Last...

Alright, so I’ve been absent from my blog lately, much to the disappointment of my faithful readers (you know who the six of you are). But I have good excuses, as well as good stories.

January 27 – New Orleans day, 3 weeks to go

We met James’ friends Tommy and Holly at Barely Legal, one of the classy Hustler strip clubs on Bourbon Street. We enjoy the dance stylings of the regular Sunday afternoon ladies, who are equally nonplussed and amused to be dancing for a bunch of comedians and a table full of creepy older dudes. Eventually James, Tommy, Holly, Shawn, and Katy head back to the ship, leaving Peter and I to chat with one of the dancers, who we’ve dubbed Rainbow Bright, as she was wearing thigh high rainbow socks and not much else. Full of curiosity and Malibu rum I inquire as to how one learns to do their brand of pole acrobatics…classes? Trial and error? Certainly you can’t learn all the moves on the job, that would be embarrassing! But I am assured by our new friend that most of it is on-the-job training and mentoring by more experienced dancers. I am impressed. These girls defy gravity (shout-out to Jenna) on those poles. Before I know it, R.B. is off to dance and Peter and I begin gathering ourselves to get back to the ship. I am just about to put my jacket on when Ms. Bright grabs my arm and says, “Come play on the pole!” Huh? I look around and sure enough, no one is onstage, the DJ is playing background music and the drunk older dudes at the only other occupied table in the club are absorbed in cigars and convo. Well, why not? Encouraged by Peter’s wild laughter, I follow R.B. up to the nearest pole (there are two onstage). Dressed in my jeans and a long-sleeved black shirt, I follow her instructions – grab the pole and spin. Now what many people may not know about these brass poles is that they aren’t stationary; they spin within their floor and ceiling mountings. So spinning…yeah, it’s pretty fast and I was soon dizzy and in awe of these girls’ senses of balance. I learn from R.B. that one of the most basic things they learn is to climb the pole, which takes a good amount of quad strength and friction. Try it, she suggests. But I protest, “I’m wearing jeans, I’ll slide right down.” “So take them off,” is her simple solution. Now, for a regular girl like me, the idea of taking pants off in a public place is a little crazy. On the other hand, when you’re onstage with a couple of brass poles talking to a mostly naked girl and being soundtracked by the giggles of a castmate, taking your pants off sounds like a totally reasonable thing to do. So off go my pink Sauconys and my jeans, and now in the long-sleeved shirt, cotton undies and socks, I’m giving the pole-climbing a go. It is hard! Those girls are much more athletic than I would’ve ever given them credit for. At this point, another girl working that afternoon sees the mentoring session going on and wants in…Sunday afternoons are slow for these ladies. She runs up and eagerly demonstrates a move or two for me to try from the second pole. I give a couple of good tries, mostly just ending up dizzy, much to Peter’s and my own amusement. After a few minutes I decide my pants have been off long enough for one afternoon and I thank the ladies for their career counseling. R.B. hugs me, pushing my face into her bare chest and exclaims, “You dance on Bourbon Street!” She really earned that fiver that found its way into her g-string on my way out. I should mention that while I was onstage the Smashing Pumpkins’ “1979” was my dance music. Apropos.

February 3 – New Orleans day, two weeks to go

MARDI GRAS!!! I couldn’t have expected this. I really loved Mardis Gras. Now, we only saw it just revving up, as we were there on a Sunday afternoon, but wow was it a party. We watched some parades and walked around until the realization was made…we don’t have drinks in our hands! This is madness. And so we stopped at one of the many fast food style drinks stands and purchased a hurricane, which is basically a grain alcohol slushie. Blech. But I finished my $9 cross between Wyler’s punch and Dimetapp because I was at Mardi Gras! Then it was off to the Old Opera House to enjoy the zydeco music, collect beads and take crazy pictures for the rest of the afternoon. All aboard time 4:30? What? We took full advantage of our passenger status and ran onto the ship at 4:35 to the amusement of the cool officers who are accustomed to us pushing it every week. Thank goodness they like us. Good guys.

February 10 – Last New Orleans day, Last Week, Last Hurrah

Yesterday was our final full day in New Orleans. We celebrated by getting our palms read (I’m supposed to have a good year!), eating beignets and jambalaya, drinking hand grenades (take that, hurricane) and listening to some more live music. I thought New York was tough on my health…oh man, did I not see New Orleans coming. So while my spiritual heart will miss this place, my physical one certainly will not. I loved Jackson Square and St. Louis Cathedral; I loved Mardi Gras; I loved the Chartres House, Café Beignet, and Café Amelie; I loved the delightful people at the Maritime Ministry for giving us such a nice place to bring our computers and send and receive mail; I loved how you can tell someone is from New Orleans by hearing them talk, but it’s not quite the southern accent of the rest of the region; I love that James and I shared a table with an old black couple and a middle-aged gay couple at Windows and they couldn’t have gotten along better, simply because they were all from New Orleans. Each Sunday that I went to mass at St. Louis I got a little misty when the cantor would welcome people who were still displaced because their home parish has “not yet reopened” since Katrina. The city is an amazing place and I hope to return to it someday soon.

So those are my last few weeks in New Orleans. I still owe a lot of pictures and of course updates from the non-US ports, but I’ll get there. This week will be a little crazy for me. My boat family has a few last hurrahs ahead of us.