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Another Dumaine Day 8.13.98
I thought yesterday was Sunday but this, the day after, is really Sunday.
I am up sometimes as early as six or six-thirty on a Sunday but four-thirty is an all time record. And that because of all the pounding of door and ringing of bell.
"Yes?"
"You better move it if you don't want to lose it again." I can't even see who it is what with the wetness reflecting light every whicha way.
"Huh," and then, Oh, shit, not again. The street is a body of water. "OK, thank you, brah."
I take the car out to Broad, with the big boys, resting high on their neutral ground, but this little car ain't hopping that curb, so I U-turn on Broad and come back up Dumaine the wrong way and park in the parking lot/basketball court behind Maurices hair cutting establishment. Where I parked only took about a foot of water on Friday. Compared to almost three feet which collects at each curb.
At seven-thirty a slow moving vintage white Cadillac, with tinted windows, is followed by an impatient Asian boy in a gray Altima. When the impatient Asian boy honks his horn, the Cadillac slows down so I can count the spokes in his
gold rims, and then makes the wide right onto Broad.
At eight-thirty the water has receded, and I'm thinking about getting the car out of that lot before Maurice come and block me in with his new Shiny Black Lincoln Navigator.
At nine-thirty I have two scrambled eggs, two pieces of buttered toast, and a pint of Bluebell strawberry ice cream.
At ten-thirty Fermin has taken me literally and has shown up with a portable wet/dry vac and is sucking the water from Lolita's carpet. I give him five dollars because that's what I said I would do if he could find a wet/dry, and so he and Hunter will be in candy for the next two hours. The sun comes out and I open all the windows and the hatchback.
Jacque helps me rearrange the pile of garbage in front of Yolanda's.
"You could just throw the small pieces back in her house, Jacque. Better than having that stuff scattered all over the sidewalk. Someone might yell at you but you could always point your finger and scream--'Mr. Jim he told me, he
told me, it wasn't me, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, but Mr. Jim told me...'"
"Nah, I wouldn't do that," Jacque says, while flinging a piece of scrap particle board into the center hall of Yolanda's house. A piece of plaster crown molding drops from the fourteen foot ceiling and lands in a puddle of rain water formed by a dip in the wood floor.
At eleven-thirty it starts raining again so I close up the car, and before I know how it happens, there are six children clustered on the porch with me. Erica makes a seat out of my squatting knees, and I hug her because I think she may need it but then I realize it was me that needed it. Ralston refused to go with the ambulance last night so he is holed up at Mama D's. Word is, he needs to be in a hospital. Ten minutes later all the children are gone.
After the tuna casserole, (one of my specialties) there is little left for me to do on this Sunday, so I watch football, read, and sleep.
Another Great Flood 9.11.98
The car has started floating a bit towards Broad.
Hot Fudge Sundae 8.31.98
Started the day with an hour of bumper to bumper on the return trip from dropping M at a Regional Medical Center where she acts as a grant writer/journal editor. Vacations are not always free of trafffic. I take many deep breaths until I finally turn onto Dumaine and find myself behind the garbage collectors. Amazing work. Guys should be given medals. "Hey, watch how you throw my can around you effin bum." Rolling towards the curb I grab the handle of the trash can formerly owned by Yolanda, which is standing in the street in the middle of my parking space, and fling it onto the sidewalk while continuing to roll up to the curb. I am not without talents.
I want to take myself out to eat breakfast but I'm afraid my social skills are ebbing low so I throw half a pack of bacon in a pan on slow fry and chop up some already baked potatoes and throw them in another pan with butter and olive oil and then the phone rings and I tell the credit card solicitor that Jim Louis is not home. But if they call back later he will be sure to ignore them entirely.
And then I take a quick bath while the doorbell rings urgently, which I almost always ignore as well, but the kids should all be in school by now and a part of me is believing it could be Ed McMahon and I just cannot afford to lose out
on the chance for that miserable fortune. I hurry the bath along, I can shave later, and go to the door, but no one is there. I show myself on the porch in case anyone wants to yell out to me, but no one does.
I crank up the heat on the bacon and potatoes. When the bacon is done I scrape the pan pretty clean, add some butter, and two eggs, and then get some bread to toasting.
It turns out to be a bacon and egg sandwich with hashbrowns. And I crave ice cold cranberry juice but craving is as close as I'm going to get, so I pour me some Dr. Pepper.
The doorbell rings again and it's Mama D and she knows she's never done this before but can she borrow twenty until tomorrow, this man selling a case of silverware.
"Of course."
I call Buddy and he says if I come over and tighten his neckbrace for him he'll smoke a joint with me. Deal.
We smoke in Audubon Park underneath the biggest live oak tree either one of us has ever seen but before that we have a beer at one of those places that serve 500 different kinds of beer. The Budweiser cost $2.50 a bottle. But it is the closest place to Buddy's new crib and he is known there, and they seem to tolerate his sometimes intolerable bullshit, and the barmaid it turns out is one of the dog walkers down at the bayou. I don't always like it when the world gets smaller. Buddy shows me these (relief?) carvings they have hangingall over the bar and says how you have to be dead and famous to be up there and how the one of Sister Teresa is holding a bottle of Bishop's Finger beer. I guess that's cute, or something, but I'm not really getting a feel for it, and, as I point out to Buddy, we left our beers at the bar.
After the beer and weed we hit one of the pricey uptown ice cream shops and have hot fudge sundaes.
"Where should we eat now Buddy?" and he suggests Ye Olde College Inn, and as we enter, all the oldtimers who are occupying every seat at the bar, turn and stare at us, and I say to Buddy that it looks like we are the only ones not at home here today, so we mosey on. Back to Cooter Brown's, with all those beer choices, and I have two more Bud's and a truly mediocre ribeye sandwich, and Buddy has a rootbeer and cheese fries.
There are a few college girls at the bar, smoking cigarettes, and drinking beer. The Barmaid is yucking it up with them and says--"and Mother Teresa is holding a Bishop's Finger," which gets a pretty big educated laugh
Death Defying Acrobats 8.7.98
The pigmentation and emaciation give me no advantage that I can see, walking
up Orleans towards Broad from the Claiborne bridge. It was a starting place
for my walk home that offered Bossman the least contact with the scary black
people. I find it neither offensive nor funny that Bossman finds this place
scary, as most right minded people would.
The three story brick buildings which make up the Lafitte Projects will
backdrop the left side, across the four divided lanes of Orleans, for about
eight blocks, until I get to Rocheblave. On the right side, where I'm at, the
sidewalk is fronted with stores and houses. It is not necessarily a
threatening experience, even with the walking knowledge that a lot of blood
has been spilled on these corners: at Johnson, at Galvez, at Miro, at Tonti,
at Rocheblave, and Dorgenois, and Broad. Mostly it is knowing that you are
being checked out, and sized up. Tall, skinny, long haired white boy equals
crackhead.
At Johnson, "Whereyat red?"
"Not looking," I say.
At Galvez, "What'sup slim?"
"Not looking."
And I could turn right at Rocheblave, or Dorgenois, and walk the two blocks
into Dumaine but instead I stay to the outskirts, right on Broad, past St.
Ann, and then home sweet Dumaine. As I turn the corner the boys are in front
of Yolanda's trying to stack three mattresses so that they can perform death
defying acrobatic tricks...
...Which is where they are today as I pull up with Kevin (I'm not afraid to
drive you to your home), and Jacque says, "Who is that, your brother."
"A friend from work," I say.
Lance says, "Watch this Mr. Jim," and he takes off running, catapulting high
off the mattresses to perform a beautifully executed front flip, and when his
feet (instead of his head) hit the sidewalk I am impressed and relieved.
"Wow, cool," I say, and so they all line up--Shelton, Glynn, Fermin, Jacque,
and Lance, and do flips for their new audience.
Later, waking up from a nap cluthching my pillow lover, I am aware that M
is being followed into the house by two very quiet pint-sized desperados.
I told him awhile back, "you just have to be patient Shelton, you'll see M
again, it's all about waiting sometimes."
And when I enter M's room Shelton is playing Venus, Goddess from Mars on
the computer, and Jacque is on the couch trying to hide behind a small green
flexible Gumby figure so that I won't see him and throw him out.
"Boy, you kint hide behine sumthin it ain't bigger 'n yur haid," and I cuff
him a few times upside his natural, and throw in a body blow or two, while he
trys to figure out why one day things are this way, and the next day they
ain't.
Nine Inch Brains And Packin' 8.8.98
"Its not that bad around where you live," Kevin said. No single
assessment of this area says it all, not the rap lyrics--"Man this world we
livin in ain't nothin but drama, everyone wanna harm ya," nor me saying--"The
corner of Dumaine and Broad has a long history of criminal drama, some days
it seems like a post-apocalyptic nightmare out there, and then we might go for two or three weeks running where there is no visible activity at all."
Last night sitting on the porch listening to Van go on about Isaac (aka. BB),
who is the latest in a long line of tenants over at the hitman's house. BB
is no longer an official resident of the house as his mama threw him out
for stealing twenty dollars from her purse. Some days BB and J Nixon run
around together and other days BB and Van are best pals.
"He don't come back with my money or that inner tube for my bike and I'm gonna
hurt the motherfucker, and J too if he wanna stand behind it."
"Oh, J's talking like that?"
"Yeah man."
"That would hardly be an afternoon's work do you think?"
"Nah man, waste of my time and energy, but this the third time BB run this
game on me."
"Hard to be friends with someone always taking you for a fool."
"That's it, slim."
BB's a pretty likeable drunk and he goofs with the neighborhood kids, which is
nice, but we had a long talk the other night and I quickly put him in that
category called--Trust him as far as I can throw him.
"Like sometime maybe you come home from work and I see you and I buy you a
beer, and we be chillin' out here, and then sometime when I need a beer or
somethin' you would be there for me."
"It may work that way BB, or it may not."
"Okay, okay," BB laughs, realizing I may be a chump of a different order.
But last night is pretty quiet, very little traffic. And the teenage girls
across the street are probably bemoaning this, but when Van goes around
the corner for a beer, the scene changes abruptly, and there is in front of me
five or six shiny new cars driven by young men, and the girls, perhaps over
eager, jump to it, and are out in the street performing flirtation services.
Now the first two cars, the Maxima, and the 4Runner, seem pretty happy about
this turn of events as they are surrounded by teenage girls, eager to please
or tease. The third car in line, however, a gold Saturn occuppied by two
handsome, yet surly and ignored youths, quickly go from interested to
impatient.
"Niggers be rolling around here," I hear the driver say, and watch him as he
surveys the street. But as the girls do not seem to know these boys (which
makes me a little nervous), and surly angst seems to be their only stock in
the charisma trade, the boys, not knowing what else to do, get angry and start
honking their horn. The first two cars join in thinking this is all good fun,
and the girls are laughing and screaming and the Dumaine Symphony is short
lived as the passenger in the gold Saturn steps from the car and...the Maxima
and the 4Runner take off for the corner, where, with super revved engines and
squealing tires, they fishtail onto Broad and into the night. The other five
or six cars follow suit and quick as that Dumaine all sleepy again.
Cinematic Misbehavior 8.13.98
So how come if you take those boys out every Sunday we don't get a boy story
every Monday?
Often I am disappointed or appalled by their behavior and do not wish to spend
Sunday night recalling it.
I am waiting for Fermin, Hunter, Shelton, Jacque, and Glynn after the movies
let out. I saw Horse Whisperer and bought them tickets for Titanic knowing
that they would be roaming between all the theaters. Fermin and Glynn with
the more shy Hunter backing them up tell me that Shelton got into a mild
altercation with a woman in the theatre and called her "a white B." Racial
and gender intolerance are two qualities I have really been trying to instill
in the boys over the last two years so you can imagine my pride.
I don't say a word and neither does Shelton, which does in a way make me
proud--to know that at least he has that much sense.
"And Fermin peed on the seats," Jacque said.
That's some sort of euphemism I'm thinking. And then they all join in and it
seems that maybe all of them are guilty of "peeing" on the seats. Were they
jacking off in the theatre?
"You could hear it when it hit the seat, Fermin," Shelton said.
Maybe they were really peeing, or jacking off, good god. Help.
I'm very quiet as they go on about all of this, fully detached, floating high
on a cloud above the Aleutian Islands.
King Of Scream 8.15.98
On the porch last night and someone in a passing car is yelling at me. It's
Billy, Mama D's youngest son, and father to Lance the Acrobat, and he wants to
apologize for his behavior at the Night Out Against Crime block party a couple
of weeks back. He says he called and left a message on the answering machine
a few days ago but I have to plead ignorance because I don't ever check the
messages.
"That was nothing," I said.
"But ya'll part of that Neighborhood Watch thing and I just wanted to say I'm
sorry for the way I acted."
"Okay Billy, it's good," I said, as he drove away.
That night in question Billy's older brother Joe Nixon and I were sitting next to each
other and Billy was standing in front of us. Billy was making fun of the
macaroni salad with prunes that I was eating. The woman who made it had
suggested I try some, and why not? I had just risked getting a hernia by
pulling this woman to an upright position after her chair had collapsed
backwards onto the sidewalk. Joe had then come over and bent the iron legs in
such a way as to prevent that happening again, and then seated himself. Joe
is trying to nod off and Billy is pestering him by suggesting that he may
stick his penis in Joe's mouth while he sleeps. Joe is very tired and says,
"come on brah, stop all that," but Billy can't stop so Joe pushes him in the
chest and Billy pushes Joe so hard that the chair is now falling backwards
again onto the car of the people that Phylis rents the other side of her house
to, and people are screaming and jumping up to stop this embarrassing night
out against crime incident, but other than the reflex action of grabbing for
Joe's arm as he flew backward, I just sit there and sip some of Mama D's
Canadian Club, and chase it with a Budweiser.
Evelyn comes over and says, "Jim, I want you to meet my little nephew, my
oldest brother's son, the one that got killed over across the street, they
ain't been back over here in all those years since it happened." And we are
introduced, his name is Glynn, and he ain't little, and he attends St.
Augustine, the all boys Catholic school and basketball powerhouse. I ask him
if he knows Eddie Green as I point across the street to Van's house. "Oh
yeah, he knows him, same school," Evelyn says and then she goes on for a good
while telling Glynn how he is family and even though his mama never brought
him over here all these years, they still family and we been loving ya'll all
this time. Kizzy comes over and Glynn seems interested and then Glynn's
sister is introduced to me and Evelyn says, "show
him your tattoo," and the sister lifts the short sleeve of her blouse to show
me on her upper arm one of those RIP tattoos which have become pretty popular
in this area as the number of murdered fathers continues to grow.
A Recent Midnight
On the Friday after that Thursday I saw the naked lady out front I did not go to work. I was too tired and a little bit upset, although the degree to which I was upset lessened as the minutes and hours passed and I was able to put perspective on a thing I would have just as soon not witnessed, or thought about.
I saw my boss the next Tuesday or Wednesday and he asked me did I not go to work on Friday. I told him I didn't but went in on Saturday to take care of the thing that needed taken care of. He was just curious because one of the supervisors had called him that day and bugged him two or three times and my boss put him off by assuring him I would be there. "No, I never was there that day," I told him. And with bags probably still under my eyes from the lack of sleep that night and a tone I guess he recognized from the previous seven years of dealing with me, I asked him, "do you want to know why?" His too quick and adamant, "No!" offended me some but that's okay, I'll get the story out of my system eventually.
Actually, on that Saturday I'd worked I was able to bounce the story off on Dave, the sheetrock guy. Dave was doing some repair work and I was painting the kitchen a Chinese restaurant red color. Dave drives in from Mississippi and says stuff like--I may be a Mississippi Redneck, but I'm not stupid. I would say that neatly sums up first and second impressions concerning Dave. Also, he is a good listener. I was well into my telling and he had asked some good questions and made substantial obervations long before he queried me-- "well, was she uh, I mean, how did she look?" She was blond, I mean blond, truly, and she had that blond skin to match, but, you know, under the circumstances there was nothing sexy about it, and well, she appeared, I mean, her behavior was such, I mean, she seemed demented. Dave nodded knowingly.
I was asleep but I guess I wasn't because I heard a few words spoken out there on the street and then the slamming of a car door and the screeching of tires. Watchdog started barking and I tried to go back to sleep. You can't get up for every little activity around here or you would never get any rest.
I did eventually get up and look out though, and that's when I saw her, the completely naked white woman, standing in the middle of the street, in the middle of the block, under the street lamp, her clothes strewn around her, in a black neighborhood in front of the only white guy's house for blocks and blocks around and I knew immediately I was outmatched, that the circumstances were beyond my ability to effectively control them. And that I was going to have to deal with the emotion of feeling cowardly.
You are supposed to help people if they are thrown naked from a vehicle in front of your home.
I know but...
How could there be a but, maybe she was injured and needed emergency medical care and...
No she was okay, trust me. She spent a good while being naked. She did pirouettes under the street lamp. She at one point was flat on her back, with knees raised, and just laying there, mumbling, and idly tapping her left foot against the asphalt. I saw all of her. There were no contusions or abrasions and certainly no deep, gaping, bleeding wounds that needed attending to...
Head injury perhaps, certainly not something you would see any evidence of from a distance, and perhaps this head injury was cause for her behavior; and you're not a doctor, are you?
Naw, Ima housepainter.
I'm sure the world needs painting now and then.
I just didn't want anyone to think she was like my date, she wasn't my type, I don't have a social standing here, I am a blank slate and maybe I didn't want her and me to be a snapshot for the neighborhood. There is no way she would not look like she was my date if I just went out there and tried to reason with a woman who was at least feasibly a Tulane St. hooker who got taken for a bad ride and dumped naked in front of another white person's house. And then what, most obviously offering her a ride somewhere? And leaving the scene of a crime with a formerly naked hooker? I'm not denying the cowardice, but there was also a small meaure of good sense involved in my not dealing personally with this particular naked white woman.
You should have at least called the police.
Yes, I think I could do that. This incident was in fact the deciding factor in me finally getting a phone. So I got one now. I think I could call the police next time.
But a few days later you didn't call when that "crazy"? gentleman was under your house.
I think I could do it next time a naked lady shows up like that. I feel bad for her, but whataya? I mean she did not seem in any hurry whatsoever to put her clothes on. She just stood out there, for minutes, rambling about something I could only hear a few words of. She tried on her pants at one point. She rolled them up like, and maybe they were, pantyhose, but they were bell-bottomed and her top was unremarkable and I forget the shoes. But she had taken the pants off because when the three black chicks arrived she was again naked. It seemed the white chick was talking trash to the three black chicks because at one point one of the younger black girls called out--We trying to help you but you refusing it. And then the naked white woman said something the older of the black women did not like and she called the naked lady a white ho. The white woman was now sitting down in the middle of the street and she responded to this, in a conversational tone of voice, no, my daddy was black, my daddy was black. The three black women retreated up the street but came back a minute later and the elder woman got in an argument with the naked lady and ended up cold cocking her pretty hard upside the face. The three women then left for the second time. The effect of this regrettable physical jolt to her system was, happily, to focus her attention on getting her clothes back on and getting out of this unfamiliar neighborhood. Fully clothed she lingered at the Iberville corner. She called out to a man lurking at the Bienville corner, asking him for a light She kept calling up the block, do you have a light? Do you have a light? The man approached from the left and they talked and then she started following him back towards the Bienville corner, her on one sidewalk, him on the other. A police cruiser crawled up the street and after it passed the white woman crossed over and joined the black man and they exited stage left, following the cruiser.
Do Not Read This, Sucker
It is very peaceful here and safe-feeling inside this Rocheblave house. That's what I want to say right off the bat. That is first. It's like a neat, tidy, secure suburbia inside here. I have the second hand yellow-gold damask couches to prove it. And my lights are on dimmer switches and I have ceiling fans. There is a little crime here in these neighborhoods, or a little more than a little, I guess, but maybe its just the right amount for the some of us who without the occasional risk of harm start forgetting what the point is or why we are here or tend towards the attitude that everything is a joke and not a very good one at that. New Orleans is my Prozac, and the money I save on mood altering drugs I am able to spend on...well, mood altering drugs. I mean beer of course. Please do not lump me with those heathens like Suzy who buy the seemingly harmless dime bag of weed from the local dealer who surprise suprise is only two or three circles away from the evil drug lord who kills babies in the pursuit of his empire, thus, let me spell it out for you--Suzy is a baby killer. YOU are a baby killer.
I recently exchanged brief emails with my best friend, who lives in Northern VA., and I wanted to know how the sniper was affecting his life and he said it made filling up your gas tank more exciting. That is what it is like here everyday. And even within the snare of day to day drudgery wherein you take all that is precious for granted you are kept alive by the fact that that very life you are taking for granted is not a guaranteed thing. It is an equation inside of which it is hard not to appreciate life. Even the drudgery can be a sweet thing. Of course, during the summer months here, all bets are off, and the mind can be as scary as the city is dangerous. Even then though, when one might find oneself simply not caring what the fuck happens, the city is always there to heed the call of the ailing mind. It can be there for you, to cradle you in its most desperate potential. It will test you. It will ask you to consider how much you really don't care and it will force you to look at more than you may wish to see. This city loves you, but it does not coddle you, and if you ask it to, it will kill you. Always--of course, but it seems somewhat an exaggerated truism here--be careful what you ask for.
And these are the words of a relatively priviledged working class white guy. This city is predominately working and poverty class black, surrounded by suburbs of working and professional whites who are mostly, and often for good reason, scared of everything this city represents. There is a lot of resentment. White people who should know better often demean by lame verbal caricature the local black citizenry. I don't mean to belabor the point but I need to make the setting clear. There is desperation and seperation here that is not so far removed from the images projected in those postcards they used to make of the lynchings of black people, where the most horrifying thing is really not the dead black man (or woman), neck broken, twisting in a tree, but the carnival-like atmoshpere exhibited by the throngs of white people, children even, who are laughing and smiling, not a troubled look among them.
I am perhaps a little bit disquieted by the implications and intonations that occurred today at work between a group of people I would label as the most liberal minded I am commonly around. Words and ideas thrown around that make me sad because I cannot effectively dispute them. I cannot be allowed to be more qualified to distinguish between black and white in my descriptions and yet I am so (quietly) offended if I myself hear it done in a way I deem improper.
Okay man, thanks for the ramble, what a deep thinker you are, get to the meat.
Well yeah, uh, I had been thinking on that particular early evening while looking out the side door, now exposed to more of the outside world since the tearing down of the dance hall, that it's really pretty amazing that no one has stolen the garden hose my friend bought for me and strategically wrapped around two of the piers holding up this house. And later sleeping soundly--like through tornadoes I have slept--I hear at 2:30 a.m. what sounds exactly like the unwrapping of that very hose. Watchdog next door is barking. I have evolved off of the floor to sleeping on the couch, the one that used to be at Dumaine and cradled Shelton for almost a year. And don't ask me about Shelton, I'll tell you when I'm good and goddamn ready. The couch is in the front room, a few feet from the front door. I got up, opened the door, and stepped out onto the front porch. I took a few steps to the left, opposite the side with the hose, toward my only bit of private yard, if you don't count the unprivate fact that it runs along the chain-linked backside of five Bienville-fronting homes. I can sense that underneath the house--which is up on piers almost three feet off the ground--is a man, as opposed to the semi-frequent roaming wild dogs, and I shout to this human to get the fuck from under my house. I wish I did not cuss so much, as I know it suggests coarseness, ill-breeding, and lack of imagination. The man, shirtless, black, barrel chested, with a gut to match, and blue jean dungarees slipped down low enough to show his butt crack, comes as if shot from a cannon from under the house out into the middle of the twelve foot wide, six foot high, chain-link enclosed side yard. All the above rap about setting, history, and desperation, is what I am asking you to hear in this man's voice. He is ranting, hyperventilating, pleading.
"Please man please you gotta help me they after me they after me, oh god, please man help me!!!"
This desperate pleading disarms me and in equal measure puts me on guard. This same evening there would be two (probable drug war related) murders and also a 16-year old and a 36-year old man would knock on the door and be let into the home of the 16-year old's uncle, and then the older perpetrator would proceed to chop the 82-year old uncle in the forehead with a meat cleaver in the effort to rob him. He, the victim, has improved recently from critical to guarded condition. This incident, I forget now what my rules are concerning the distinguishing between black and white, involved all white people in a relatively affluent uptown neighborhood. So I guess the two murders were black killing black? You're not allowed to know anymore, which is good, and bad. I have read vintage turn of the century New Orleans newspaper accounts that qualified all non-white people as "colored." Certainly that is not an ideal accounting. But as things pertain to crime the color of a perpetrator's skin, for the purposes of indentification, is as pertinent as whether or not the perpetrator was a man or a woman, and without checking, I think the newspaper does condone free use of the distinguishing gender pronouns. That's another discussion though and is one I'm not sure which side I would stand on. I guess if I were adequately discussing it I would be standing on both sides. Whenever possible the newspaper prints a picture, which effectively cancels this discussion, but when they don't, and the crime is one of gross violence, I think, for the edification of a concerned public, it would be appropriate, in addition to describing what the man or woman was wearing, to tell the color of the person's skin. In a town of nearly 50/50 black/white pigmentation, I think it is appropriate. I think, as far as racism goes, it is more racist not to distinguish the color of a criminal's skin color because it leaves the reader to guess, and make generalizations, based on location, type of crime, name, spelling of names, and other such confusing factors.
Mane, are you gonna tell the story or not?
Which one?
The crazy man under your house, the naked lady, the meat?
I can hardly see that I'll get to the naked lady.
Gahddangit, I knew you wouldn't get to the naked lady. You suckering your readership.
Readership? That's a big word, gahddangit.
Mane, fuck you.
Watch the language please, I thought we were going to work on that.
No, "we," did not agree on nothing like that.
It's so unnecessary. It makes us look bad.
"We" ain't "us." Tell the thing man. You so sorry. That little day in the life you posted and then that thing you said at the end about the naked lady. You knew that was as cheap a trick as posting in bold letters, Don't Read This.
I like that. I saw it in the back of a comic book once.
You such a pussy.
Man, please, the language!
Maaane, Pleeze, the language.
You're a little bit scary.
So are you.
Just tell the damn story, fewest syllables, no editorializing.
Okay Slim, for you, this is for you--the man was pleading. I asked him who was chasing him. I wanted to know, gangbanger or cop. Gangbanger, he on his own, cop, I might let him take his chances hiding under the house. Its not right but its what I thought. And that goes for everything else that happens. He tried to scale the fence, and then suddenly skirted under and around and me and him were sharing the same world. He was very agitated. I was sympathetic but basically utterly frightened, concerned only for my own well-being. He offered up to me a single black patent leather shoe. That had happened before and I could not figure why it was happening now. No, man, I don't want that, I said. He came around from the side to the front and walked up the steps while I told him not to. Don't come up here, I said. Why are you coming up here? The man could have snapped me like a twig. He was still pleading desperately for help but would give no clue as to the nature of his demons. The only thing I cared about at that point in time was living to be 110-years old. The last thing he said to me was, could I just come inside for a little while? Without excusing myself I took two steps, opened the door, stepped inside, slammed the door, and flicked the deadbolt all in one more or less fluid motion. The man moaned and took off down the steps, across my driveway, and into the street. He walked toward Iberville. I went into my hallway and picked up the shotgun that got leaned against a door jamb during one recent murdering crime spree that made me feel vulnerable. This was more real though and I suddenly wasn't sure I wanted to live to be 110 that bad. I put the gun down and went to the front door glass and looked out. The man came back from Iberville, stage right, and walked up Rocheblave to stage left. A few seconds passed and then a man on a bicycle wearing a light blue warmup suit appeared from stage right. He called out to the agitated man, whom I could no longer see. Hey dag, com'ere, the man in the light blue sweats said all business-like. Then he too disappeared stage left. And I had bought the phone three days previous because of the naked lady incident. But I wasn't moving for it even as I waited for what seemed a most real possibility--murder. I was paralyzed by what I don't know, but weakness would be a good guess. This was preternatural silence, waiting for the gunshots. Please don't kill, please don't kill, please don't kill, I most lamely, and silently, admonished the night. The agitated man reappeared and went into the side yard of my neighbor across the street and begged to be let in. He was ignored or told to go away, and go away is what he did, panting, and ranting back towards Iberville.
Later, on the couch, trying to sleep a few more minutes before going to work, I looked across the room and I could almost see him there, on the love seat, curled in the fetal position, one hand between his knees, the other in a fist with thumb extended, in his mouth.
Things I Forget
I'm working out by the lake on this house these people are having built at the site where their previous home burned to the ground. The next door neighbor says I look just like her brother, and, as far as I remember of that first meeting, apropos of nothing, said something about being part Lebanese (although that would have been my last guess as to the heritage of this petite blond woman), and I said oh that must be the connection, I am half Lebanese. She has been very friendly to me, which is a thing I had forgotten I cared about, until I realized I was missing it.
I'm looking out my window now at my next door neighbor's twenty foot palm tree. The bottom fronds are dead, the color of wheat, and are soaking up the evening Fall sun in such a way as to make them look plugged into a life source. There are the frail limbs of a weed tree with vibrant green leaves both in front and behind this vision of life infused death and the jagged remaining background sky is so blue as to look fake. I'll say nothing of the small puffy white clouds so evenly spaced as to imply the imagination of an amateur.
Right before the sun drops behind the auto title establishment to my west the dead palm fronds glow like they on fire, or like Tom Waits says, all Halloween orange, and I take a couple sips of stout beer and daydream about nothing, staring straight ahead at glowing words I don't understand while listening to another neighbor like clockwork call out for his ancient aging Sheba.
When I look back just a little bit of time has passed, the light has changed, and the fronds are sad scum soaked brittle-looking dead vegetation. The sky has no color. The clouds have blown away, and I'm not one word closer to describing what I sat down to describe--that recent midnight a woman got thrown naked from a car in front of my home.
Brainless Pleasure
You know, if you don't own one, not watching TV is not really much of an accomplishment, or even that much of a laudable preference, I think, because you are never testing your implied conviction that not watching TV allows you to make better use of your time. I say this with all the vehemence of a person who had more or less gone twenty years without a TV in residence and then just went out and bought a five-inch black and white. This year I wanted to watch, instead of listening to on the radio, the New Orleans Saints football games. I really wanted to indulge in a simple brainless pleasure; is that so wrong?
At the risk of sounding as tedious and overbearing as a born again Christian or a recent non-smoker who acts all disdainful of his former nicotine soaked buddies (by the way, its been one thousand four hundred and eighty-eight days since I have smoked any kind of tobacco), I say to you my non-TV owning brethren, get off your mescaline soaked high horses and plop your asses down on that couch. I say mescaline soaked because it just popped into my head. I'm lying. I heard it on TV. I haven't been able to limit my viewing to just Sunday football games. I have watched a few other programs, occasionally bordering on what you might call faithful viewing. I sometimes forget to be faithful though, if I'm reading, or tranced out. One of the new shows I would see countless promotions for and thought looked ridiculous was Push, Nevada. But after watching the first episode--I had come out of a trance state and had time to kill--I thought the show might have promise. One of the characters asked the lead character, a perpetually befuddled, earnest, truth seeking IRS investigator (what a great idea for an anti-hero), if he had received mescaline as a painkiller for the tattoo he had just gotten. It's like that Monty Python bit--"...I think there's too much sex on television, I mean, I keep falling off...," except this one goes--I think there's too much mescaline on television, I mean, I keep tripping over it. Thank you, thank you very much.
For the purposes of this particular piece of preposterous babbling I'm pleading innocent to knowing anything about mescaline. I learned about it on TV is what I'm telling you. TV provides education as well as brainless pleasure. Go on, go on out and get you one. Saints are 6-1.
Positively Puzzling 7.22.98
Poochie's four year old daughter, Shentrell, and Shentrell's cousin, Erica, and her nine-year old uncle, Marqin, are
pestering me for a puzzle when I come home yesterday.
"I'll have to ask M," and when I do I agree with her that someone will have to be
with them or our dwindling supply of donated puzzles will be one less because
by act of God or just common carelessness the puzzle will be lost, stolen, or
destroyed, if two four-year olds and a nine-year old are not somewhat
supervised.
And neither M nor I are interested in heat of the day porch sitting.
And that is exactly what I eloquently explained to Erica, Shentrell, and
Marqin.
"So go get us one Mr. Jim," Erica said.
"I know you wouldn't lose it on purpose," I go on, gently and expertly.
"Which one you gonna bring out," Erica demanded to know.
"Yeah, bring the puzzle, Jim," Shentrell said.
"We won't lose it really, Mr. Jim," Marqin said.
And this goes on for awhile until they have me where they want me--broken,
unsure, and full of self-doubt, the three sisters of invention, so I relent,
crafting as I go.
"OK, I'll get one, but not one of the one's you really like, and if you all
three can play together nicely and not destroy the puzzle, then maybe on
another day I will let you play with a good one."
"Yea," they exclaimed.
And then, just for the hell of it, I give Marqin some explicit instructions,
and shut the door.
About an hour later the doorbell rings, and rings, and rings, some knocking,
and more ringing. "I'll get it," I said to myself.
I open the door and the three of them are stark raving mad with bubbling
enthusiasm.
"Here it is Mr. Jim, we didn't lose it, see," Marqin said to me with big teeth
smiling.
"Yeah, we thought we lose two pieces but we sittin' on 'em," Erica stammered.
"We sitting on 'em," Shentrell giggled.
"Erica was sittin' on one, and Shentrell sittin' on the other," Marqin
explained.
What a bunch of nerds, I thought.
"You are the greatest children in this whole world, and I am happy to know
you," I said.
Erica and Shentrell offer me kisses which I gladly accept, and thanking Marqin
I began shutting the door while pushing Shentrell's tiny hand from the jamb.
And tonite's play on Dumaine was as pure as this life will offer, but I don't
have the words for it.
A Guarded Good Morning 7.19.98
Heading for the river at 7 a.m. I see as I cross Bourbon and then Royal, on St.Peter,
an ambulance and some victims at the corner of Chartres--fat white brawling
tourists, and their blood, begin dotting the sidewalk. Following the drops I come to the
motherlode spot, ouch, and glance over to see a victim shimmied onto a
stretcher. And a pile of poop steams at the base of a no parking sign, the
obligatory vomit and the urine and beer make the sidewalk slick. And plastic
cups and paper fill the gutters
Heading home over flagstone with the Pontalba on my left and the wrought iron
of Jackson Square to my right. A black woman about my age in colorful ethnic
garb is sitting in the area reserved for artists and fortune tellers. The area
surrounding her on the bench is filled with treasure laden shopping bags.
Fifty feet away and I have entered her space and acknowledged her presence in
an offhanded way. At twenty feet I make shaded eye contact. Her eyes are
more tired and experienced than mine. Her expression is guarded, hopeful, and
resigned. And I know what she means by that and it makes me smile at her, and
say, "good morning." She returns my smile and years drip off her face, for
but a second, and then its gone, as if her cheek muscles, unpracticed and out of
shape, cannot bear the weight of momentary happiness.
I Saw Movies
I've seen some movies this summer. Here's what I think.
Down here in New Orleans, where men are men, except in the Quarter, where sometimes men are women, and you start questioning your sexuality, or the just the general idea of sexuality, because you really couldn't tell the difference, obviously you couldn't, the way you were staring at that woman (who turned out to be a man), surely a manly man could tell the difference, and eventually you console yourself with some laissez faire rigamarole like its only a chromosome or two separating the sexes anyway so don't be so hard on yourself, live and let live, go to a chick movie if you want. And back and forth and back and forth I went just to get up the nerve to go see Possession with Gwyneth Paltrow. I have two words for the movie: ick.
After all that though (my indecisiveness concerning Possession went on for days), I was all steeled up, so it was nothing at all for me to go see The Good Girl with Jennifer Anniston. Two observations: pretty damn accurate portrayal of housepainters, and, Jennifer Anniston is ok when she's not on TV.
Staying with the theme of chick movies I also this summer saw XXX with Vin Diesel. Vin, as you may know, is a homosexual. I read that on the cover of a tabloid at the grocery store. I went to work with that news and said, "Jerry, did you know that Vin Diesel is a homosexual?" Jerry said, "No, Come on!!??" "Jerry," I said, "live and let live man, what do you care who the man buggers?" Jerry said, "I really don't care, I liked that last movie." So there you have that.
I didn't see Like Mike but I recommended it to my friend from France and she, stranded for seven days in Dallas, took her 12-year old son who is a basketball and hip hop fan. They thought it sucked. Too Disney-like. Time constraints, at least, prevented them from accepting my offer to round up some of the Dumaine kids for a street game during their short visit here last month. And I'm sure Cadillac Shelton would have consented to blaring the rap from his most adequate sound system. His taste in modern urban music--like I'm any kind of judge--is actually pretty decent. Of the crowd that would have likely been sitting on stoops that night, one is dead from a (possibly suicidal) motorcycle crash at the corner of Galvez and Orleans, one has seven recent bullet holes in his body, and one is in jail for car theft, a count of murder, and two counts of attempted murder. Nothing Disneyesque about the Sixth Ward of New Orleans.
Road to Perdition was slick, maybe a tad too slick, and stylized, but I liked it, at least partly, if not altogether, for the same reason I liked A-I--that reason being--Jude Law.
Speaking of Tom Hanks, I saw the Greek Wedding flick, because Jerry at work said he laughed his ass off. Jerry is dating. People who date tend to laugh their asses off for reasons that are not entirely clear to the rest of us. But single people, like myself, huddled alone, by themselves, wallowing in singularity, attempting to assure themselves that singularity is greaaat, require actual funny material to make them laugh. I did not laugh my ass off but did not either feel like I should be refunded my money. I'm happy for the lotto-esque success of the Greek standup comic/female lead.
I saw some other stuff, can't remember it though, but can say with the utmost certainty that it was all either ehh ok, or, hey man who you think you dicking with laying off crap like that? Oh yeah, Signs, with Mel Gibson, two words--yawn.
And Slim really liked Undercover Brother, gives it his one very enthusiastic double jointed thumb up.
The Mean Month
I'm hearing that distant helicopter again. Last night the search light blasted briefly through my undraped windows; it was better than the effect of a disco ball, even if I don't dance. I judged the distance by the muted sound of the chopper. Chopper is slang for helicopter. It is also what the local youth of the street call the fully automatic weaponry--some hybridization or bastardization of the Israeli Uzi or the Russian AK-47--that is so prevalent on their streets. But let's not talk about modern aviation and weaponry.
On Monday, with primitve motive and that relatively primitve butcher's knife, two youngsters, brothers they were, murdered a college student on Fourth and Magazine in the Irish Channel, adjacent to the Garden District. The student had adopted the admirable but bad habit of allowing those in need to come to his door for small monetary handouts. The girlfriend upstairs heard the boyfriend say he didn't have any money to give, she heard a struggle, went down, saw the two brothers carrying the student by his hands and feet, she then ran back upstairs and locked herself in the bathroom and dialed 911. When the police came they found the front door open, the boyfriend dead with two stab wounds in his chest, and apparently a couple of minor items stolen from the house. The girlfriend was noted to be (understandably) hysterical. Ten thousand dollars quickly added to the standard Crimestopper's reward (you can remain anonymous, identified by a file number, and don't have to testify in court) had the brothers dimed out and in jail within 24 hours. A third brother was arrested the next day for accessory after the fact--letting the brothers hide in his crib.
On Wednesday a major drug sting in the Iberville Projects (bordering the French Quarter to the north) culminated with 14 arrests. Police also collected 100 pounds of weed, 1.5 kilos of heroin, a few hundred rocks, 250,000 dollars in cash, and a tractor/trailer. A product of the First (police) District himself, new police chief Eddie Compass III remarks that the drug activity in and around the Iberville projects was directly related to the high murder rate for that area--25 per cent of the First District's 44 murders for the year have occurred in or around the Iberville. He boldly, perhaps too brazenly, stated that we will see a drop in the murder rate in that area. There have been two, possibly three murders near the Iberville in the three days since he said that, but we can still hope for better days.
For his part Chief Compass is determined to do more than just hope. He has enlisted the help of the state police and for a few days now there have been joint operations in the city's high crime areas. I assume the helicopter with the spotlight is part of that.
I am grateful for the efforts of the previous chief, Richard Pennington, who after losing his bid to be mayor, accepted the top job with Atlanta's police department. He did in his years here unquestionably bring improvement to a department nearly crippled with corruption. And he promised to cut the murder rate in half, and he achieved that. What I have lately come to realize though is that that promise was a bit of political snow (blow) job to ease the minds and hearts of the New Orleans citizenry, and which was at least somewhat calculated, I think, to pad the resume of a basically very decent guy with high ambitions. He was playing with a fairly obvious spike in the murder rate graph. The 420 murders that year were statistically very unlikely to recur, with even the slightest intervention from an improved police force. All I'm saying is--at the time it seemed like a remarkable thing to promise and when the promise came to be, we all got blinded by the apparent greatness of the accomplishment. We loved our chief. I don't know jack about statistics but I think what we have been left with here is something that goes by the title--the mean numbers. How appropriately descriptive that is. And I think our beloved chief knew that is what he was promising us.
Bottom line though, Richard Pennington was good for this city at a time when only an outsider could have affected the necessary changes. Now though, with our mean numbers to deal with every year, we are lucky to have a hometown boy in the trenches. I think Eddie Compass will be part of brighter future for this city. He's seen enough. We've all seen enough.
On Thursday, Eric McCormick, a young man I have known for several years, and have referred to by various names, was, while in jail for car theft, booked on one count of murder and two counts of attempted murder for an incident in New Orleans East back in December. His younger brother, Glynn, is one of the core Dumaine kids I used to spend time with each Sunday, and still see ocassionally.
On Sunday in the BW Cooper projects a crowd of nearly 200 people gathered to celebrate the murder of that project's most unfavored son, Alexis "Slam" Williams. While his family wept, word of the killing moved quickly throughout the complex and people came in numbers, kids eating candied apples and snacks, and adults drinking beer, as they gathered around and rejoiced at the sight of Williams' dead body under an oak tree. Suspected of several but charged with only one murder himself, Alexis Williams was a person no one would testify against.
On Monday, the Times Picayune's editorial department ran a scathing indictment against those people who celebrated the William's death.
On Thursday Leonard Pitts of the Miami Herald ran a column also lamenting the behavior of the residents of the BW Cooper (aka. Calliope) projects. He yearned for a day when such residents might gain the "intestinal fortitude" to deal with the Slam Williamses of the world by turning to the police before circumstances lead them to behave in such unkindly fashions as murder and celebration thereof.
Several days passed with no murderous crime reported. It is these days which keep the NO murder rate down as an end of year number. Which keeps this city in the top ten per capita murderville every year, but not number one.
Then tropical storm Isidore came through and dropped 25 inches of rain. The Wednesday before landfall the heaviest rains hit and I watched from my windows and front porch as Iberville Street, and half of my block of Rochebalve Street, flooded mildly. Three or four inches of standing water in my back and side yard were all there was at Rocheblave. I was at Dumaine today (Friday, long enough to realize the A: drive wouldn't accept my movie reviews, so nothing for the dmtree, but did not ask any of the ten or twelve teenagers residing therein how high the waters got. I did remind Glynn that his St. Louis Rams have lost eight in a row, but Glynn remained hopeful and loyal, which is a thing I greatly admire about him. He did not think my suggestion that perhaps Kurt Warner's contract with the devil having expired was a theory worth considering. It did not hold water, in his opinion.), and I could see the ruts in the grass of the neutral ground on Broad Street which prove the water got high enough to scare people to park their cars up there, a six inch advantage which often is all the difference between dry car and flooded, stinky carpeted car.
In the Wednesday-Thursday twenty-four hour period during which Isidore was all the worry, there did occur six murders. I have done the per capita comparison to a large city like New York before; in this case it would calculate out at 120-140 murders in a single day. Which I think would be world news. (Would link in nicely with the assassination style murder madness in DC/Maryland occurring a few days after this. I can't help hearing Barbara Walters reporting "tonight on 20-20, Madness in America, what is weely going on?")
One of the NO dead was a 7-year old kid named Ishmael, who while trying to protect his mother from being beaten by her 49-year old boyfriend was chased from the house by boyfriend and then repeatedly stabbed in the chest until dead, in broad daylight while stunned church-goers watched.
And the only reason the murder count wasn't 7 in a 24-hour period is because the gun jammed when the alleged gunman, 19-year old Bryan Nelson, fired at Amy Briede as she lay on the floor of her home in Fabourg St. John (near the Bayou St. John and the Fairgrounds), next to her husband Christopher, who had just been executed with a gunshot to the chest. Amy had been carjacked to the nearest ATM on Broad Street and was then brought back to the house where the gunman's accomplice(s) held hostage her husband. The click of the gun was her salvation, and she lives.
The hurricane Lili produced a frightening lot of wind. Between the two storms the most notable violence was the surviving of a man on N. Villere, in Treme, who was shot twenty-five times.
Invariably, those artists and celebrities of the cinema that come here from elsewhere, and are famous enough to be quoted, say the same thing when speaking about the unspeakable allure of New Orleans. They, each and every one, use the word "Ghosts" to describe what they most notice about this place. And they got that right. In many cases the blood is barely yet dried when they walk around that corner where reside the spirits they talking about.