do about it? Nothing. It's too overwhelming. It's frigging crushing to even think about it. How do we, as a society, create enough Mackenzie Scotts to counteract all of the you-know-who's?
Well, Hawkeye Pierce and B.J. Hunnicut would know the answer: be kind, sarcastic, a pain in the ass, and complain, point out discrepancies in the system, and refuse to participate in its inequities, as well as vote, get involved, do something useful for no reward or recognition, and pay attention. Be better.
Sure, on M*A*S*H most everybody's getting laid (or trying to), playing practical jokes on each other, getting drunk, eating lousy food, and living in lousy conditions, but, in spite of all that, when the wounded come in and the broken bodies get to the operating room, there's no monkeying around. It's all business. That's another lesson to learn—put people's welfare and wellness ahead of our selfish convenience. Which would you rather see: a pig drinking beer or a hog getting its throat cut (or a dog, a horse, or a person)?
Valentine's for me is not only a celebration of love, but a time for pre-spring evaluation of my habits and behavior. Say what you want about January 1st, my new year starts with the Vernal Equinox (that's my story and I'm stickin' with it). So I think this year I'll adopt the Hippocratic tradition and think of myself as a person who will conduct their life by "[f]irst, do no harm," and second, refusing to support anyone who does harm.
That's a tall order and a noble thought. It's gonna take a lot of will power and strength. Therefore, I will go to another source of courage, fortitude, wisdom, and instruction. I am now committing myself to watching all the episodes of Golden Girls. After that maybe Frank's Place, and then maybe Will and Grace and so on.
A joyous Valentine's to you. May you, by day, enjoy nature and, by night, take life lessons from Sophia Petrillo.
Hope Fiend Or I Don't Get It
"Breaking away to the other side.
I wanna make sense of why we live and die.
I don't get it. I don't get it."
Cowboy Junkies "I Don't Get It"
When I hear that, my mind also wails, twenty-two percent of the time or 4.5%.
We've become a society of facts, figures, and statistics adrift, seeking to find a foothold in our collective semi-conscious mental states of ennui: 45 million people affected by a cold front; 50% chance of an earthquake; Senator Fancy Pants has an approval rating of 42%; the interest rate has gone up again ¾ of a point; Aaron Judge (Jersey #99) hits home run number 62 this season (making 220 career) and makes history, but Barry Bonds (#s 24, 25) still holds the record of 762; the Dow Jones has slipped; the S&P has fallen; "and the race is on and here comes pride on the outside."
Somalia car bomb kills 100, wounds 400; Seoul, Korea stampede kills 150 injures hundreds; a bridge collapses in India and kills 141; the Palestinians fight the Jews—16 dead; Ukraine staves off another invasion and people are dying by the thousands; a gunman opens fire in an elementary school and slaughters in double digits; millions are starving in Africa; and hurricane Ian is the hardest to hit Florida since 1935.
And we head into 2023 with the same hope as 2022: "Dear Lord, please make this a better year," as the Devil chuckles.
The Book of Revelations lists the Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse as Conquest, War, Famine, and Death. It seems that there is a Fifth Horseman. It is us, and, for no apparent reason, we still hope for better times. Sometimes it makes me want to throw up. The odds are against us—eight to five and climbing.
Buddha's brain wants us to practice the science of happiness, peace, and wisdom, and still we raise animals to slaughter. We poison our bodies, minds, and environment. We send our children into harm's way and for no apparent reason, we hope for the best in our lives and for our loved ones. I don't get it.
We believe and follow leaders that only serve themselves, and the highest bidders keep them in office by voting for the loudest voice, or someone who talks as smooth as cream cheese on a bagel. We know the names of the players on our local football team better than those of our representatives in congress. Our attention span and reading levels are—what was I gonna say?
Oh! just this: We're acting like we're stupid, and we know it.
Renouncing ego seems the way to go; however, in this dog-eat-dog rat race, where we work like beavers just to keep our head above water, when we're up to our asses in alligators, it's hard to remember that our goal was to join in the Peace River Freedom Swim.
Whiskey Tango Foxtrot? What's to keep us from going emotionally comatose when it all seems to be an uphill battle? How are we to maintain a positive outlook on life? Hope.
Hope; the way we view life, the universe, and everything; not taking our quality of life for granted is how. Realizing that everything is relative like the sun, the moon, and the stars, and how we react to a beautiful sunset or the tiniest of flowers could possibly bring about world peace.
Some wise guy said, "I will tell you the truth. Unless you change and become like little children, you will never enter the Kingdom of Heaven," implying that the way that we're living should not be our default state. Chew on that for a moment.
Here's the point: In the quest to relieve the adverse effects that bring about disappointment, disillusionment, heartache, misery, and soul-sucking pain in our lives because of greed and ego, we collectively are advised to follow these three simple steps to achieve a happy and forever existence: right thought, right speech, and right action (a practical guideline for ethical and mental development designed to free us from attachments and delusions).
Think about it: If you don't have anything good to say, shut the pie hole, swallow that negativity, and, eventually, you'll begin to stop your negative thoughts (not as simple as it sounds, and it takes a lot of practice). Once you've gone beyond keeping your mouth shut and follow up with thinking pleasanter thoughts, you'll find your outlook on life changing and indeed—your very life and actions.
Listen, you don't just wake up with a hangover, in a strange bed, with a three-legged dog, an empty bourbon bottle, and a mouth that tastes like a garbage truck has emptied itself on you with your tongue asleep, itchy teeth, and remembering that, not only are you still living with your mother, but you vaguely recall calling up your employer last night and telling them to stick your job and salary where the sun don't shine. When that happens to you, you may want to consider the concept of cause and effect.
You don't just happen to wake up naked across the hood of your car with the ignition key stuck in your butt without it. These situations start somewhere. The exact wrong decision that you've made before but refused to learn from because you didn't think, thought that it was gonna be fun, or this time you hoped the outcome would be different.
You don't get it, do you? Hope is not enough. It's 2023, folks. It's time to wake ourselves, and the world, up and get our act together. Because this world, with you in it, is going to hell in a handbasket, and no one can save it but you (and you, and you, and me). Get it? Got it? Good.
I Restauranti Morti or Dead Cafés
March 11, 2020, the World Health Organization declared COVID-19 the disease caused by the SARS-CoV-2 a pandemic. On March 15, 2020, states began to implement shutdowns in order to prevent the spread. The shutdowns included schools, commerce, the service industry, trade, and other retail businesses considered "inessential". About two years later, one million Americans were dead and so was food and beverage ("from farm to tombstone", as they say). In the country in general and in New Orleans specifically, the thin line between effort and reward was quickly erased.
Immediately, if not sooner, the government began a program called the Pandemic Unemployment Assistance, The American Rescue Plan Coronavirus Aid, Relief and Economic Security Act, which put money into the pockets of workers affected by not having any work to go to. Forty-three agencies took part in giving nearly $4 trillion to keep folks in food, clothing, and shelter. The Paycheck Protection Program gave away no-cost loans to "essential" businesses that needed to remain open so that folks could spend that gravy from the government train. Unfortunately, with the pandemic worldwide, the supply chain came off the rails and "essential" goods and services came to a standstill along with wholesale household, food, electronic, and repair supplies. Rent, mortgage, insurance, and utility bills did keep coming and restaurants in New Orleans fell like circus clowns in a mud pool rope-pulling contest.
Just when light appeared at the end of a long dark tunnel, along came Hurricane Ida and every eatery ate dirt. Multiple closings (and re-openings) during erratic/sporadic COVID lockdown periods took a financial toll everywhere. Some restaurants never got back to their knees, let alone their feet. As one owner put it, "I've reopened, shut down, reopened, and shut down again and lost entire inventories and staff four times, and (sigh) I just can't do it anymore. I'm throwing in the towel."
Some managed to hang on for six or eight months. However, many eateries are not many payrolls away from bankruptcy. Many an entrepreneur will tell you that the best way to go broke is to open a restaurant. The mortality rate is one of the highest of endeavors. For large and (especially) small eateries, the prognosis was obvious: if the supply chain, labor shortages, pandemic restrictions, electrical outages, and spotty trash pickups didn't get you, the hurricane (Ida) will take the grim and ironic humor (the usual attitude of a New Orleanian, if there ever was one) out of desperate and hopeless situations. We watched some of our favorite restaurants' tail lights gleam and there wasn't a dry eye in the house; some just walked and others ran away. One owner said it was like watching your childhood dreams die. Yes, it was that bad.
People who did not experience Katrina do not get visceral feelings when that subject comes up. Likewise, Newer Orleanians will not wax nostalgic when someone plays that 'ain't dere no more' game: Cake Café, Meauxbar, Emeril's Delmonico, Upperline, Arrow Café, or Saint Charles Tavern.
Some stalwarts tried comebacks. L'il Dizzy's Café on Esplanade died and was reborn, as was Couvant. Kebab on Saint Claude made a go with new ownership. Mimi's in the Marigny is still MIA. The last Semolina finally bit the dust. Nine Roses in the Quarter called it quits on the Eastbank. Nacho Mama's, Sammy's, Polly's, The Bordeaux, The Standard. And you know more than I do, which isn't where it was and ought to be. Kingfish is just gaining ground after its hiatus. Is Mahoney's open yet? It's a shame, sad, and downright unfair for this to happen to us. As they say: "It ain't ought to be like this; it's like being erased."
I've been in New Orleans on and off over 40 years and I can count on all the fingers of the Saints Cheer Krewe how many businesses that served my soul, spirit, and appetite have shut down, closed, but still remain a topic of conversation when like minded friends gather over a glass and recount the food that made us fall in love again and again (and again) with New Orleans.
The good news is that eateries are like phoenixes that rise from ashes, newly transformed for the new days here and ahead. Wide-eyed innocents and business-savvy veterans will take that "FOR RENT" sign down, add a coat of fresh paint, and open a new venture that will face all of the time-worn challenges of their predecessors with the same faith and optimism: Bisutoro, Pomelo, Queen Trini-Lis, Cru, Jamaican Jerk House, Leo's Bakery, Zee's Pizzeria, and Margot's all vying for a place in your favor, attention, and love. And what's not to love?
The sad news is that there will never be another K-Paul's Restaurant, and sadder still is that any of our most welcome newbies will look at us as if we are some kind of weird to be obsessed with recalling flavors and foods that have passed into the otherworld of gestation and olfactory memory. Someday, someone will open a restaurant called Orpheus that will bring back those memorable dishes. Do you remember Buster Holmes' red beans, Kolb's sauerbraten, Morrison's deluxe cornbread pecan dressing, the stuffed pepper and potato salad that came with the chicken platter at Chez Helene, the bread pudding with whiskey sauce at the Bon Ton Café? What was the name of that little place in the French Quarter that served a fried oyster and roast beef with gravy combo po-boy and called it a Bear Sandwich or what was that joint on Broad Street that deep-fried (breaded) their dressed po-boy? You see what I started?
Three things I've learned: cherish (and support) your favorite eateries for they also may fade someday, try new places to add more favorites to your memories, and The Wu Tang Clan ain't nuthin' to @#$%&!* with!
Disambiguation or Unfulfilled Closure
This is not about that 1993 film that starred Bill Murray entitled Groundhog Day, in which he relived the same day over and over and over again. It is about platitudes and the Kleine-Levin Syndrome.
"Pour yourself a drink, put on some lipstick and pull yourself together," Elizabeth Taylor once advised.
Is it telling that we cremate loved ones and put them up on shelves instead of burying them? "So there's good ol' whatshisname (in the box/jar/urn), up there next to the San Marzano canned tomatoes." Or maybe the ashes are "over by the window (the better for them to enjoy the sunrise/set) atop their copy of Kahil Gibran's The Prophet," or perhaps they have their own shelf—an altar, if you will. Possibly, it has a battery-operated, perpetual candle, a bell, a book, maybe some plastic flowers, seashells—a chance for us to grieve in little increments as we get on with our busy life. A chance for us to look back and then a chance to back away and say, "What's done is done."
The alternative, of course, would have been a hole in the ground or an upper berth in a corner mausoleum where we could've wailed, tore our hair, wrent at our clothing, and maybe thrown ourselves despondently on top of the casket before it was lowered (or raised). A visit now and then would be in order. A chat, perhaps some freshening of the site, throw pillows, more flowers, saying, "Boohoo, I miss you," as time marches on.
Face it, nobody's perfect. We're somnambulating through most of our lives and are roused by reminders of what we missed, times we had, and situations we have left unresolved. There are also some that we have buried (or left unburied). And then hellishly, we try to catch up. We wake to find that time has passed, years maybe. The kids have grown, we're no longer young, it was just there the other day, and suddenly, "it ain't dere no more." Who knows where the time goes?
As Harry Chapin once lamented, "The cat's in the cradle and the silver spoon / little boy blue and the man in the moon." We can only do what we can do.
Gurus tell you to "be here now," an alcoholic says, "One day at a time," yogis recommend "meditation and repetition of your mantra," your bartender will tell you to "have another one," your shrink asks, "How you feel about it?" and your family will pose, "What the hell is wrong with you?" Grandma offers cookies. Your BFF takes you to lunch. Meher Baba says, "Don't worry, be happy".
We are so ahead of ourselves that ourselves are the ones left behind. We sometimes meet ourselves coming back from where we were going and may become momentarily discombobulated, flummoxed, and impulse in full power—boomeranged and deranged. I'm so confused that "[t]here's someone in my head but it's not me" makes too much sense (Brain Damage 1973).
Are we asleep at the wheel as life passes us by? Not quite. It's more like we're paying so much attention to the bumps, potholes, road debris, reckless drivers, stop signs, and school zones that it's all detours on our life's highways. So much to do, so little of it getting done and there it all is in the rear view mirror. I'm coming up on things that I need to do now. I'm overloaded, and I need a nap.
Okay, so now let's examine the Kleine-Levin Syndrome, sometimes called the Sleeping Beauty Sickness. It's not common enough to be in our faces, except that it can appear in varying functional degrees. Sleeping 20-22 hours a day—sometimes for weeks, months, and, in some cases, up to a year—getting up to gorge, exercise bodily functions (such as bowel movements and/or increased sexual impulses), while suffering from confusion, befuddlement, anxiousness, sometimes exhibiting violent behavior, and then going back to sleep. At times having to be told what went on in the world and life while unconscious. I posit that there is a distinct possibility that we all have it in some measure.
You close your eyes for a moment. Perhaps you feel like napping in the afternoon. You fall asleep on a bus, in a car, at a movie, and time marches on. Where did you go when the world went on without you? Away? Where is "away," anyway?
When one door closes…
I often think that if I wasn't reminded by the environment and familiarity of people present when I wake in the morning that I wouldn't know who I am, where I am, and what the hell I was doing in this place. Then I rouse, recognize some stuff, and I'm back to being who I am in this reality.
"If happy little bluebirds fly beyond the rainbow why can't I?" Dorothy once asked.
Where do I go in my daydreams, in my nightmares? And there I am remembering that I'm late with a bill or birthday card. As Alice once noted, it's "[c]uriouser and curiouser."
The fact that you don't get to use the limitless potential of your brain and intelligence doesn't mean that it doesn't strive to be used; that goes for your emotions, feelings, and spiritual development. Your brain goes into overdrive and for no apparent reason, you're drained of energy. It's a call to digress, digest, regroup, recharge, relax, but you say, "There's so much more that needs to get done."
I say to go easy on yourself. Sometimes you have to "[d]rink some coffee, put on some gangster rap, and handle it," as Martina Simonova observed. Other times, though, just sit back and let things work themselves out. Remember, this ain't no contest; you're doing better than you think, literally.
"Long you live and high you fly / Smiles you'll give and tears you'll cry / And all you touch and all you see is all your life will ever be" was put forth in the Pink Floyd song "Breathe (in the Air)."
Keep doin' whatcha doin'. You got this.
Dead End or Six Feet Above
For sure, there are forty-two cemeteries in the New Orleans area, and daily, people are dying to get into them, but, as you can imagine, it's still first come first served. Even considering the fact that death is such an inconvenience and, in my thoughts, a grave mistake, folks keep doin' it and we keep burying them. Or we burn them into ashes and send them home in an urn or a box to be shelved with the canned tomatoes.
Some will say, "In New Orleans, we don't just bury our dead, we send them off with a party, music, and dancing in the streets." That's kinda true. In a traditional jazz funeral here, the dearly departed are accompanied to their final rest with a brass band, the family in the front line, and the well wishers in the second line; the music is at a slow cadence until the body is laid to rest and then the band breaks into celebratory music as the soul is set free of its earthly bonds and the party moves on to the proper wake. There's dancing and drinking and so much carrying on that folks here almost look forward to Old Aunt Rose kicking the bucket—or not.
Cemeteries here are class-conscious to be sure. The higher classes go to Metairie where there's higher ground and they can be buried under it. The notorious and the famous prefer St. Louis Cemetery #1 where, although they're buried above ground, at least they are among their peers. The indigent get kicked to the curb in another place and make due as they can. I have one friend who says she'd rather be buried "in Holt cemetery with them hookers and homeless than there with them muckity-mucks in town."
Despite the fact that some people only rent tombs and some single burial plots can have upwards of twenty or more family members interred, it's a tradition to dress someone in their finest so they can be laid out to rot. I can't figure that one out. The rental plots are those iconic two level affairs where the casket is allowed to repose for a year and a day; after that time, a worker with a long pole pushes that which has not disintegrated with time and the tropic climate down a hole in the back of the second floor into the space below, giving rise to the adage of derision, "I wouldn't touch you with a ten foot pole" (or so the story goes).
You can't swing a cat here without hitting a cemetery and all the best folk are spread around like gossip: Marie Laveau (the Voodoo Queen) and Doctor John are night trippin' in Saint Louis Cemetery #1 outside the French Quarter along with Homer Plessy, Etienne de Bore (the sugar king), and the-not-yet-dead-but-has-a-tomb, Nicholas Cage. Saint Louis #2 has Ernie K. Doe (but not his mother-in-law), and Paul Prudhomme is buried largely in Saint Louis #3.
Mount Olivet near Dillard University is swingin' with Allen Toussaint, Fats Domino, Professor Longhair, and rapper Soulja Slim. Pete Fountain and Al Hirt are backing up Mahalia Jackson, and Gram Parsons' charred remains in Metairie along with the "Queen of the Storyville Madams," Josie Arlington, looking fondly on. If you're into rather large prosthetic limbs, crutches, and eyeglasses displayed, visit the gothic revival chapel at Saint Roch Cemetery #1.
Unlike at the more ornate "Cities of the Dead," Holt Cemetery has most of their inhabitants buried underground. Filled to capacity with New Orleans indigent, homeless and fringe society one-time denizens, it can be depressing and haunting until you consider the probable devil-may-care lives led by those that wind up there. And among the wooden crosses, hand-lettered planks and even unmarked mounds of earth, Babe Stovall, Buddy Bolden, Jack Working, Jessie Hill, Robert Charles, and countless "ladies of the evening" are cavorting with, at last count, at least 1,400 military veterans and don't really give a rat's whisker what you think of them. As a side note, Huey P. Long is buried in Baton Rouge and New Orleans' favorite son, Louis Armstrong, decided he'd rather go underground in Queens, New York.
We take an almost morbid fascination here with our cemeteries, films are shot in them, tours are given of them, rituals and macabre rites are performed in them and not one person I know doesn't believe that spirits will rise in them at any given moment. When I read Peter S. Beagle's A Fine and Private Place, I considered it not so much as a piece of fiction, but a documentary.
Dying isn't enough for a person here; it's never the end. Anyone who has ever "gotten" New Orleans will believe that when it's time to shuffle off this mortal coil, their last thoughts will be "I ain't goin' nowhere," and will find themselves as another of the myriad of ghosts, spirits, and phantasmagoria here that share the spaces of those still weighed down with human flesh. Don't believe it if you don't want to, but come sit a spell in one of our "cities of the dead" and bring a lunch. I guarantee you'll feel a tap on your shoulder, an unlikely bit of breeze, or get the feeling of being watched—especially if that meal is some Brother's fried chicken, and you can leave the bones for the myriad of felines that cohabitate with our dearly not so departed.
I read the obituaries daily to see if I'm in them; it would just be like my friends not to let me know that I've gone over my own Rainbow Bridge. Will I be united with all the people from my past? Maybe not. Could I possibly reconnect with all the critters that I've shared my life with? I'm counting on it.
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Bon Appétit or Soup's On!
Long before the advent of the Celebrity Chef, the hands that stirred the pots in New Orleans restaurants were black and people were fed well. Curiously, the business' names are generally synonymous with the names of the (white) restaurateurs Antoine's, Galatoire's, Arnaud's, Tujaques, and Kolbs.
It was the same in most major cities that became famous for food. An enterprising person put out tables, called it a café or restaurant and started serving food. Someone placed a wooden board across two barrels, called it a bar and served drinks. They stood in the way of hungry and thirsty traffic and worked and built and served and took in money and raised their children to do the same. Eventually staff was added and the owners became managers and handled the money, the clients, and their employees; then, their reputations grew.
Sometimes they began as a grocery store and shoehorned in space for a kitchen as takeout food became a source of income and by and large the kitchens were cramped, hot, sweaty, noisy, dirty, and a hard, thankless place to work. The hours were long, the pay was small, and the staff was readily expendable. There was no training curriculum except being told what to do and becoming trusted to know and do more. Workers, and those in charge of them, were invisible to the public. That was then and this is now.
Fast forward to the twentieth century where our food Mecca is comprised of restaurant museums, factories, and little mom and pop places that carved out niches and anchored neighborhoods. Any cook or culinarian with any ambition left town for training (and generally did not come back) and any ambitious restaurateur fished outside of this small pond for talent. The food here was mostly popular with locals.
In the 1970s a forward-thinking Ella Brennan hired, outside of the box, a magician of flavor named Paul Prudhomme who put Creole and Cajun food not only on the map, but in actuality, splashed our food and flavors into the world's faces (and the world lapped every scrap and wiped their plates clean). Culinary classes, per se, had barely started emerging as curriculum and endeavors; however, no real full time structured education for aspiring chefs took root and dared face the world, worthy of the name "school."
In 2017 after three years of negotiations, a location at 725 Howard Avenue, a space of 94,000 square feet, quietly began construction of what would become the New Orleans Culinary and Hospitality Institute or NOCHI. At that time the hospitality industry was the region's largest employer with a workforce of 88,000 people, and it was clear to anyone with the sense of a goat that a lack of education was the one thing seriously holding so many employees back. Several New Orleans culinary and business heavy hitters including Ti Martin of Commander's Palace and Dickie Brennan backed the foundling enterprise with energy, financial astuteness, fancy footwork, and all-around audacity. NOCHI opened for its first class in January 2019.
We all know what the last three years have been like and can probably imagine what any business in New Orleans has been through; it's been like that at NOCHI— squared. The economy, the pandemic, the hurricane, the pandemic again, and the recession have bent, but not broken, the spirit of NOCHI which is like a proud ship sailing rough seas. As captain and executive director of that ship, Chef Leah Sarris, RD, LDN holds fast to the vision and purpose.
I started at the location with World Central Kitchen during Hurricane Ida where NOCHI turned the building into a machine that put over half a million meals into the stomachs of New Orleanians along with four surrounding parishes. I stayed on and became Executive Events Chef and part of a cadre of professionals dedicated to making NOCHI look sharp and stand tall.
NOCHI is skilling the chefs of New Orleans and the world (pun intended); the 650 hours' course of instruction in the culinary arts as well as baking and pastry is taught by instructors who could work anywhere in the world but have chosen NOCHI. The support staff consisting of directors of admissions, educations, finance, promotions, and dining are second to none that I've ever seen and there is real NOCHI pride that comes to work each day. NOCHI pride is an inspiration and shines through the students (called cohorts) that are basically given an immersion into the arts, sciences, and execution of the culinary disciplines—none of which is available in on the job training.
When a cohort finishes the 100-day course of instruction, they are on the fast track to becoming chefs, managers and owners; with this knowledge, paired with focus and dedication, the sky virtually is the limit.
Imagine, if you will, the arrival of a new class of cohorts; they're in their fresh white chef's jackets, have new knife kits, are freshly scrubbed and more than a little intimidated by what lies ahead: being thrown into the deep end of the culinary pool. Slowly, they gain their footing and take on the rhythm of learning: knife skills, protein fabrication, bread baking, basic desserts both fancy and fancier, breakfast and lunch standard dishes, as well as the preparation of meals in twelve nationalities. They gain visible confidence.
At the close of each course the cohorts "pop up" a simulated restaurant in the third floor dining lab where the public (by reservation) gets to sample what their capabilities have become. Don't miss out on a magical mystery meal; there may be one coming up before you know it.
New Orleans Culinary and Hospitality Institute, 725 Howard Street, New Orleans, Louisiana, 70130. 504-891-4060. This article came to you spontaneously and unsolicited from NOCHI's biggest fan: me. Thank you.
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Dreamer or What's Goin' On?
It seems that these days are some of the darkest that we've seen, that wherever we turn, things are not turning out righteous. Still we hope and pray that whenever one person stands up and says, Wait a minute, this is wrong," it will help other people to do the same" (Anon). And yet no one will admit the Emperor has
no clothes.
How old am I? I was old when groups like the Raspberries, Strawberry Alarm Clock, and The 1910 Fruitgum Company were making money with bad beats and childish lyrics. I was old when the Doors, the Grateful Dead, and Big Brother and the Holding Company (with Janis Joplin) made my head explode. I was still older when industrial, heavy metal, electronic, hip hop, rap, and woke music snuck their way into my aural aura. I digested folk music at an early age, I swooned over progressive jazz in my formative years, and I still get misty on classical and symphonic music. I am at peace with that Eastern Raga, and I jump up and kiss reggae tunes. Country and western music and rhythm and blues really can get me going, and I can sing along with Marvin Gaye and Sam Cooke 'til the train rolls in. All of which makes me a well rounded and dedicated revolutionary. Who better equipped to rail against the machine?
Add to that that I am an insatiable reader of just as many genres as the music that I listen to. I disappeared into books when I was young like someone running into the woods and have not returned yet. I was born old and have only gotten younger and more energetic with each trip around the sun—my getting younger does not mean that I've gotten naive, quite the opposite. I have seen and have an aversion to cruelty, injustice, and the self-serving hypocrisy, misogyny, and the mendacity of people who, through no consent of mine, believe themselves fit and in charge of the health and well being of more than themselves, bastards all.
You see, basically, you cannot have all that stuff running around in your veins and gray cells without thinking that there should be something done to end this madness and insanity in the day-to-day living on this planet that only gets weirder and more hurtful as months and years pass. I can give you so many examples; however, good taste has me avoiding topics in my rants that include sex, politics, and religion. You, as astute as you are, can read between the lines and put context with my content to your heart's delight.
The average age of our readership is well below half my lifetime, and I wonder if experience and exposure hath not made my little outlook less rosy and/or sanguine. Youngsters might consider that I, as well as other geezers, have been witness to events and conditions that are possibly unimaginable to a younger generation: abject racism, sexism, fires, floods, storms, wars, assassinations, civil liberties fought for and won (or lost), earthquakes, devastations, and defeats of all stripes. That that might tend to drizzle a bit on an oldster's current outlook, but know that under it all, I maintain a quixotic sense that good will triumph over evil, no matter the scars that we must carry forth for our efforts, no matter how many times "heaven calls in sick on me and let hell's claws bust through these doors. Love still lives here," as Robert J. Sherrah says. Amen.
So this month will be full of storms, and as I live and breathe, I can assure you that at times, it will seem like "cheer up things could be worse" is only an assurance that even when you cheer up, things get worse. If you've been paying attention at all and are not so busy trying to keep your life from falling apart physically, mentally, and emotionally, you'll have seen the clouds on the horizon looking like the storm of your existence is about to blow this house to the Kingdom of L. Frank Baum where your spirit will be risked at great expense. There will be times when someone will tell you, "you ain't seen nuthin' yet" and have it sound like an omen. Of course it is, but they only say that because their memory has not let go of their experiences—good or not good.
The only challenge with that is they are not you—you are the warrior, no matter your age. In essence, we're all living with our own battle of good versus evil, and it's up to us to keep up the fight. The powers that have taken it upon themselves to make decisions about our health and welfare need to be kept challenged on a constant basis, no matter how tiring and frustrating it may be. The bastards need that power taken away from them.
I say, pay attention to that person behind the curtain. Would you have tea, buy a car, take a pill, or vote with confidence for them? Would you invite them into your house, share a meal or a bed with them, trust your children or your money with them, trust and let them tell you what's best for you and not what they can benefit from?
Listen, there's a story going around about a small country that has been invaded by and is at war with a power far superior in assets and weaponry than they, and yet they fight for their land, freedom and dignity. The world watches and tries to support their efforts, and still they're getting their asses kicked royally. And still they fight. How could you let complacency allow you to be less than them in your personal life? And yes, I said that this piece would avoid discourse on sex, politics and religion. I lied—he is naked.
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Ball of Confusion or Kiss My Assets
"I wanna learn patience, and I wanna learn it right now." That's right, that's my friggin' mantra: "Patience: right now."
I mean, how many things in my/your/our everyday life conspire—yes conspire—to keep us from obtaining spiritual growth, peace, harmony, and all the other crap that it will take for us to be able to settle damn down and be simply "happy." It's like a conspiracy: from your phone alarm thinking that it's tomorrow (or yesterday), to spell-check thinking you said f**k instead of flock, or your phone fielding a call from someone who wants to give your car "one more chance to renew its service warranty," or the password that you've been using for six years being deemed invalid, so you need a new one with twelve or more letters including, but not limited to: "one upper case, one lower case, one numerical symbol, one weird at the top of the keyboard symbol, one of your pet's names, the numerical equivalent of the last blood pressure that you had taken, and your mother's maiden name" (now, "prove that you're not a robot by picking out the telephone poles in this photo").
You misplace your car keys, your Amazon package is porch lifted, you get a notice for jury duty, your favorite place to get coffee is closed (suddenly) on Mondays, and your new route to work includes three School Zones and two construction detours. Is the universe really trying to piss you off? Yes, it is.
Listen, the entire universe is locked in a battle of good against evil; it's beside the point that evil is kicking our asses. We, as heroes, are being distracted from joining the struggle by forces that continue to distract us from participating in the conflict. Your landlord is selling the house that you've been renting, the air conditioning in the car just quit, your co-worker just came down with COVID, and/or your actions at work have now been considered "micro-aggressive" because you called someone an "a-hole" (because they are), and you've been sent by HR to a "sensitivity training" seminar.
In the normal, dysfunctional world, the way things work is that the boss gives the man a bad time, the man comes home and gives the wife grief, she then takes it out on the kid, the kid kicks the dog, and the dog bites a neighbor (me). The universe works the same way, but you're above that—you've found a 'happy place" that helps you to reconnect with your center—your spirit, your calm, your patience.
There's conflict in the world: there's war, real people are dying and displaced, and there's hunger, disease, disruption, and despair. People are hurting, evil rides rampant, children are being gunned down, the government doesn't care to, or is just too impotent to act. Hunger, injustice, civil liberties, and so-called rights are being trampled on, and unnatural disasters that are mowing down people's lives and property have become commonplace—global frickin' warming. Name it, we got it.
We've had a choice, and we've taken it. We can take mud up to our chins and, then, either swallow it or spit it out, and we've chosen to spit it out. We speak out, we vote, we act out, and we're vocal in our views. We have values. Evil does not care. Peace, love, and understanding are fodder to be mowed down like the idealists before us, to be worn down, to be tested and bested. What do we do? We recharge and move the needle forward.
Everyone who believes in freedom and justice needs to recharge. My advice is to find your happy place and visit as often as possible. Early on, my happy place was wearing myself out with drugs, alcohol, and rocking 'n' rolling until I couldn't see straight. But one quiet night, in a strange place, I looked up and saw a sky full of stars and found a real "happy place." Now, when I feel disconnected from my patience and peace, I go to one of my happy places. I realize that I will never solve the world's challenges and can only do my small part by being a good person, an example, and a revolution/evolution of one.
A happy place is not a place of distraction; it is a place where you find peace and strength within yourself returning to its normal high functioning level. Here are a few examples:
Take a long walk or hike, by yourself; speak to no one. Read a book about some protagonist's adventures—one who uses wit to overcome malice. Go sit under a tree. Go for a swim. Make a pot of spaghetti sauce (enough for twelve). Go to a big store and peruse the aisles and wonder at the things people buy. Put on some quiet music and listen or sit still, let the crazy horses' band of thoughts gallop wildly until they're exhausted. Get down on your hands and knees and visit the small flowers that grow unnoticed. Watch bees and butterflies. Commune with your cat. Roam a museum and don't analyze the works found there—just enjoy looking. Go to a coffee house where you know nobody and have a tasty pastry. Take a nap. Recharge.
Sound simple? It's not. Most times we're being knocked about like a pinball in an arcade game, and it almost becomes reflex to keep thinking on our feet, nose to the grindstone, shoulder to the wheel, tacking into the wind, racing with the rats, and runnin' with the devil. Go easy on yourself and everything will get done eventually. Concentrate your energy on the challenge of the moment. Namaste and all that nonsense, and, as Mister Natural says, "keep your sunny side up."
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Randall or Paradise Lost
Randy has gone into "assisted living," which to me, means into a purgatory between independence and invalidation. He's at one of the better facilities, one with a high falutin religious moniker and we can go visit. He doesn't get around much anymore so we will have to go to him. The word is that he's "adjusting quite nicely." That's not the Randy that I met nearly twenty-five years ago. As Kurt Vonnegut said, "and so it goes," but not quite.
Randall Garland was a gin and tonic drinker, he was an artist/painter, had served in the Army overseas, raised a family, was on good terms with his former wife, and was loved by his daughters and grandkids. His apartment is now empty. No longer will I walk by and hear the strains of classical music from his record player, and I'm sure that his season tickets to the opera are no longer valid. He will no longer hold court on his porch during Jazz Fest and tell interesting and funny stories about the life he had led, was leading, and was also looking forward to pursuing.
I met Randy at a time when we all were younger, when literary salons and raconteurs in the French Quarter were de rigueur, when drinking in bars was an adult occupation and conversation about life, the universe and everything was an art to be polished and pursued, and when patrons would rather commiserate than watch mind-numbing HD screens. Randall was a master. At one time Randall had lived above the Napoleon House and painted; he had a bevy of women and men that adored him. He could be relied on to know local geographical history, current events, and topics of art and literature. He wrote and published a book. He was a member of the city museum and voted religiously.
He was raised in the Ninth Ward, had a career, owned property, and could be relied on to have a shine on his shoes and a smile on his face. He was kind, and it's not like he's passed away—only passed on to a place that will assist him in his everyday life and make sure that he's comfortable and taken care of, which is something that he did quite well into his eighth decade on his own terms and in his own time. Randy never was, as Shakespeare said, "a walking shadow, a poor player who strutted and fretted his hour on the stage." To those of us who have known Randall Garland, he is a god.
His fishing camp on the Gulf Coast, where he had sleepovers and fish fries for "the gang," who was blown away by Katrina. He took an apartment further down the road and drove there weekly. I wonder what they did with his car… Obviously, he no longer drives. I wonder if the new place knows how much he likes his gumbo and fried shrimp po-boys. I wonder if there's someone there to listen to his conversation, if he's still on his computer, and if he's sleeping well. I wonder what he's thinking.
And now I wonder if you too have a Randall in a "facility," if you too will go visiting, if you too know that someday you, too, will be in Randall's shoes, in Randall's place, "assisted" in your living.
I think these places where people are housed seem like book depositories where tomes are sent, having been handicapped by age or infirmary, each with stories that have been written but never published. Some are in libraries; some are in warehouses depending on their value to others. They are cared for in their fashion until some future expiration date finally closes them, and their stories are lost or only remembered by someone who once was a part.
Denmark instituted a Human Library Organization, which is now available in eighty countries. The idea is to check out a person and learn about them and from them. It helps you and it helps them; it's like reading a book-a book about them. What an idea, huh? Its mission is to build spaces in the community for personal dialogue about issues that are often difficult, challenging or stigmatizing. They publish people like open books on a given subject and "readers" ask questions and get answers from "their book." It's win-win.
Facilities for the elderly and less-than-mobile would be the perfect place to gain some insight to our outlooks, wouldn't you say? These places are occupied by folks that have lived through good and bad times: teachers, poets, parents, and the ordinary and the extraordinary people that have gone through hell, high water, and high and low times. These are books that need to be read and understood-how to get along with a partner/mate, how to keep from lighting my hair on fire every time that I feel stressed, how the hell do you make tough choices, and why does the meringue on my lemon pie not stand up?
There are people in those places that are worth listening to, and they also need perspective. As I get older, and the lemons that I'm used to throwing back at life no longer can be ignored. I want to reiterate to someone how I believe that my life was worth living still and how I have loved, lost, fought and overcome challenges that have made me a worthwhile person.
At that stage of his life, I want Randall to have dialogue with someone who wants to know about the time he was fishing in Claremont Harbor and had to warn a swimmer that there was a six foot alligator heading their way and that maybe they should think about heading back to shore; about how to hold a lantern above your head at night when you wade in the gulf in search of flounder and how high you need to roll your pants legs up.
Consider Randall Garland worth considering.
