While having my nose and shoulders softly kissed red by the heavens would have been enough to set any soul blooming like so many tulips, the people truly set the smile on my face. My friend Kristi picked me up from the airport and whisked me to Baton Rouge for the evening, introducing me to potential grad school professors, and then drove me tirelessly back to New Orleans. Getting to spend time with my parents in a way reminiscent of the family vacations we took not so long ago was priceless. I miss them and it was wonderful.
And then the music! The music and the art and the people! And the food! Oh, the culture! That beautiful, slow, rich Southern culture that is so often dismissed as poor and ignorant, not worth preservation. Being in the North, where I'm considered a slow walker, I've forgotten how quick I am below the Mason Dixon Line.
Maybe it's only a mirage to be admired while on vacation. I feel like a part of me is tied to New Orleans. It's had its hooks in me from a young age. I feel myself pulled to her. But am I just nostalgic for the nostalgia that isn't mine? Am I infatuated with city that's an empty shell of its former glory? No. No! Because we need a New Orleans. We need that other worldly place to escape and revel, and even sin.
I don't know what I want. I know I don't want this cold angry city the rest of my life. I don't want this loss of purpose that accompanies my vitamin D deficiency. I know I want love and intelligence and to somehow improve this world, this country. But that's so general! I'll simply plow forward and see what comes. What can any of us do besides that?
