What Are You Looking At?

My friends.

I want to know how they manage to do everything they do.

I can barely keep it together enough to post a couple times a week (if I'm lucky), and yet they juggle family, work and 2 two freakin' blogs.

And still, the let me play with them. In case you haven't figured it out, I am referring to those incredibly cute and talented folk, Jenn in Holland and the frustrated woman in a gay man's body - I mean, Soccer Mom in Denial. (Oops.)

And their relatively new venture, Looking Into. If you haven't Looked Into it yet, I am shocked. The people are fabulous artists, doing their parts for making the world a little more beautiful, one photograph at a time. And the fact that let me hang with them is just so damn cool.

Curious, now? You should be.

Today they are posting one of my favorite pics from my neighborhood in NOLA - thank you, my friends.

And to all my new friends, check out all the breathtaking photos they've put up - and spend some time Looking Into.

And really, really Look. Take a deep breath, relax, and enjoy the moment.

You'll be glad you did.

Dear Applicant

(Even though I posted this a little over 2 months ago, I couldn't resist re-posting in order to play today in the Monday Mission, hosted today Painted Maypole! Hope you enjoy - your Ambassador.)

Dear Applicant,

Thank you for submitting your resume and cover letter for consideration for the Administrative Assistant position recently posted on Monster.com. We are currently in the early stages of our hiring process, and while we found your resume properly titled and your cover letter virtually free of misspellings, at this time I regret to inform you that we will not be inviting you to interview with us.

Disappointing as this may be to you, I feel confident that your extraordinary skills and assets will not long go untapped. Especially of interest to us was your ability to communicate telepathically with animals - namely the leopards at the Zoo. While this is a skill few job candidates possess, it would tragically be wasted in our small, feline-less office.

Likewise, count yourself among the standouts for your bold choices for font, format and background. There remains some debate in our office as to what body part was featured in the lower right corner of your background mosaic. You did not list photography among your plethora of skills or hobbies - would it be too much to ask you to clear up this mystery for us?

I would be remiss if I did not applaud your cover letter, not only for its length and audacity, but for the most compellingly inappropriate use of the word "diacritical" we've seen in years. It is the rare occasion these days to see one unintentionally blur the line between self-promotion and sad farce so deftly. Huzzah!

I feel it is my duty to recommend to you to place somewhat tighter privacy restrictions on your MySpace page. While photos chronicling the antics of you and your associates make for entertaining divertissments, perhaps a firmer hand in editing would serve you well in the future.

Also, consider casting a keener eye toward your page's overall content and tenor, lest a potential employer glean information which could ever prevent you from becoming that ignominious office drone with whom we all thrill to work.

A note of caution: it is decidedly poor form to post to your blog about applying to a "bogus" company for some "f***ing wack" job. Some grown-ups know how to turn on their computers and track your sorry ass down.

Respectfully yours,
The Ambassador

Old Friends (Aquarium Style)

I miss working at the Aquarium.

Correction.

I miss the work I got to do at the Aquarium and

the animals I worked with.

(The people? Not so much...)

So, here are a few of my favorites:

Yellow Sea Urchin

Golden Dart Frog

Sea Anemone

Leafy Sea Dragon

(Yes, these are all my own photos! Canon PowerShot)

Goin' Out Walkin'...

We all do what we can.

Every morning that I can still get up and go to work is a great day.

Sunday, I will get out of bed, get dressed and then join several thousand of my nearest and dearest friends (sadly, SMID won't be there) for the 2007 NO/AIDS WALK.

This event, held yearly since 1990 with the exception of 2005 (for some strange reason), raises money for HIV/AIDS organizations, services and education in Louisiana. So, if you are in New Orleans Sunday morning and are looking for something to do - come join us. You don't even need to register or raise money - just Walk with us. Strength in numbers sort of stuff. Increased visibility is just that.

And despite what this and other previous administrations would like to think, the AIDS epidemic is not over, nor is going away any time soon.

Lucky for us, there's a "cold" front expected to move through this weekend after the remnants of Hurricane Humberto blow through. It'll be almost 90 degrees, but it'll be much less humid. Still reprehensible by the standards of my Yankee past, but less humid.

Our merry little band has already raised over $1600 as a team and the last minute arm twisting is about to start. If you can and are so inclined, you can sponsor us/me at my personal page for the Walk. If you'd like to join us for a 5K stroll, leave a note in my comments.

Any good thoughts and energy you can send out are greatly appreciated too. I am one of the fortunate ones - 16 years+ after diagnosis, I am still going strong.

And so I Walk.

Last year's WALK Team - Motley looking bunch, eh?

Monday Morning Glory

Color...

...and Light...

...and Harmony.

A Few Hours, A Couple Years Ago

August 29, 2005. We were awake early, watching the news.

Until the power went out. That was 6:32AM.

We would live our lives from sunrise to sunset for the next 8 days.

Monday was spent restlessly trying to nap or
read or in attempts at banal conversation.

The winds blew ceaselessly
- imagine the wax-paper-on-a-comb noise,
extrapolated to door-size shutters.

We dubbed the cacaphony "Satan's Harmonica."

After the worst of the storm had passed us,
we ventured outside to survey the devastation.

What we saw was bad - tree carnage,
mostly,and bits of the copper roof of
the Old US Mint strewn over ten blocks.

All the beautiful Magnolias in the St. Louis Cathedral
garden had succumbed to the force of the wind
- but in the midst of the wreckage,
the Mardi Gras Jesus still stood, unharmed.

(Forgive the sacrilege, please. The statue is of Jesus
with his arms raised up in the classic
"Throw Me Somthin', Mister!" pose.)

This was still hours before the levees gave way.

We had only sporadic radio reception,
but were inundated with rumors of the ugliest stripe.

We did not yet know the worst of it all.

And it was three days later before we finally left New Orleans.

My Lessons in Gratitude

I want to say thanks.

It’ll never be enough, but I need to say it anyway.

Thank you to every single person in my life who reached out in the hours and days and months (and now years) since Katrina. Thank you,too, to all those folks who’s names I don’t, and will never, know.

Thank you to the lovely Red Cross mental health professional (with the Dickensian name of Mary Cope) who made a point to come and speak discreetly to our small band of evacuees - to ensure that we had access to specific services for our needs and to let us know that we were among family (wink).

Thank you to Jessica, the ever-vigilant front desk manager at the Residence Inn in Nashville - our home away from home for nearly 4 months. After the first week, Jessica would call up to our room to let us know when the important pieces of mail had arrived - and became our den mother, making sure we were eating enough and sleeping through the night. I still think she knew we often lied on both accounts. (To make her Sunday morning shifts a little more bearable, we’d slip down to the office with a homemade Irish Coffee for her...)

To Bobbi, my dear friend of 20 years now, I can never express my thanks and appreciation for taking over as my press agent in the days immediately following the storm. Until we reached Nashville, we had limited communication with the outside world - landlines (including pay phones!) in the French Quarter are insulated underground and continued to work, even after the levees gave way. I would call Mom and Bobbi, and between the two, they’d piece together what they perceived was the real story. Bobbi then took the initiative to email to all my friends and family what she thought was appropriate to share. (I’d sent a mass email the eve of the storm to nearly all my address book...I got so many comments later that it was Bobbi’s emails that helped them get through those first 10 days.) Thank you.

Allison. I know she’ll probably say this is not deserving of thanks, but she’s wrong and too modest. Very early on, it was my conversations with her that actually helped me begin the grieving process sooner and faster than I otherwise might have. She asked me the tough questions that only a close friend has right to...and allowed me think about them and answer in my own time. With her help, I began to face the reality of my immediate future and make plans for life if, in fact, I could not return to New Orleans. And. Oh, this is a big And. Allison kept after me in her not-entirely-subtle way to rejoin the blogdom...challenging me to tell the untold stories, in a from-the-trenches point of view. How do I ever begin to thank you? I love you.

Mom. Without ever meeting Mark or John, Mom offered to fly us all out to Washington (state), to give us a safe place and a quiet space in which to pull it all back together. Even though we didn’t/couldn’t take her up on the offer, it was beautiful in its timing and simplicity. Thank you. (Mom never asked the hard questions, but confessed to Bobbi that she was worried that I’d seen things that had changed me for good. I hadand they did...but I love that she could express that care and concern.)

I am so grateful for the amazing friend I made during my exile to Nashville - Shellie. Through a series of unlikely (but incredibly fortuitous) events, I landed a sweet job working for Shellie at the Nashville Zoo - doing almost exactly the same kind of job I'd had in New Orleans. Not only do Shellie and I share very similar work ethics and notions of what quality education is - but we got each other. I had not made a new great friend like that in some time - and as a boss, she let me use my time there to grow and recharge and use all my gifts - and in turn, I helped the Zoo sparkle. Thank you, my new friend!


Mark. I don’t write much about Mark here, but I must thank him. The phrase he uttered to me, the words he knew would help me through time and time again...from the moment we realized the city was filling with water, to the now-or-never trip over the Mississippi River out of the city with John and me riding in the bed of Mark's truck to guard our worldly possessions (yes, that's me wielding the Henkels), to our long cold nights in Nashville, so very far from home. We'll get through this together. We did and we have. And now this life is in a new chapter. We didn't get through the way we thought we would, but we got through anyhow. So, thank you...

I was about to write that I could go on thanking people forever - the choir director at the small Methodist Church who let me sit in on rehearsals for a month or so despite not having the time to actually sing with them on Sundays...Andrew & Elwyn, my boys in Britain, who kept my spirits up and offered me refuge on their distant shore...Tamara, my first fiancee (we were Ambrose and Ermengard in Hello, Dolly! oh, so many moons ago) who shared my gut-wrenching emails with friends and coworker who in turn reached out to a stranger...Amy, who did her damnedest to keep all of us now-former Audubon staff in touch...Dean in Houston who listened, really listened, and helped me fathom it all...

But no. I cannot write it all down yet. Someday.

For now, I can only hope that these wonderful people know how much it all means to me - that I do thank them - and that not a day goes by that I don't try to repay all that kindness in the way I live my life.

There's really nothing left to say.

Except.

Thank you.

K+2

The anniversary retrospectives have begun again, essentially unavoidable this week. I gotta tell you, it’s exhausting.

I was scanning Saturday’s New Orleans Times-Picayune, when I spotted the shorthand expression that is my post title today. And you know what? It really disturbs me...

K+2.

Two years since Hurricane Katrina made landfall and the levees broke, flooding 80% of New Orleans. Two years since so much of the Gulf South was devastated.

It is impossible to express some things in any terms other than “post-Katrina” - population centers, insurance rates, property values, etc.

But everything? I think what disturbs me most is this dangerous new identity. In years past, we hated how New Orleans was known to too many folks only for Bourbon Street, Girls Gone Wild and Mardi Gras. Anyone who’s ever visited this city for more than a day understands implicitly that it’s so much more than that.

And now? New Orleans has been shoehorned into this newer identity of ultimate victimhood. “How does it make you feel that the government is dragging its feet with recovery funding?” Umm, how do you think we feel? “Do you think the high murder rate will adversely affect the flow of tourists to New Orleans?” Do you really need me to answer that?

Oh...and please don’t ask if things are getting back to normal, because they never were to begin with.

Yes, as a city in recovery (sounds a bit like AA, eh?), we are not where we expected to be two years after this disaster of Republican proportions. Entire neighborhoods still lie in ruins. Our mental health services are non-existent. The levees still aren’t strong enough to hold back a surge of similar power. And, yes...the people here are getting more brittle and less likely to keep up the brave face.

But.

There’s so much good happening here that will continue to go unreported by the media giants. So, I guess you’ll have to look for it here.

Not only has our church rebuilt its roof and sanctuary, we are less than six months away from opening a free medical clinic in a neighborhood where such services don’t exist.

How does a creative city respond to trauma of this nature? With laughter and tears and great parties. Jazz Fest saw record number in attendance and the local theatre community is burgeoning with new shows - not all of which are acts of catharsis. (To misquote Stephen King, gallows humor is only funny when its your neck.) The Louisiana Philharmonic and New Orleans Opera Company are playing to standing room only crowds.

Oh, and the predicted conflict and strife that city leaders anticipated in “accommodating” the influx of Latin American workers (and their families - many of whom are choosing to stay here and settle down) never materialized.

It’s not perfect. It never was before. Stop comparing years and dates and what’s back and what isn’t. We’re here and we’re working as much and as hard as we can, and some days, it really really hurts. I mean bad.

But. That’s only some days. Most days, just like anywhere else in the rest of the world, we wake up, we work, we love, we eat, we fight, we talk, we worry, we build, we wonder, we teach, we grow, we die, we hope, we leave, we blog, we pray, we put our heads back down on our pillows and drift off to sleep...only to wake up and do it all over again.

Just like everyone else.

Everyone else who isn’t measuring everything in terms of when their world came to an end.

And yet, somehow the world kept turning. And it's still turning. And so tomorrow, we will wake up and start all over again.

Again.

A Picture's Worth...

I love my immensely creative friends. Not only are they clever and witty, cute and fun--they're also REALLY good photographers. And now they have a new place to play, er, show their stuff.

Soccer Mom in Denial and Jenn in Holland are way cool. And I'm not just saying that because they're letting me place with them tomorrow. I wanna be like them when I grow up...just without the kids.

No offense to all the moms and dads out there. Or any of the kids. (Declan, why are you reading over mommy's shoulder?!?)

That said, please go check out my fabulous friends at Looking Into. I think you'll dig it.

The Things You Don't Hear

Sure, FEMA puts victims of Katrina and Rita into trailers that are patently unsafe (high levels of formaldehyde, etc). Glamorous stuff like that always makes the evening news.

The LRA announces that it'll run out of money long before all the 136,000 applicants receive a penny. (Estimates say that somewhere around recipient 84,000 the well will run dry.) You can bet the natives are blogging about that - as well they should.

Blighted, neglected homes are collapsing under their own weight and sadness. Could you stage a better photo op?

It's all so much more than that.

I'll be willing to bet real money than no one's told you about the more than 10,000 college students (and that's just the ones that registered with agencies) who gave up their 2007 Spring Breaks to come to the Gulf South and help with home-gutting and rebuilding.

That doesn't include the hundreds and hundreds of other college students who came here under the aegis of their churches, sleeping on Youth Room floors and physically changing the landscape so much for the better.

How come Anderson Cooper isn't all over that story? Young people, out in the world...doing good for no other reward than the joy of helping their fellow human.

Oh, kids these days...

For the Love of Crying

Saturday, we attended the funeral for Gordon Maginnis, New Orleans icon and bon vivant. The pre-service reception at St. Anna's Episcopal Church (yes, you read that correctly - pre - ) was exactly as he had wished...free-flowing mimosas and yummy nosh (just enough to hold everyone over until after the interment).

Gordon was 78 and suffering a host of illnesses, including congestive heart failure. Ever the champion of Quality of Life, he chose not to torture his body with drugs and tube and needles and such only to gain a few more weeks in misery. Gordon returned to his elegant home, gradually withdrew from most of his social circles and last Monday night, went quietly in his sleep.

The funeral service was spot-on. Personal and witty, dignified and illuminating, it was everything we each needed to hear about Gordon's life and his hereafter. I was fine through the most of the service until just before communion when the soloist sang "It is Well with My Soul."

I lost it.

The force of so many associations to that song, the years of singing it at funerals, the trove of so very many memories of Gordon. The soloist was...extraordinary. I wept, unashamed, for Gordon...for myself...for all we've lost. And it felt really good, honest and true to cry like that.

We spent some quality time in the hours after the funeral, telling all the tales we could bear to tell. I first met Gordon at Good Friends Piano Bar - during my first years attending their Sunday Sing-a-long. I'd been belting out Gershwin, Berlin and Porter tunes - including some of the more obscure lyrics cut during out-of-town tryouts and mostly relegated to liner notes.

Gordon sidled up to me, his Grey Goose in hand, and asked, "Tell me. How does a young man like you come to know all these old songs?" Thinking I was much cleverer than my 25 years, I quipped, "Must have been raised right!"

Mustering a withering glance, Gordon turned to me and drolled, "My dear, no one who knows those songs would ever claim they were raised right."

Most of the stories we passed around were not bawdy, but certainly racier than mine. A favorite tale centered around Gordon's vague animosity toward the young Tennessee Williams - and of the night they both wore their identical floor length fur coats (in New Orleans of all places!) to the same party. In the tradition of literary farce, each went home with the wrong coat - speculation still abounds that Gordon pulled the switch intentionally to piss off Williams, not realizing until ages later that there were personal letters and notes and outlines in the breast pocket. It's been suggested that the papers are still in Gordon's home

___________________________________________________

Sunday, we rededicated the newly restored sanctuary at Rayne Methodist Church. Such a long time coming, and still the A/C did not function to the necessary levels. Our early service (8:45AM) was sparsely attended (just under 100), but the 11 o'clock service was Standing Room Only...and very warm. The music was glorious - we performed 2 of our favorites, Randall Thompson's Alleluia and Johannes Brahms' How Lovely is Thy Dwelling Place. Mmmm...

For an emotionally charged day, I did quite well...until second service. The choir processed during the singing of the opening verses of Joyful, Joyful, We Adore Thee and all was well with the world...except I hadn't counted on some old friends to drive all the way in from Hell, sorry, Tyler, TX. Bob and Linda have a long history with our church - she was our secretary for years, and Bob was interim Associate Pastor basically whenever we needed him to fill the gaps.

I can't begin to comprehend their life in Tyler - Bob and Linda are two of the most liberal, forward thinking people I know (and I know SMID!!) and apparently, they are 2 of only 5 Democrats in town. Bob has long been working within the Methodist Church, furthering the recognition and celebration of same sex unions. And they both sang with the choir...and were universally adored by everyone. The sort of kind people I want to be when I grow up.

It hadn't occured to me just how much I missed them.

I refocused on the service and made the choice not to look back at them until it was all over. After the benediction, I beat a hasty retreat up to the choir room and then bounded back down the stairs three at a time.

Gone.

Oh.

I searched every inch of the building I could think to look and had resigned myself to having missed a moment to catch up with them. Then...the door to the pre-school wing opened and they walked back through - determined to see as much of the remodel as their time would allow. I exchanged quick hugs and greetings with Linda while I waited until Bob finished his conversation and he turned around to speak to me...I don't remember everything we said, but we hugged and cried and laughed and cried and didn't really know the reason why we were crying and didn't care all the same. Happy and sad and joyful and tearful all at once.

I cry for friends who are gone. I cry for the friends who have come back.

I've never been stingy with my feelings, good or bad. What a way to honor those we love but to cry with them and for them.

And now I've got myself all misty eyed again.

Dear Applicant,

Thank you for submitting your resume and cover letter for consideration for the Administrative Assistant position recently posted on Monster.com. We are currently in the early stages of our hiring process, and while we found your resume properly titled and your cover letter virtually free of misspellings, at this time I regret to inform you that we will not be inviting you to interview with us.

Disappointing as this may be to you, I feel confident that your extraordinary skills and assets will not long go untapped. Especially of interest to us was your ability to communicate telepathically with animals - namely the leopards at the Zoo. While this is a skill few job candidates possess, it would tragically be wasted in our small, feline-less office.

Likewise, count yourself among the standouts for your bold choices for font, format and background. There remains some debate in our office as to what body part was featured in the lower right corner of your background mosaic. You did not list photography among your plethora of skills or hobbies - would it be too much to ask you to clear up this mystery for us?

I would be remiss if I did not applaud your cover letter, not only for its length and audacity, but for the most compellingly inappropriate use of the word "diacritical" we've seen in years. It is the rare occasion these days to see one unintentionally blur the line between self-promotion and sad farce so deftly. Huzzah!

I feel it is my duty to recommend to you to place somewhat tighter privacy restrictions on your MySpace page. While photos chronicling the antics of you and your associates make for entertaining divertissments, perhaps a firmer hand in editing would serve you well in the future. Also, consider casting a keener eye toward your page's overall content and tenor, lest a potential employer glean information which could ever prevent you from becoming that ignominious office drone with whom we all thrill to work.

A note of caution: it is decidedly poor form to post to your blog about applying to a "bogus" company for some "f***ing wack" job. Some grown-ups know how to turn on their computers and track your sorry ass down.

Respectfully yours,

The Ambassador

So Much To Tell

Like all of you, there are a million posts running around inside my head, all struggling to get out at the same time. Recently, there just hasn't been the time to sit and sift through it all to post regularly - and thank you all for the prods to make the most of my new home internet connection, but the truth is this (to quote the pre-Simpsons Matt Groenig):

Work is Hell.

How and why are not the topics of discussion today. Let's just say I've let my work suck the blessed life right out of me. By the time I get home at night, the inclination to do anything other than read all y'all's posts does not exist.

Now for some Good News: the other thing taking up so much of my time is church. We are preparing a butt-load of really sensational music for this Sunday's services - no sleeping in for your Ambassador this weekend, as I will have to be at church, warmed up to sing by 8 - freakin' - AM.

Ya see, after 99 weeks, Rayne Memorial United Methodist Church (on the lovely, historic St. Charles Avenue) is coming home. We will be physically processing out of our large Fellowship Hall where we've been worshiping for all this post-K time...and entering our newly restored sanctuary. For those of you unfamiliar with this tale, Katrina's wind blew our gorgeous steeple off and through our sanctuary roof. Many pews were destroyed, the floors and altar badly damaged and the stunning and priceless Aeolian-Skinner Organ suffered substantial wounds.

The miracle in that day was that despite the destruction within and without the church, the 8 three-story, late 1800's stained glass windows were utterly untouched. They don't even make the glass the same way anymore to replace them.

So, this Sunday, we will re-enter our sanctuary as a family. Not the kind of family that we were before the storm, but a tighter, more involved family. You cannot come through tragedy such as this unchanged. And none of us are fooling ourselves that the work is done and we'll all go back to the way things were before Hurricane Katrina. Understand this: there is no going back. Only forward. (Or, perhaps, in the hardest cases to bear, away.)

Yes, the work is not done, but it is clearly time to go home...The organ has not been fully restored, nor the choir loft that is cradled by those gorgeous pipes. Key to our re-entry is the successful installation and testing of the air conditioning system. It works!! Tested in the midst of the hideous heat and humidity that plagues us in summer here, it works!

So, if you happen to be in New Orleans this weekend, please feel free to drop on by - we have 2 services, 8:45 and 11:00AM, both with full choir and such. All are welcome!

Pink Snow & Giant Chrysanthemums

I spent some quality time walking in the rain on the 4th. It was lovely.

The skies clouded over late that morning, and it rained steadily for almost six hours - sometimes torrentially, but mostly in a quiet, regular drizzle. It soaked the ground, cleared some amount of the dust and pollen out of the air and did a great job of keeping the day much cooler than recent July 4ths.

The walking-in-the-rain came as a result of needing to do way too many loads of laundry. Still, the walks were lovely.

One of my favorite parts of summer rainstorms in New Orleans comes during the just-after time...pink snow on the streets and sidewalks and cars and rooftops. Pale pinks and fuschias and pinks so deep they're really purple. It's the gentle pink snow of the seemingly ever-blooming Crape Myrtles. (Of course, for car owners, the tiny colorful blooms from these prolific flowering trees can be more than just ornamental - they can be downright detrimental to a paint job if left on a car in the ensuing, post-shower bright sun.)

Lucky for us, the sun was denied the chance to come out for the rest of the day. The clouds parted just after the sun finished setting, making for a comfortable evening for fireworks.

About three-quarters of the way through the display up on the Mississippi River, the barges each shot up aerial shells that exploded white-gold, far bigger than any of the previous ones - with comet trails reaching almost back to the water. I've always been most fond of those shells. Tonight, for the first time in many years, the image of those explosions took me way back...

Mommy, that one looks like a giant Chrysanthemum!

That's right! But, sweetie...how do you know that word?

Oh, I think it's in one of Daddy's books in the kitchen. It's that flower with lots and lots of white petals called a Chrysanthemum, right?

Yes, that's right...(Mom shook her head, a bit stupefied.)

I was only 4 1/2 years old at the time. I could always be found with my nose in a book, even if I couldn't read it.

It didn't occur to me until many years later that everyone didn't read all the time, just for the hell of it. I consider myself fortunate to come from a family of readers - as the youngest of 5 kids, I saw my siblings reading all the time for school. Dad devoured Zane Grey novels while Mom's penchant was for biographies. National Geographic played a huge part in my upbringing, not in just the subscriptions of their signature periodical and World, we owned seemingly every hardback NG book known to humankind in the later 70's. Chrysanthemums...

While I still love to read very much, there never seems to be enough time. Any suggestions for some good summer reading - after I consume the last Harry Potter book next weekend? What are y'all reading?

About as Random as It Gets...

OK, despite now having internet service at home (finally), life seems to have had other designs on my time than blogging, reading all y'all's (that is the correct plural form, after all) blogs and commenting thusly. So, to get back in the game (and in the habit), I've decided to play along with the blessedly non-tag form of "8 Random Facts About You". Those of you who really know me will understand I am one of my favorite subjects anyway!!

So, via just about everyone that I read these days - Random Stuff about your Ambassador.

The Rules:

Players start with 8 random facts about themselves.

Those who are tagged should post these rules and their 8 random facts.

Players should tag eight other people and notify them that they have been tagged. (I will not tag you for this - if you read this and want to play along, go for it - just let me know so I can post a link to your fabulocity!)


1. I am a Master Procrastinator. I have this absurd internal clock/calendar that allows me to sense the last possible moment to start a project, return a call/email, pay a bill, etc. That's not to say that I am always behind on things - quite to the contrary. The OCD Yankee in me (the last vestiges of the Northerner left in me after 16 years below sea level in the Crescent City) refuses to be late for meetings, hates the idea of having to pay any kind of late fee, and cringes at the thought of my own lapsing social graces. This is all a matter of timing.

2. Dovetailing on #1, I am oddly intolerant of other people's shortcomings. For example: I think less of someone if they are chronically late, etc. This is a part of what also makes me hideously capably of fostering and maintain a long-term grudge. Talk about wasted energy...

3. My worst first date ended with me having to rush to a CVS for Benadryl. Not only was the guy a total ass, but I had an allergic reaction to something in my food - blotches, labored breathing, puffiness. It was actually a great way out of a really painful dinner. Turns out there is something in Capers - either the seed or the pickling process - that more than just doesn't agree with me. Damn that Salad Nicoise!!

4. I withdrew from college halfway through my sophmore year, and never went back. Not because I wasn't good at it - I left with a 3.5 GPA. I just hated it. Music School was entirely subjective, and I was vehemently unwilling to play the game the professors were expecting me to in order to get a degree I no longer wanted. Faced with a room full of squeaky clarinets, I wanted to chew my arm off. I was shocked a couple years ago when a guy I'd dated for almost a month declared that it was over because he was unable to reconcile the fact that I had not gotten my degree and had no interest in going back to finish. (He's a Biology professor at Tulane University and hated the fact that a college dropout could beat him at Scrabble, Trivial Pursuit, etc.).

5. My freakish memory has allowed me to retain the music and lyrics to close to 2000 songs of every variety (showtunes, opera aria, art songs, international folk songs, jingles, pop tunes, big band standards...it's all filed away up there). Add to this the lines (not just mine, but most of the cast) for nearly every stage show I've done in my adult life. This ability also gave me a great foot in the door for traveling teaching grade school - after having the the students introduced themselves, I could often remember all of them for the rest of the class period. (Now, I just want the voices to stop!)

6. I hesitate to put this in print as I may be inviting disaster, but I've never lost my wallet or keys...ever. It's part of the little daily rituals I go through to make sure I always know where they are. I've also never been pick-pocketed, but a very beautiful gift that SMID gave me was stolen when the guy (Jim) I was kindly renting a room out to got crapface drunk one night, brought home a hustler who stole Jim's laptop (the one he was working on his doctoral thesis on, but had not backed up), his passport (Canadian, ya know), and my wonderful ring that SMID brought all the way back from South Africa for me...oh, and then the guy rode off on Jim's bike...It breaks my heart that this ring is gone from me...

7. I am one of the most emotional people I know. I have been known to cry at the Hallmark commercials (you know, the one where the little boy thinks his big brother won't make it home in time from college for Christmas Eve?), laugh to be heard over an entire audience in a crowded theatre, quick to anger and just as quick to get over it. I can sing at a piano bar, so absorbed in the music and the moment that I don't realize there are tears streaming down my face. I have music and movies that I use when I need to get that kind of emotional release - things that I know will vicerally move me - happy, sad, angry, elated, scared. Exhausting, yes...but so alive!

8. I watch much more TV than anyone in my life knows. I've wasted more hours than I care to admit on the tube. It's not like I have to be home at a specific time to watch this week's episode of WhatEverCrap...I come home, I turn it on...and veg.

And now you know...

So, if you'd like to play, go for it and have fun. Hope you enjoyed reading!

It was how Hot?

(OK, so it wasn't really hot enough to melt the laminate off a Stop Sign...but it sure feels that way. A monster moving truck parked next to the sign, and the constant blast from its exhaust pipe reaked this havoc.)

Glad to be wrong

I was off by two entire weeks. I am not sure this is something to celebrate, but I will happily admit to being wrong.

I wrote two weeks ago about New Orleans' soaring crime rate and its place as the current murder capital of the US...and about our personal losses this year. At the time, I inferred from the trend that we would tally our 100th murder of 2007 by that weekend.

I was wrong. That happened yesterday.

Yeesh.

Note: Yes, it's been a tough year (actually going on two now). But. We are not walking around, heads down, on the verge of tears everyday. Just like anywhere else in the world, we have good and bad days. We live, we love, we fight, we die. The daily images (blue roofs, delapidated buildings, water lines, empty neighborhoods, etc.) are challenging reminders of what we've been through and continue to go through and what we will face for an immeasurable time to come.

Here's what I want from you, the reader, this week: Ask the questions you think you shouldn't ask. Ask the questions polite society tells you not to ask. Set your tact and civility aside for a while and either leave your questions in the comments or email me if you prefer anonymity.

Curiosity reigns. If you've ever wanted to know anything about New Orleans as it was during the time of Katrina and in the nearly two years since, it's all fair game.

It's time for me to exorcise some demons, and y'all can help.

Peace. Your Ambassador.

And The Winner is...

Fifteen years ago, shortly after arriving in New Orleans, I submitted a couple short monologues to a local professional theatre company, in hopes of getting into their Southern New Plays Festival.

This was at a time in my life (I was only 23) when I didn't think that I couldn't win, that my work wasn't good enough, that I wasn't part of the "in" crowd of New Orleans writers. Turned out it didn't matter, because they picked one of my pieces. It was produced as part of an evening of monologues and short plays - repeated over several weekends.

Soccer Mom came to one of my nights - I have the most wonderful picture taken by the future Mr. Soccer Mom, of SM and me - beaming after the performance. It's one of my favorite photos, and one of the first I stripped from its elegant gilt frame the morning of my belated evacuation from New Orleans.

That night seems so long ago.

I had more hair on my head than on my chest.

Soccer Mom wasn't Soccer Mom yet, and the world knew nothing of Blogging. (Is that really possible??)

Now, don't get me wrong. Soccer Mom was already saving the world, one kid at a time. I had notebooks full of short notes and long essays that have started to find their ways into my posts in the last few months.

I guess we were laying the groundwork for what we'd become.

Has it all turned out the way we imagined back then?

Erm, not really.

Is it better than we knew it might be?

Hell, yes!

Today, I will be heading out the door to church, but on my way, I will be stopping by Le Chat Noir, a sensational Cabaret Theatre that has done a remarkable job of carving out a lovely corner of creativity in the city's theatre scene. There, I will be dropping off my submission for their Fall New Plays Festival Competition. They will be picking only 3 of the first 20 one act play scripts they receive.

I've written something of which I am very proud. Neither Soccer Mom nor I are characters in the story, but part of what I know from her (and the other strong women in my life) has found its way into this piece. Hopefully, I captured how much I adore and respect them all - and I really hope I've allowed these women to come across as real, vibrant beings of passion and joy and pain and daring and love.

It would be almost more than I could stand if they pick my play.

Truth is, seeing this play up on the stage would be exhilirating.

But, if you ask me, I've already won.

I have Soccer Mom in my life.

Dawn of a New Day (In More Ways than One)

OK. Two months shy of two years since Katrina, and I finally have internet service at home. Someday, I'll have enough distance to find the humor in the long road to here...but for now, I am just happy to have service.

Of course, it did come at a price. Rather than getting to sleep in at all on a Saturday morning (and my apologies to all the parents who don't ever get that luxury), I had no choice but to accept their earliest appointment - 8AM today.

No complaints. I have wicked (for you Allison) high speed connection and the privacy of my home. Ahhh....

Let the blog-barrage commence!!

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