Lost and Found

Atlantis, the Land of the Lotus Eaters, New Orleans. If you didn't know any better, you'd think everyone here was lost. Here, nobody walks quickly and no one watches their feet. People sit on their porches, smile at strangers, shout at neighbors, or take a drag on their cigarette if tourists hurry by. Perhaps the people aren't lost, rather the city itself. The old buildings with crumbling easter egg walls, jazz music drifting from wooden doors, real gas lamps casting faint light on un-even sidewalks.

When I first moved here, I watched my feet to make sure I wouldn't trip on the cracked cement blocks; now, I walk slowly enough that I don't have to worry. In some ways, it's hard to worry about anything here. This could be the curse of the city, but nobody seems too concerned about that either. Nothing is taken too seriously, even the recent tragedy. Before Katrina there was a popular bumper sticker: New Orleans, proud to call home. Now that bumper sticker has been replaced: New Orleans, proud to swim home. If the city ever seems sad, it's not the same dull emptiness you'd find in Los Angeles; here, it's the enjoyable melancholy that goes well with bourbon and the gravely voice of Bessie Smith or Muddy Waters.

But you have to be careful here or you can sink right along with the city. In a place where it's upside-down day everyday, the outside world is all too easy to forget. Laws and rules of society don't seem to really apply here. While this makes the city unbelievably beautiful, it also makes it corrupt, and at times, grotesque. The buildings are crumbling and the people inside of them drowning from alcohol instead of water. Perhaps that's why my mom calls the city Sodom and Gomorrah.

Atlantis, the Land of the Lotus Eaters, the Big Easy, Sodom and Gomorrah, the Crescent City; the city has a different name for each of its faces. Yet, for anyone who has ever lived here, we can only call it home.