I can see the neon light of the ferris wheel over in the Andouille Festival from the window of PJs. As I passed it on the highway, it seemed like the place to be in La Place this Saturday night. I spent last night again in New Orleans. Alex and I met up with a bunch of her Vassar friends at Washington park as they were preparing for a "girls' night out." How sexist, right? Nah, the few boys that were with them ended up joining them anyway. I met Zen and Zion, the two toddlers of the prototypical hippy, "Kim." Zion enjoyed eating dirt. I watched Alex get acupuncture performed on her by two visiting doctors. I watched Matt, a burnout from Connecticut, paint a wooden sign he found that had the word "Restaurant" engraved on it. I also talked to Ross, whose dog, Po Boy, bit the hell out of my arm because he probably smelled Jack on me. There was generally a positive vibe within the commune. They had raided the free clothes tent and decked themslves out in the poofy thrilly dresses and high heels. We went to the Hookah bar on Frenchmen which was back in action. We sat on the plush chairs and were serenaded by the various belly dancers that were seducing the patrons and flaunting the one dollar bills sticking out of their dresses like low grade strippers. We conversed with a few national guard troops that were enjoying a brief night off. They seemed to be enjoying themselves and asked politely that the pictures we had taken were censored, blacking out their faces and nametags. I was also priviledged to meet the one and only Kenya Jamar Rounds, a hilarious self-promoting injury lawyer of the New Orleans area. I cannot articulate how hysterical it was to hear the dialogue between him and one of the belly dancer/strippers when she recognized him from his billboard that lays in tatters on interstate ten. His excitement that his five thousand dollars a month had not gone to waste was like a prepubescent girl at an N'Sync concert ( I guess that simile is a little dated now, too late nineties). He stood up displaying his theatrical range and proclaimed that " The only thing I'm good at are my opening and closing statements. To be completely honest, I really don't know anything about law. That stuff in the middle puts me to sleep. As long as you have a good opening statement, you'll win the case. That's why I've won 99 percent of the cases I've tried. Here, have my business card. Bring me a case, but you better talk to me, butter me up." He was with his brother Jerome and cousin Ted. You can imagine how difficult it was to hold back tears. He actually ended up giving me his card twice. It was the quite the fun night even though I was exhausted.
I met a girl, Jessica, today at the coffee shop. I knew her name because it was tatooed on her arm. That's always been a little weird to me, people who have their names tatooed on them. She was really nice and had a thick southern accent. She had been living outside of Biloxi until her place got wrecked. She told me this crazy story about her five friends who had decided to wait for Katrina on the beach. They had been found dead around a burned out fire with their beer cans still in hand. It was frightening how easily she was able to laugh about it, but I guess people deal with tragedy in different ways. She also invited me to the local church's performance of " Heaven's Gate and Hell's Flame." I couldn't tell if she didn't know that I was Jewish or that she was subtly trying to convert me. Apparently the play asks all those souls who had not accepted Jesus in their hearts to come up on the stage at the end of it. Come to think of it, maybe her tatoo said Jesus and not Jessica. I can't help but feel intimidated by folks who are zealously religious. My religious tendenceies have dwindled over the years, and it's difficult to practice now because there isn't a synygogue within fifty miles of La Place. I probably wouldn't attend anyway though. I'll come back to God when I have children...that sounds really bad, yet true. I haven't decided yet if I'm going to go to the show or not. From my personal experience, I've found that people who are extremely dedicated to their religion don't completely understand those with a different faith, but those are only the ones I have come into contact with.
Well, the Ferris Wheel lights are still blinking. They remind me of the one and only song I ever wrote when I was back in college. The song was about some romantic date I was going to have in the future. I was going to meet some girl on the Jersey Shore and ride the Ferris Wheel. I used to go down to the boardwalk/ the amusement park when I was younger. The lyrics were as follows:
Decemeber 12th 2003,
A day carried on a Jersey Shore breeze.
After work, I wander to the shore.
Not quite certain, of what I'm searching.
I don't know where to look,
Or the signs I need to see.
I'll be the one with the smile on my face,
And you'll be the one smiling back at me.
You grab my hand,
and lead me through the crowd.
From a distance, the Ferris Wheel screams out.
We'll give a quarter to the man at the gate,
As the sun falls, the waves crash, and the Ferris wheel awaits.
As we climb into the night,
Our hearts beat fast together.
The Ferris Wheel of blue and white,
stands tall as she sheds her light.
As we look down, onthe streets below,
the city sleeps in darkness.
Another chance at star-crossed love,
The world cannot part this
December 12th 2003
You’ll hold me tight, as the descent gains speed
I’ll touch your face our eyes will lock
As our shadows dance beneath the boardwalk.
December 12th, 2003
I can’t blame you, but can you blame me?
I once had the world in the palm of my hand
And then you reduced me to what I am.
I know, I know, it's cheezy as hell. Guilty as charged. The only thing that seemed sad to me was that the date, December 12th 2003, came and went with no real consequence. I'm not claiming to be Nostradamas, but I think I had some glimmer of hope that it was a possibility. I'm not sure why I have this obsession with the Jersey Shore. I actually wrote my best short story about it too. I'll attach it to the blog for anyone who's interested. And on that note, I'm signing off.
http://gasussman.blogs.friendster.com/The%20sound%20of%20the%20quarter%20clange this is the site for the story...I hope. Sorry about the format. It may be frustrating to read.
