Little change in Louisiana's Quarter

Oct. 24, 2002

Dear Ken,

New Orleans must offer more opportunities to commit the seven deadly sins than anywhere else on Earth. Many of those are occurring right outside our Bourbon Street door this week. Bourbon Street is the alternative reality in which George Bailey's sweet home turns into the besotted carnality of Pottersville in "It's a Wonderful Life." Thousands crowd the street every night just to see if they can believe their eyes.

DC, her father and her sister from San Diego are attending a convention with 38,000 other dental practitioners. George Bush the elder and Bob Dole spoke. Former secretary of state Madeline Albright hit the podium too. Old political warriors don't die, they just reminisce for a substantial fee and keep some of the professionals off Bourbon Street for a few hours.

One of the New Orleans officials greeting the convention on the opening morning only half-kiddingly said he hoped the makers of the flesh-feast video "Girls Gone Wild" don't have the opportunity this week to film the new feature "Dental Girls Gone Wild."

New Orleans is much the same as when I lived here 17 years ago, if I am not. Then, being a bartender in New Orleans seemed romantic, almost like being a painter in Paris or a surfer in Hawaii. The reality of bartending in New Orleans was subsistence pay and a life in which nights blurred into dawns. I watched the earnestly alcoholic scion of one of New Orleans' most famous restaurant families used by "friends" who followed him to bar after bar just because he was always buying. I saw women demean themselves for cocaine. Romance must have been occurring in another bar.

The St. Charles Avenue Athletic Club now resides in the building that housed that bar. Maybe sweat has exorcised the sins.

I still like New Orleans, perhaps because people get so much pleasure from living and visiting here.

This week on Jackson Square, a young clarinetist who could trade riffs with Pete Fountain was playing real well for free. The Neville Brothers, Dr. John, the Radiators, Allen Toussaint, the Subdudes and Wynton Marsalis are just the most notorious of New Orleans' treasured musicians. The spirits of Louis Armstrong, Professor Longhair and Mahalia Jackson may not be encountered on one of the ghost tours through the Quarter, but they're here.

Any trip to New Orleans is inevitably an excursion into gastronomy. Beignets, andouille sausage, jambalaya, oysters, gumbo, barbecued shrimp, coffee with chicory and bread pudding have been the staples of our menu. Sunday brunch was at Commander's Palace, a New Orleans institution where a bouquet of balloons floats above every table and the waiters escort you to the restrooms.

Every extreme seems to co-exist in New Orleans, and people seem to like it just fine. One block from the debauchery on Bourbon, refined galleries and antique stores line Royal Street. On the corner outside some of the best restaurants anywhere sit Lucky Dog carts manned by people who surely are the offspring of the characters in "A Confederacy of Dunces." In the shadow of St. Louis Cathedral, men and women in black read about tourists' souls from Tarot cards and sell voodoo enchantments.

Talented design shops keep New Orleanians in costumes for endless parties. One night walking through the Quarter, my father-in-law spied a leather store called Second Skin. As we walked by, we realized that leather in Cape Girardeau and leather in New Orleans don't quite mean the same thing.

For me, the romance and beauty of New Orleans are in its love and acceptance of itself. Today we took a boat trip into the swamp. Alligators were everywhere and the 30-plus varieties of snakes remained hidden, but you could feel them out there. Alligators and snakes are pretty scary, the bayou guide admitted. "But have you been to Bourbon Street?" he asked.

Love, Sam

Sam Blackwell is a staff writer for the Southeast Missourian.