New Orleans is BACK!

Scenes From New Orleans:


Well, New Orleans is back, and will never go away. I realized this at about 3:30 a.m. on Saturday Night at Miss Mae’s, the 24 hour bar across from the police station and basketball court on Napolean and Magazine.

Why did I realize this? Because my brother had discovered that this venerable institution sold “house” tequila for 50 cents a shot. This, combined with a buck fifty beers allowed him to buy us both a shot and a beer and have change left over from a five spot. No where else in North America is this possible. It was finally crystallized in my mind that America generally, and the South specifically needs New Orleans.

New Orleans is not an architectural style, or a festival, or a specific race or nationality; it is a concept. It is a concept of people accepting each other, celebrating the idiosyncrasies of mankind, and reveling in the fun that the human mind can conceive and that our devolved bodies can tolerate.

I am firmly convinced that there are at least 250,000 to 500,000 people that want to inhabit this conceptual commune, and they will be back. They are stifled and not whole in Houston, Baton Rouge, Birmingham. They need their Mojo working, and it just doesn’t work in Gainesville, Tucson, or Dallas.

Last night at Vaughan’s Kermit Ruffan’s and his horn sat in with the house band, and a local randomly spoke out “I love this place, I love this town, and I love these people.” Strong and true words for a place that is never on the straight and narrow.