What this ballad is...is what he represents. It was the only cab I took in New Orleans. Beauchant has likely driven the route hundreds of times. He could have driven me to Baton Rouge and back and I wouldn't have known, but he didn't. That would be difficult. An unnecessary use of time. Instead, I arrived at my hotel. It was easy.
It'd be easy to blend in along the Mississippi River wearing a Tulane Angry Wave t shirt. The humidity was already getting to everyone, family, on-looker, and local color alike. It wasn't until I had yet another shrimp po'boy and half a dozen iced teas in me that I could finally get up the movement to hop along with a roving Dixieland band on a street in the middle of a Memorial Day afternoon. I didn't spill any of my 7th iced tea on St. Ann Street while dancing, either. Maybe I wasn't totally in the groove because there were occasional nuthouse screamers not far away threatening the vibe. But I pressed on. It was easy to do so.
And hell, you might as well ask everyone about restaurants because you're just gonna wander and drink and eat constantly. Only way I knew how to beat this heat. It didn't prevent everyone from acting like a jerk or get in your way. I just slowed down. Breathed slower. Seems like it's something Beauchant would do at times like this.
At night, I roamed the music clubs of Frenchmen Street, all enticing you to hang out, come inside, drink, and enjoy. If it's easier to enter a club a half hour before a band goes on to get some drink in you before the cover starts, so be it. The music selection as the band was setting up was apparently the playlist "funk-o-gold" so that was in my favor. When they finally showed up, this group tore it down. After a particularly spirited tune, something made me think to head outside. Not sure why. I did, and a block away found this:
They passed the hat, musicians left and showed up simultaneously, and it was evident to me how easy it was to have a good time.
It's not easy getting out of the rack early on a vacation, but a bus took me and others out of town, out to White Kitchen, Louisiana. Part of the allure was seeing what a town called White Kitchen actually looked like, and also to drive by a Piggly Wiggly. Near the Mississippi border, I boarded a boat with "Captain Sonny," but it's also easy to choose to sit next to him as his "co-captain" to watch him hand grass snakes to the offspring, and to show how to throw "gator bait" so that, over time, they know to come to you. As we get away, another boat waves and says "Hey, brother!" to Sonny. "I'm not your brother, thank God. Not with what you're up to. I know you." Later, in a peaceful enclave off the Old Pearl River, we assist in de-escalating a possible stand-off between alligators and raccoons. Everyone gets food and no one becomes it, either. It was easy to let the breezes cool me down under the shade of trees.
I don't need to tell you that a trip here wouldn't be complete without visiting Preservation Hall to hear jazz. It's sensational, these small venues, so intimate that you feel you are part of the show, that they aren't playing for you; you just happen to be there while they're playing.
What I didn't know until afterwards was just how easy it would be to talk to all the musicians. They were approachable as hell - including one who'd been there for decades. I felt like I just visited the church of music.
Even with a helpful app, it took a fortifying BBQ lunch to get a-moving on the streetcar. Once I did, it was liberating to move about in a very local way. It wasn't without the usual public transport issues, but those were pleasing rides. Maybe it was the fact that I figured out what went where. (More than 1 local said that in the 70s, many lines were dug up and replaced with busses. "Busses can't drive on these streets! Now they bringing them all back."
I was thinking that on one of my trips on the St. Charles line, the oldest running streetcar line in the world. For centuries, people have travelled this line, and here I was taking this to get more ice cream. It's just as it always goes for me - just as I figure out how to get around, where to go and where I want to go, it's time to leave.
It's not easy going anywhere, especially with family members that are either indecisive or don't want to be there to begin with. It's not easy to always have to stop for beignets when I still don't "get them" and, frankly, would rather eat more of those delicious praline pecans. Now, a few days after returning to Dealville and reflecting...when vacationing in New Orleans, it really was all a Big E-Z.
