The mileage sign which says "New Orleans 19" always makes me smile. At first, I just assumed that smile came because I was almost there, almost to the "home" I miss, and after a drive like today's turned out to be, a relief. On further thought though, that's only a small part of it. In that last 19 miles, I cross the Bonnet Carre Spillway & part of the enormous Lake Pontchartrain. To my left is 630 square miles of lake, but at night, without a light anywhere, it looks like a solid black wall. I remember once going out with someone on the lake at night, & it was amazing! It kind of felt like being in a black hole, but still able to see a vast array of stars through the top. I could hear the water lapping on the side of the boat, & feel the wind as it glided over my skin. It was another world besides the black wall I see now to my left, so the black wall makes me smile. I know what's hidden there.
To my right, on much of this last 19 miles, is that spillway. For those of you not in the know, in New Orleans things are rarely pronounced as you would expect from the spelling, so the Bonnet Carre is pronounced as Bonnie Carrie. The swamps are back that way too, along with the glow of the refineries in the distance. Where the left is a black wall, the right is full of a life which goes back through the ages. Another memory . . . In high school, the boys liked to go out riding in the mud by the Spillway. I went along a couple of times, but I always had a fear that they would open the Spillway without us knowing, & we would be washed away, so I couldn't fully enjoy the experience. Anyway, to my right, are lots of dimly lit, hidden away "camps" (what we call the houses on the water, pretty much.) Out there is gator hunting & all kinds of things that go slither into the night. There are also what I refer to as the toothpick trees. What is left of the trees when the water and wind have done their job. Then, back in the distance, is that orange & yellow glow from the refineries. Without that glow, I would have a black wall on the right to match the one on the left. Instead, that glow gives the toothpick trees a perpetual sunset background. That glow also represents the enterprise and hard labor of Louisiana people over the last 300 years. The hard work on the plantations and of the small farmers to make a go of life on the river, the lake, and the swamp, to battle the heat, the debilitating humidity, the mosquitoes, and all the other dangers of the region. I think back to my Louisiana History class in middle school, and remember the stories of Iberville finding the Mississippi delta at Biloxi and his brother Bienville establishing New Orleans upriver in a crescent bend he thought would be safe. So began the Crescent City. That illumination my come from an environmental sore, but it is a continuation of the souls of those who have gone before in hard toil.
Perhaps I romanticize a bit, but for me, this area is so rich with the souls of others, souls which still linger. It is a different & beautiful world in countless ways, and mostly because it is accepted and appreciated as a very imperfect world. As my son Asa said, " I like this place because everything is just a little broken, but it's ok." Yep, we just roll with it, and sometimes even celebrate it.
It's not long before I'm off the long bridge and into town. Now it's back to a much more modern, real world, and my 19 miles are done. I'm back in the land of a festival for anything and the drive thru daiquiri. That must be my next stop.
