It seems like a tall task to write
about Mardi Gras in New Orleans without coming off trite, twee, or
washed up. But it's been the single most omnipresent and pervasive
definer of my human existence for so long that to let it go
undiscussed feels wrong.
So in general, here, “Mardi Gras”
is an umbrella that refers to the entire Carnival season, stretching
from Twelfth Night (or Epiphany) on January 6th,
escalating (the real beginning is Krewe de Vieux on January 31st)
and reaching frenetic climax on Fat Tuesday or Mardi Gras Day. I
suppose it's all based on the Jewish Calendar which is lunar and thus
falls on different days of our standard solar calendar each year. But
don't worry, it's not all monotheism and straight-laced catholic
holidays (ha.) There are huge pagan roots running through the veins
of this celebration (like any christian holiday) and to me they meld
more seamlessly than anything I've seen before. Without further ado,
some Mardi Gras recap from the world of Kate.
• My Mardi Gras beginning was Krewe
de Vieux, (was sick in bed for Twelfth Night) and I borrowed
Justine's car, went to Walmart, realized I forgot my wallet, went
home, went back to Walmart for Jello, ramekins, and vodka. Hustling
in the streets here was something I knew I wanted to do, a rite of
passage of sorts, so I nervously, hurriedly made Jello shots all day
while Justine worked, picked her up with over 300 in tow, and we
headed into the CBD to intersect Krewe de Vieux. Floats were
satirical, referential, and vulgar, Dickstartr crowdsourcing, Spank
Squad, stuff like that. We made stacks, had a blast, and celebrated
with delicious kebabs and a coconut with a tiny umbrella. Ah.
• Chewbaccus (whose name is one of
many spinoffs of Bacchus, a major parade) was the best, went to a
party, ate queso, geeked out with this Sci-fi themed parade that
comes right through our neighborhood. I spun many Leia's and Chewy's
in my impromptu dance-one-move tradition. Right before Chewbacchus
was 'tit Rex, (the 'tit is pronounced tee and short for petit)
which is a mini-parade, where
folks pull floats made from shoeboxes down St. Claude to the
delighted squeals of everyday people.
• Muses
is one of the big ones. It was cold, I had given up my work shift
that night out of sheer exhaustion but still managed to get dragged
into a costume and out the door. The streets were littered with trash
from previous parades and as the bitter wind whipped them into
trashnado frenzy on St. Charles I sipped my clamato and told myself
to hang in there. We watched, walked a ways along the route to go
meet some friends and accidentally witnessed a double homicide. I
froze in the noise and gunsmoke, I'd been looking down at my phone,
texting Dizzy. Hundreds of people were running all around me. I
slowly snapped back into the moment hearing MC shouting my name
“Kate. Kate. Kate.” He pushed me behind him, squatting, baring
his skateboard like a Viking Shield Warrior. We were shook up,
everything was lights and sirens and cold. I ached desperately for
forest, for wood stove and seed catalogue, for pastureland. I
settled for drink with friends at Molly's and an early bedtime.
• The
weekend before Mardi Gras day I worked a ton pedicabbing, wore myself
out, made great money, had an awesome time. It was total chaos,
streets closed, more streets closed, more streets closed. I pedaled
uptown, downtown, uptown, downtown, until my legs burst through my
bike shorts, turning green and unfurling as grotesque muscles and
veins developed on top of other muscles and veins. I carried this
sweet old couple's luggage for two blocks across a parade and caught
a football from Iris on the way back.
•Eris
was a culminating highlight of the season for me. An unpermitted
(thus illegal) DIY punk parade, Eris begins at dawn at the End of the
World (near our house, where the industrial canal meets the mighty
Mississip') with a choral performance, then the band strikes up and
the whole shebang moves slowly, disruptively, to the river for
another band and choir performance, then weaves back through the
quarter ending with free brunch near the tracks. I sang in the choir
this year, practicing twice a week since I got here. What a powerful
thing to have a completely homemade parade, no plastic beads, no
tractors pulling floats. The music was all original, the bands tune's
largely sprawling, dirgey, brassy and circusy. Choirs tunes were
reverent, with elaborate imagery, sea creatures, rivers weaving
courses and eroding and the way deposition rebuilds land. The one
band-choir collab is the Eris anthem, it is triumphant, concise, yet
still funky, with Latin lyrics about reflecting and refracting each
others' lights. This years theme was 'Washed Up' I think many years
themes reference the gulf and oil spill in some way. Every costume
was homemade, elaborate. The whole thing was gaudy, reverent, loud,
soft, and beautiful.
• Lundi
Gras we saw a few great bands: Steamboat Calypso and Deslondes. We
were paraded out.
• Mardi
Gras Day we went to a fabulous party in our neighborhood, we're
talking 8am, complete with champagne fountain, full bloody mary bar,
meat cooked over an open fire, and platters and platters of po-boys.
It really inspired me to throw parties, get old, have an awesome
house. Then we followed parades all through the Marigny and Quarter,
drinking a lot, dancing, having a great time. I ran into (and
twirled) pretty much everyone I know in the city. We ate a delicious
Po Boy and got home before the sun.
Yesterday
was Ash Wednesday and it was passed at home, cleaning, hydrating,
cooking moussaka, coming back to the basic things adult humans do to
ensure their survival. We are balancing out all this revelry with
some Lenten observance: me, I'm giving up faybo on my phone and taking on a yoga intensive and a daily flossing habit. MC is
giving up booze which is pretty awesome, I'm going to make him fancy
mocktails and shrubs.
I have
lots of thoughts about this parade culture, this Mardi Gras culture,
and the way it holds people. One recent one was how healthy it seems
to delve deeply into vice, drink too much, stay out too late, be
brazen and brassy, and then voluntarily and gleefully choose living
well, rising early, breathing deeply. In cultures that rely on
forbidding vice, it seems the temptation is always there, dancing in
the darkness and sort of unchecked. This city was never an English
colony and maybe it thus lacks some of the puritanical bent that
formed America.
I
don't know, I'm sure my understanding and reflections will change and
grow with each year. For now, I know that what I've witnessed in
these past weeks, in the old city, is something special, and I am
glad for it.
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