Lucky in love, home in New Orleans

Gayarre Place, New Orleans, LA

When a city has been around for three centuries, it accumulates a lot of details.  A barge docked in the Mississippi River accumulates barnacles, why wouldn't the port city on the river's shore?  When you live in New Orleans, you accumulate memories.  Good memories.  The best kind.

We have lived in New Orleans four years, now.  It isn't as long as people who were born here.  It's not as long as other people who moved here before us.  It is long enough to be thoroughly charmed, to be caught in the city's web, to be captivated by its spell, but that really only took about fifteen minutes.  After that it's been all gravy and roux.

When you live in New Orleans, you can't help but gather up bits and notions that history leaves in your lap.  You can walk around the city with a camera, but I wouldn't recommend it.  When you have a camera, you are too focused on taking pictures.  When you don't have a camera, you are just busy enough to enjoy what you see.  The good memories will stick in your mind.  You won't need to be reminded.  The best memories will get better with each recollection and retelling.  

Since we don't have to worry about carrying things back home on a plane, we pick up what catches our fancy and we display them in our inn.

Remember the other day when I told you about Denise, who walks her dog past our house?  She is an artist and she painted a wine glass that she gave us, apropos of nothing aside from the fact that she likes the colors we painted our house.  That's what it's like to live in New Orleans.  Everyone is generous with their time, with their courtesy, and with their joie de vivre.  You can't help but smile when you walk down Esplanade Avenue.

Here's the wine glass Denise painted.  We keep it on our mantle in the dining room:

Denise's wine glass

When we first moved to New Orleans, we were lucky enough to meet a man who collects driftwood on the banks of the Mississippi River.  The land between the levee and the low water mark is called the batture.  This gentleman walks the batture with his significant other and his dogs, and he collects driftwood that he later assembles into objects that are both beautiful and functional.  He made the shelf that hangs over the mantle in our dining room...

The mantle in the dining room

When we saw the shelf in his studio, which is in Arabi, part of St. Bernard Parish, he had some shells on the shelf, by way of showing what the shelf could be used for.  When we purchased the shelf from him, his significant other insisted he throw in the shells as lagniappe.

Shells from the Mississippi River

The shells come from apple snails, which are an invasive species.  They are edible, but no one eats them much...yet.  Give it ten years and they will be on every fancy menu in town.  If there is anything that New Orleanians love, it is something to eat.  Ask a New Orleanian for a recipe and it always begins, "First you have to make a roux..."

We have a mirror on the mantle that we got from a local artist who we know quite well.  One of us thinks he is a genius.  Whether our estimation of his talent is correct or not, only time will tell.  When you look in this mirror, you can see your New Orleans face.  It's like magic.

Your humble narrator in the mirror

He also painted a picture that we have in our lobby.  It's a reproduction of a vintage sign that used to hang in streetcar stops along St. Charles Avenue.  He is as interested in New Orleans history as we are.  He is as much in love with the city as we are.  As much as anyone is, really.  Lucky in love, home in New Orleans.

Stops on the St. Charles Line

You never know what you'll pick up in New Orleans.  Most people leave venerating the city through fond memories they have gathered up while they've walked these storied streets.  Some people leave with venereal diseases they've contracted on Bourbon Street.  Esplanade Avenue is not Bourbon Street.  Our inn is full of stories, but it is a far cry from Storyville.

When you leave New Orleans, we hope you leave on a high note.  It is only the happy ending of a prologue, a prelude to future chapters to follow.  You will want to come back.  In a city chockablock with traditions, nothing is ever conclusive.  Good things live on and on.  The best things last forever.  Vive la Nouvelle Orleans, as the old Creoles like to say around the coffee shop counter.  Vive la Nouvelle Orleans, indeed.

This was someone's New Orleans face on St. Patrick's Day in front of our house:

Vive la Nouvelle Orleans

You can be who want to be in New Orleans.  You can dance like nobody is watching.  You can be happy.  You can be your best self. It's a nice place to be.

Long live New Orleans.

A votre santé,
La Belle Esplanade bed and breakfast.