Dear Poughkeepsie,
I awoke in a sweat recently, stirred from my slumber before dawn by thoughts of such crucial issues as quarterback succession plans, the impact of tariffs on Carnival throws and whatever storm du jour is brewing out in the belligerently warm waters of the Gulf of Marrero.
These, and human bladder capacity, are the things that keep New Orleans up at night.
Unable to re-achieve unconsciousness, I simply laid there, basking in the gentle music conjured by a chorus of night critters as they croaked and chirruped back and forth in tuneful lust.
And I fell ever deeper in love with the 29th parallel.
Living in a swampside metropolis exposes one to a singular soundtrack, and, in the relative hush of the wee hours, it is as transfixing as any meditative mantra.
New Orleans is not one of those places that claims to never sleep, but parts of it do pass out on occasion. On those special nights in which they do, the rest of the city dozes restfully.
It doesn’t happen every night, mind you. Major tourist events and sturdy livers often steal it from us. But every once in a precious while, the nightly swarms of bachelorettes and conventioneers trade Bourbon Street for the starchy embrace of hotel sheets a little earlier than usual.
With their boozy breaths slowed to a rhythmic rasp, the informal street economy that exists to serve them – the buskers, the Lucky Dog slingers, the gents who make their money a sawbuck at a time by informing tourists where they got their shoes at – follows them into the dream-generating ether of REM sleep.
It is then that New Orleans’ special brand of nightmagic blooms in its gauzy, soul-recharging glory.
It is a fleeting rest. Two hours, maybe. Three, tops. But all the best things are perishable, aren’t they? It is an unwritten but immutable law of the universe that such rare moments of existential perfection be snuffed too soon. How else to explain the cruel brevity of a gardenia’s bloom?
The wise waste little time lamenting it. They know to treasure the powerful juju at work in such times before it evaporates the same way good gin always seems to.
And, so, I arose and laced up my walking shoes. The city I found was one enveloped in a fragile quiet, the cobbles and curbs scrubbed by the blue light of almost-morning with a false but temporarily convincing sterility.
Those who have experienced the city in its quietest hours know well that care might have forgotten New Orleans but that mystique remembers it well.
The North Pole has the aurora borealis. The South has the aurora australis. New Orleans has its own atmospheric phenomenon – call it the aurora Tchoupitoulas – and although not as conspicuous as those other aurorae, it is every bit as enchanting.
The city still felt like the city, but as viewed through a vaguely supernatural lens, dreamy and otherworldly, the pressing urgencies of its daytime bustle replaced with whisperings from the ghosts of its history.
There is the building in which the Louisiana Purchased was signed. And there is the one in which modern Mardi Gras was born. Tennessee wrote “Streetcar” under that skylight, Elvis crooned from that balcony, and Satch became Satch after being pinched at that intersection.
Marie Laveau lived in that building. Jefferson Davis died in that one. Andrew Jackson slept here. Napoleon did not sleep there.
It was nothing short of entrancing. Until …
The first shards of sunlight jabbed their way into my consciousness a little more than an hour into my sojourn. With that, the pre-dawn spell began rapidly to fall away.
In the distance echoed the ear-splitting chirping of a garbage truck backing that thang up. A heavy-lidded kitchen worker, sporting the tell-tale houndstooth trousers of his trade, trudged past. The daily queue in front of Café du Monde was already forming.
A bird sang. A siren sounded. A passing bus belched a dark cumulus of diesel fumes in my direction.
(Rude.)
Alas, night had expired, exiled by dawn. The day had begun. The sun, as it always does, rose.
I realized then that the thoughts that previously kept me awake had been replaced by a contended calm – and the sleep that evaded me earlier beckoned once more.
Ever the faithful servant, I feel I have no option but to obey. So, off I go.
Good night, Poughkeepsie. And good morning. Come visit. Dreams await.
Insincerely yours,
New Orleans
Ask Mike Have a question or a thought to share about New Orleans etiquette or tradition? I’d love to hear it. Email it to mike@myneworleans.com
