In love with a city

It is very rare to find a city that you just instantly fall in love with on the first visit being there, a city where in the first week of being there you are infatuated, you just can't leave, at least not for a while. Some find that in New York, Paris, San Fransisco, Washington D.C., I've even heard Cincinnati (that is a shout out to my roommate Forrest). I have found my love in this city of New Orleans, a city so backwards, upside down, and slow moving, you just have to sit back and laugh sometimes at the insanity this city brings some days.

A state that still follows the law books of its French and Spanish origins, Mardi Gras is the holiday of choice, and corruption just gets a shrug of laughter and a saying of "welcome to New Orleans." One has to sit back and wonder how this city still manages to be functional, the answer is really simple, New Orleans accepts its faults, mess-ups, weird quarks, slow moving pace, and willingness to persevere in the worst of times. This state and the city of New Orleans were built on a swamps, has survived hurricanes, Jim Crow, corruption to unnecessary extremes, and still yet is a place where people want to go and live. I would say that this city and state are built for the eccentric, those who don't mind that things just don't make sense all the time, and that government is sometimes just messy and backwards here. I think people here also just accept things as they are, and they have also learned to just accept people for who they are; human beings, we all make mistakes, and we all have skeletons in our closets.

A city in love with itself, a city so in love with its historic roots, that when disaster strikes, the historic districts are always first on the list to save and make right. Whether that means getting power back on in the French Quarter or that means fixing Treme, or putting the eyes of the public on Central City as a neighborhood in need of help. Yes, New Orleans, has some priority problems, but what city doesn't. What makes New Orleans different, is that it accepts its problems and screw-ups.

I love this city for all of its crazyness, its weird quarks, the people who treat you with all the respect they would like to see in return, not a single judgement about who you are or what you do in your personal life. As conservative as southerners are sometimes, I like these people, if you just avoid talking politics and religion, and accept them for who they are, southerners can really teach you something. Slow down and enjoy life for what it is, stop rushing around and just live life for what God is giving you. I think us northern folk are so quick to judge those who think a little slower, and who may see life a little more conservatively then others, that we forget they know life just as well if not better then we do. I understand that New Orleans is a uniquely liberal city in the deep south, but I have been to other parts of the state, and I still have found some pretty interesting people, who offer an interesting perspective on life.

Anyway, that is my thoughts for the day.

Peace y'all.

New Orleans by Chuck Perkins

I found this poem a while ago, and I think that it perfectly surmises everything I love about this city.

Enjoy.  

New Orleans

If your American dream is painted on a canvas
Neatly folded in the corner of Andy Warhol’s mind
New Orleans is a hurricane beating down your coast


If you close your eyes
And feel the easy ride
Of the St. Charles Street Car
Where a solo tuba
Blows the scent of magnolia
Down narrow streets
and everyone plays possum with the heat
and no one’s too big or too small
to paint their tongue with a snowball


where former slaves pay homage to the first Americans
by masking in suits of rhine stones and bright colored feathers
that transform security guards into Indian Chiefs
doing rain dances on Congo Square
where the drums drum
and the wine drink
and the big chief sing
somebody give me a quarter
cause pretty big chief want some water


if you can envision the souls of yesterday
living in the music
that rises from the cracks in the sidewalks
New Orleans is your dream
With a heart as soft
As the spanish moss
Dripping from centuries old oak tress

She’s a pretty face with dirty feet

The good witch of lake Ponchartrain
The spice god of shrimp and crawfish
Keeping the spirits fed

Communities of windowless monuments
Masquerading as cemeteries
Tower above ground
No earth or worms to cover the flesh
No silver bullets to turn out the spirits
That still dance with her


Spin your umbrella
And wave your bandanna
It’s Mardi Gras time
And everybody’s happy


Armed with a blue print of civilization
The new world stormed in
With enough asphalt and cement
To pave a boulevard back to Paris


the spirit of the swamp still hasn’t submitted
Leaving mildewed kisses of disapproval
On every thing foreign to the wet lands


 Catholicism could not turn out the spirit of Marie Laveau
The wrecking ball could not turn out the spirit of Storyville
And death could not turn out the spirit of Louie Armstrong
When yesterday hangs on to forever
Tradition is a temple.

Chuck Perkins 

How New Orleans has helped me!

A portion of my collection from all the Mardi Gras Parades.

I wonder sometimes how I ended up in New Orleans, Louisiana, working as a full time volunteer doing what I want to and partying like the locals do during Carnival. I ended up in a city that fits my personality, uses streetcars alongside buses, the street lights are on the side of the road, they invented the go-cup, po-boy, and the fine art of partying all night long. New Orleanians perfected the art of taking it slow, and enjoying the very life that God has given them. Lessaiz Le Bon Temps Roulez is engrained into their mindset here, and taking a break for an hour or so is not a completely alien ideology. Somehow I found this place, not by my own decisions but rather by a beautiful chance. A city that is as weird and backwards as I am, enjoys life, doesn't judge, allows for all people to come and just sit back and take it slow on a hot Sunday evening, then turns around and dances down Claiborne Avenue for a random Sunday Second Line.

Best Costume of Mardi Gras

Every once in a while I wonder how I got here, then I am gently reminded by the city why I am here, because I belong here. I may not have been born here, but I definitely have no problem calling it my home city. I know it sounds silly, but I feel like this city gave me a rebirth of myself, I have found more of who I am here than anywhere else I have been in my life. I have learned how to just stop worrying about what comes next and just take life as it is handed to me, and enjoy every part of what is given to me. I have learned how to have fun with who I am, being me, realizing that while I do like helping people, I am also one who can stop and enjoy myself, I am a gay man who likes the fact that I have finally become comfortable with my sexuality. I am feminine, I can be and more often than not am a diva, while also just being a free spirited human being. I like color, all of them, and i like to keep them in my life, I wear color, and I love to give it to people. I love music, dancing to it, singing it all the time, and listening to it, God gave me music, and dancing is something that has been instilled in my heart. I am idealistic, sometimes too much so, but regardless, I hold on to the amazing power of ideas, I am enchanted with the idea the peace and love can solve all of the worlds problems.

Guy from random dance party in Quarter

I am not able to sit still, in any way possible, if God wants me to still, then that time will come. I like to make my life as interesting as possible. I have learned that one of my many life motto's is to "LIVE LIFE LOUD" and that "Life is only as interesting as I make it." Labels are not for me, and I will never define myself by them, so when I say I am feminine, I also say that I just who I am, because I do understand masculine things, but I just sway to the fem side of life.

Anyway, I am ending this post with a little saying we use down here in New Orleans.
Laissez Le Bon Temps Roulez!



Peace y'all.