“There is no better time and place to be alive,” a high school friend reminisced a few weeks ago, “than as a teenager in New Orleans during Mardi Gras.”
“Yes,” I agreed, warily. “I remember, and that’s the whole problem.”
There is so much joy in raising my kids where I myself grew up.
Watching Georgia scramble up the same trees in City Park that I climbed in my Rainbow Brite hoodie in 1987. Watching Ruby and her friends picnic by the Lakefront in the exact spot where, circa 1996, my friends and I used to sit and idly make clover necklaces while gossiping. Watching them both dig into cheese fries and roast beef po’ boys at R & O’s, my family’s go-to spot growing up.
But the flip side of that is knowing exactly how much trouble they can get into here … because I did it myself.
Overall, I was a mostly wholesome teenager; see above regarding making clover necklaces at the Lakefront. My friends and I studied hard; ate lots of junk food, particularly at the blessedly now-defunct Pancho’s Mexican buffet; hung out at bookstores and coffee shops; and listened to nerdy music like The Foreman, which was a left-leaning satirical folk band (listening to it now, it feels so innocent and dated), and “Schoolhouse Rock” Rocks!, which featured ’90s icons such as Moby, The Lemonheads, and Biz Markie (RIP) covering songs from the classic children’s TV show.
But I still did things my parents didn’t know about. I sneaked out to The Rocky Horror Picture Show at the blessedly now-defunct theater on Vets, where I met and fell deeply in love with a much-older boy whom I knew only as Skungy. (I am 97% certain my own teenage daughter has sneaked out to The Rocky Horror Picture Show at The Prytania, but she hasn’t tried to bring any sketchy guys with weird nicknames home, so I’ll count that as a win.) I drove erratically and with a certain inherent confusion about basic traffic laws. I carried – more for effect than actual consumption – a package of clove cigarettes with me everywhere I went.
And then there was Mardi Gras.
I will always remember being 16 and sipping an illegally obtained daiquiri while wandering through the Quarter with my friends on Fat Tuesday … only to run smack-dab into one of our teachers fully decked out in bondage gear.
She looked at us, and we looked at her – and then she whispered, “I won’t tell if you won’t tell,” and we all gave her a hasty thumbs-up and ran.
(I guess I am now telling, but I’m telling on myself, too, so it seems fair.)
I flirted with Tulane boys I met along the parade route for beer; I lifted my shirt for beads; I was once plucked off a friend’s shoulders by a float-rider and carried along, laughing, legs dangling, for at least a full block.
Nothing we did during Mardi Gras was, as such, exactly safe or advisable. Nothing we did is anything I’m especially proud of. Nothing we did was anything I want my own teenager to do.
And yet, God help me, my friend is right: It sure was fun.
I was the first of my friends to have a baby. Ruby was born when I was 26, which obviously isn’t Teen Mom territory, but I was still the first one staying home and changing diapers while my friends were out partying until the wee hours.
But then when my friends were all struggling with sleep-training and teething and tantrums while my kid was breezing through second grade, I felt a smug sense of satisfaction.
Now, though, my friends all have kids solidly in the sweet spot of ages 4-12 while I am fumbling around in the terrifying wilderness of the teen years.
I have to let her grow up. I have to let her take risks. I have to let her make her own mistakes.
I just wish I didn’t have to know so precisely what those risks and mistakes might be.
But at least she can’t buy clove cigarettes anymore, I guess.
