Last week, I visited the Big Easy for the second time this year. My first impression of the city was cheap and unfair. I indulged in beignets and ‘world famous’ coffee, and chased my days with $12 drinks. After 4 days I’d seen races and racism; I’d seen smiles wider than the river. I saw confidence, I saw contentment, and I saw comfort. I left thinking I’d found the Sorbonne of southern culture.
I. Love. New Orleans.
I left knowing I’d missed something, though.
So, five months passed and I gave myself two days to try again. Here are my impressions from a 6:30 AM walk through the city.
I came back to drink down my impressions. They went down as easy as smooth jazz and tin can art. Precarious beads dangle from a carnival of ambiguously supported balconies. In a pinch, the thread holding the structure in place might in fact be beads, tossed up innocently parades ago.
Every city is most itself after a nightly reset. 6am, and New Orleans scoffs at ‘reset’. Open containers of daiquiri wave hello to a warm cup of chickory. Both empty cups know that this is the city that never sleeps.
This particular morning glows with Bourbon, spilling over with sugar and mint. New Orleans is most comfortably itself under the watchful eye of St. Louis. The people are grits and honey, homemade car washes, and decaffeinated inhibitions.
A city leveled several times over, NOLA’s flag elaborates on its soul. As timeless as the fleur de lis itself, the real coat of arms is a symphony of colors with vibrations to match. C’est vrai, several lands meet here. Love, adventure, and enchantment alone fix broken bones of homes.
6am, laughing in New Orleans. Here, cacophony meets peace. Here, the first cigarette of the day counts down to a life lived at the speed of a bayou.