A walk home

Walking home from work is usually pretty uneventful. Sometimes I stop at the quarter master and get some breakfast, sometimes not. Once I get a block or two past the gay bars I rarely see anyone in these walks . This morning I had one of the nicest walks home ever. A block from my own bar I encountered a street fight between a very drunk white tourist and a black man, presumably (from his dress and the direction he was walking) someone who lived in the Treme. The drunk tourist had evidently tried striking up a conversation with the black gentleman, who responded like any good Orleanian; "Man don't talk to me, you don't even know me." I missed a moment or two of this as I had simply walked past. The next thing I hear are the obvious sounds of a street fight and turned around (to watch of course) to see the white boy throwing up his fists like he's in the road show of West Side Story. It was sad really and I think the black guy just eventually felt sorry for him, shook his head and said "Get out of here you stupid faggot." My feelings exactly.

Though it was entertaining, the fight wasn't the highlight of my walk. The last few days has seen a fog descend upon the city at night. Not like the usual fog that prevents people from using proper English, but a real fog, settling on us and shrouding the city. As I made my way down Bourbon Street the scene was one out of a book, the fog lifting and wafting down the street, lampposts giving off an eerie shadowed light. All at once a tugboats horn began to blow, reminding us of the lifeblood that flows just a few blocks from us, the reason why we are settled here, why this place exists. Even after I made it home, in fact while I am writing this I can still hear the horn of that tugboat in the distance. There's a satisfaction to these senses that can't be explained any more than one can explain why New Orleans is a city that beats inside your chest. The city is a narcotic, it is mysterious and overwhelming in it's ability to keep you wrapped up tightly in it's foggy colored world.

P.S. I woke up this afternoon at 1 or so, snuggled in my warm bed and the first thing I heard when I woke up was the horn of a tugboat. I drifted back to sleep, content with the sounds of my adopted home.