Elegy

Last Friday I got out of my torts class with the adorable professor at ten minutes till noon. I put my books in my locker, got on my bike, and rode to the Taqueria Corona where I ate fish tacos. Then I went shopping on Magazine Street: new sneakers at Shoefty, new bras at the lingerie store by the CCs at the corner of Jefferson. I rode up to the Creole Creamery and had a hot fudge sundae, and on the way out I ran into Miss P, who had been having lunch with her ex-boyfriend (hmm) at the sushi restaurant next door. Further down Prytania, I stopped at the ophthalmologist and picked up my new contacts (thank goodness I was able to do that.) Back down on Magazine Street, I bought a pair of jeans and a velvet jacket at Buffalo Clothing Exchange. It was hot, and I went across the street to the Big Rue to have iced tea. I called Miss S. She was working on the paper mache skulls she used to sell at the artist's market, but she was ready for a break and came down to meet me.

She told me she'd gotten a new window unit AC and was proud of herself for lifting and installing it herself. It made a big difference because her kitchen got so hot with the skulls in the oven (!)

Also while I was there, I chatted with a girl who had been my tutoring student and was now my classmate in law school. I was impressed that she was studying on Friday afternoon, and I worried that I was negligent in taking the afternoon off.

I'd wanted to take Miss S out for her birthday earlier in the month, but I'd been broke. Now that I had money, I asked her if she wanted to go to Ralph's on the Park that night.

Ralph's was one of the Brennan's Restaurants. It was in a beautiful old house that looked out on City Park, with its huge oak trees with thick, long branches that hit the ground and rose again.

We didn't have reservations, but the maitre d' said the wait wouldn't be too long. We had cocktails in the bar. A television was on--Katrina was a category 1 storm that was probably going to hit Florida, but the weatherman was concerned by changes that might lead it our way. There was a loud party of white uptown women, drunk and loud in that special way of southern aristocrats that confusingly shifts from charming to obnoxious and back.

Then we were seated and we drank pinot and ate: salads, one with a sort of ratatouille, the other with baked goat cheese; crabcakes; grilled shrimp; fried green tomatoes with a creamy, tart, slightly spicy sauce; oysters baked in the shell with a different cream sauce; and a rich, gooey hot fudge cake and coffee for dessert. It was all perfect. I was a little tipsy and happy and some of the food--that baked cheese and those oysters--were astonishingly, almost orgasmically good, you had to close your eyes and just focus on what was going on in your tastebuds, you wouldn't want to miss any of it.

We talked about our lives and where they were going. We thought eventually they were going to go out of New Orleans, and we regretted that. We talked about New Orleans and all its problems, including the fact that eventually it was all going to go underwater in the big hurricane.

It was a lovely night, warm but not too hot. We went back to my house and Miss S gave me a bunch of little house-warming presents, including a couple of her small skulls painted in psychedelic colors.

We decided to go see Egg Yolk Jubilee, one of those only-in-New-Orleans rock/brass bands, at the Circle Bar. We crowded up next to the band in the living-room-like stage/dance floor and danced.

It was such a perfect night, such a quintessentially New Orleans night. We didn't know it was going to be the last one. I was tired and I'd considered staying home and going to bed early. I'm so glad I didn't do that.

Now City Park and Ralph's are at the bottom of the lake. I hope New Orleans comes back, but I don't think it will ever be the same.