Honey Swamp, I'm home...

Honey swamp, I’m home.

Café du Monde at 8am. The place is already packed with tourists and some locals whom you can usually spot as the manner of dress here is unique. I’m especially fond of the older gents who sport straw hats, dressy linen jackets and shorts with sandals. I’m on a pilgrimage, once again taking in everything I find wonderful about this place. I short cut through Pirates Alley , where Jean Lafitte's’ brother had a blacksmith shop and cross Jackson Square to get my cup of chicory coffee and fresh beignets

I’m Gonna Let It Shine

The walk over is a doo wop of sounds: a small village and living museum waking for the day. Shop keepers opening shutters and throwing out buckets of swill water. Street musicians are setting up shop. Already the sounds of alto jax and horn in the air. In the air also is the smell of river mud, crawfish and funk. Centuries old urine and sewage systems stressed with the shock of all of us. But no matter, all great old cities wear this perfume. Bars are opening and preparing to get busy. Mist hangs in the air like smoke on Old Man River. Tourists are talking about their problems and who they said what to and how much they paid for their hotels and their tours. The locals quiet but acknowledging each other with nods and “how ya’ doin’”s. . There is still a chill in the air.

I’m staying in the Quarter on Dauphine between Toulouse and St. Peter's. My hosts are still sleeping. Robiere is the French sax player that I met in Johnny White’s on Bourbon St. last year. We became fast friends and I was lucky to receive such a quick entree into the city's music and cultural history through him and his wife Holly who gives leads historical tours through the city. They are both scholars and music aficionados. I owe a good chunk of my NOLA education to them. Within hours of landing we were watching vintage Count Basie 'soundies' from the 40’s in their loft. They are late sleepers as they keep musician’s hours. I’ve been living with no electricity in the jungles of Quintana Roo. I rise and fall with the chickens and the sun, so in spite of long travel day, I’m up and anxious to see my city.

New Orleans is pulsing with its usual energies and then some, still coming down from the high of the Saints win. Everyone tells me about what it meant to this city and how it has helped to change the world's view of them. Tourism is back. New Orleans is not lost but standing proud, full of hope for the its future with its newly elected mayor, Mitch Landrieu, the city's first white mayor since 1978. New Orleanian's were so tired of the failings of Ray Nagin that Landrieu won by a landslide, even capturing the black vote by 78%

But the work and struggle goes on here, as I was reminded within minutes of landing. While waiting to claim my luggage I heard my first story. A chauffeur sitting waiting for his ride told me of how his wife now lives in Chicago with the kids as in the time it has taken to rebuild their life here, she has built a new life elsewhere. He now visits her when he can. Versions of this story abound. Later, making my way into the city, I was dropped at Johnny Whites, the famous local’s bar that has never closed its doors, even during Katrina. The man sitting next to me starts to tell the tale of his return to Mississippi and the search for his house on a street that its self had been blasted into nothingness by the ferocity of those winds. The same stories that gripped me last year of what happened to these people and this culture during and after Katrina, are unfolding . They come pouring out, with no prompting, stories of loss and shock and courage. They both break your heart and inspire you , not told in self-pity but from an unrecognized need for catharsis.

I reach Cafe du Monde

I get my favorite corner table by the main entrance and cover myself in powdered sugar while " Down By The Riverside" and old jazz hits favored by the tourists are belted out.. I'm looking across to Jackson Square and the grand St. Louis cathedral, the oldest cathedral in north America. Flanking St. Lou are the Pontalba apartments, purportedly America's first apartment complex, built in the 1840's. My friend Donna grew up in them. One of the cooler thing about New Orleans is how personal all this history quickly becomes. It's not book dry and abstract, but up close and personal, you can feel it, smell it and run your fingers through its long tangled hair.

I went on a pilgrimage to see old friends and places. First taking the street car down Canal, arguably the widest street in the country, to Mid City to see my friends Mayla and Dianna. They had kindly left me their double shotgun camel-back for 3 months last summer. Their only condition fro this generous gift was that if a hurricane came, I would not let the truck drown as it had during Katrina. They are vegetarian and I arrived just in time for lunch. For once I got my ten servings of vegetables for the day. Something that is often lacking but seldom missed in my diet here. Good to eat green when you can.

That evening went to the new bar The Maison on Frenchmen for a free crawfish boil. The secret in the pot seems to be oranges. I lifted the lid and looked in. The chef told me with some anxiety that he was not giving away his secrets. Naw uh. I scored with two plates of crawfish, as my friend Donna is a vegetarian, bless her. Then we crossed the street and entered the latest revival of The Spotted Cat to catch my friend Robiere sit in with the a local band. The lead singer doing a sincere imitation of Billy Holiday, complete with white gardenia behind her right ear.