I never lived in New Orleans. I never had to leave my home for a square foot in the Superdome. I never saw my roots drown before my eyes. But for a brief moment, just a month before disaster struck, my visit there showed me people and places I will not soon forget.
The hurricane occurred months ago, and many across the country have moved on, yet I remain haunted by the beauty that so suddenly disappeared.
The cab driver was friendly. Telling my friend and me that he always knew which music his customers liked, he flipped the radio to easy listening. We both grimaced but didn’t have the heart to ask him to change the station.
We got out of the cab and, already suffering under the humidity of July, rolled our suitcases into the yard, past the palm trees and up the steps. My friend April, our hostess, was all smiles, hugging us and showing the way into a small, high-ceilinged house. April is a lady, and her room, the little world she had created, reflected as much. Her landlord, Dino, came shuffling in later, and she explained that his new relationship kept him busy. Dino worked at the zoo with his girlfriend. He rarely spoke.
April had come to New Orleans to pursue an internship with the Times-Picayune. Never daunted, she learned to drive on the city highways. She, at 18, became the office pet, but this did not stop her from reporting every story with the utmost confidence. Her most important work was a series on the experience of Vietnamese immigrants, their hopes and struggles, already great in pre-Katrina New Orleans.
While April worked, my friend Eliza and I toured. We sampled boutiques. We watched the rain from wobbly tables, sipping café au lait as we waited for our beignets. The waiter, covered in powdered sugar, teased us for coming into his place twice in a single day.
We visited the Garden District, and after a few more stops and a few more purchases, April said we needed to meet her friend Joey. She gave no other details, and so I expected someone young or middle-aged, perhaps a mentor from the paper. I could not have been more wrong.
Like snatches of a Faulkner novel, Joey Bonhage’s long life was one of Southern mystique and foreign intrigue. He spent his days in an open house, making jewelry and botanical sculptures, the metal flowers so realistic I felt they must have had roots. His creations had once graced the home of Lady Bird Johnson, the former First Lady and his quiet patience made them that much more valuable. Several weeks before, April had done a profile of him for the newspaper, and his love for her spilled over to us in the form of faux pearl earrings, with the understanding that we would never wear them when she did.
That night we went to an art fair, winding around galleries’ white walls and sampling Bananas Foster. We ran into Dino and his girlfriend. Noticing a sign advertising free samples, we entered a half-finished restaurant. The owners excitedly told passersby to come in for their opening, then just weeks away.
The next morning promised an experience unusual for the three of us: a church service.
At its founding, St. Augustine’s was the most integrated church in the United States, as free African Americans bought pews for themselves and for enslaved men and women, competing with whites who wanted the rows for their families.Annually, the church hosts a jazz service as part of the Louis Armstrong Festival.
The warmth of the congregation, the enthusiasm of the minister, and the sheer joy of the music nearly brought tears to my eyes. For a moment, there were no boundaries, whether regional, racial or socioeconomic. We were all as one, steeped in the culture of a great city.
