Southern Hospitality Louisiana Style

March 11, 2012

We have arrived at our easternmost destination:  Baton Rouge, Louisiana.  Here we found good ole' southern hospitality in the home of Lindsay and Jeremy Reynolds, friends we met at our church in Tumwater.  This will be our third night with them, we are so grateful for their graciousness, and have truly enjoyed getting a chance to visit and know them better.  Thank you, Lindsay and Jeremy!  It has been great!

Duffy and I have slept in the trailer parked in the driveway of their home, enjoyed meals out with them on Friday and today after church.  This morning, we attended a church with Lindsay, in her search for a church home.  We were all three impressed with Pastor Dr. Juliet Spencer's message at St. Andrew's United Methodist Church.  The sermon topic was "I want to talk about me...," words of a current country western song, regarding our penchant for always asking for things for ourselves.  Even through intercessory prayer, she noted, we are asking God for something.  Rarely do we pray to God to simply say "Thank You," "I am so glad You are in my life."  The benefit or reward of having God in our lives is plain and simply the relationship we have with God.  This is God's reason for drawing us near to Him, for desiring our worship and praise.  Today's was a great sermon in the common Lenten series.  Plus, the church was friendly and had a well organized welcoming committee.  It could be that Lindsay just found a church home for herself and Jeremy.

On Saturday, Duffy and I drove to New Orleans.  I would like to write that we arrived early and spent the entire day taking it all in.  Not so.  We left at about 11:00am, right on Rader Time, and took the wrong road.  Highway 12 would also go to New Orleans, but it was not the way we wanted to go, having planned to stop by Oak Alley Plantation off I-10 on the way.  Doubling back, completely confusing our GPS, aptly dubbed 'Miss Direction' for obvious reasons.  Thinking that I would not find anything I could eat in the French Quarter of N.O., we set out to find a restaurant favored by locals while we zig-zagged our way to I-10 and across the mighty Mississippi River to the plantation.  The recommendation, Carli-Co Cafe in Gonzalez, LA. was just what we were looking for.  We can vouch for asking the locals.  It was a great choice.

By sometime after 1:00pm, we arrived at our interim stop along the Mississippi River, a plantation home called Oak Alley.  The front and rear entrances of this multi-story, white, columned home are framed by two long columns of enormous, historic oak trees in the front and back.  Twenty-six of these oak trees decorate the grounds.  The approach toward either entrance is like walking beneath a huge green canopy - just gorgeous. 

From Oak Alley we drove on to New Orleans, arriving at 2:00pm or 2:30pm, not what you call early.  But, early enough for us.  I don't know what I was expecting of New Orleans, but I had envisioned something totally different than I found.  The city, and even the Quarter, did not have the charm with which I had endeared them in my imaginings. 

Approaching the Quarter through downtown, it was apparent some big event was happening in New Orleans, for we saw droves of people in royal blue shirts with KENTUCKY printed on front and back.  They all seemed to be heading in the same direction we were going.  It was not until today that we learned the collegiate Southeastern Conference championship basketball game between Vanderbilt University of Nashville, TN and University of Kentucky in Lexington took place this weekend in New Orleans.  Number 1 seed Kentucky was overturned by Vanderbilt according to today's news.  I don't imagine the happy Saturday blue-shirts were as cheery today.

In our hunt for the Quarter, we stumbled upon the Jean Lafitte National Park Service Interpretive Center (that may not be the correct name) in the Quarter, where we collected information about events and happenings.  The best advice we received was to leave the French Quarter, find our way back to our car and out of the city before the night's St. Joseph parade starting at 6:00pm.  Definitely good advice we chose to heed.

On foot we next located first Jackson Square (a central park one-square-block large) and then St. Louis Cathedral in the heart of the district.  Across the street from the park, on the side opposite the cathedral is Performance Square, a wide space in the sidewalk with concrete bleachers rising from it on the river side.  A group of acrobats were entertaining the crowd with their high tumbling antics to hoots and hollers, cheers and spare change.

At St. Louis Cathedral, a wedding had just taken place as evidenced by the bride and groom who sat side-by-side in a horse-drawn carriage waiting to depart for the next stage in the festivities.  Onlookers included invited guests on the cathedral steps and uninvited tourists like us watching from the park and just outside the park gates.  We moved through the crowd and crossed the street to the cathedral side where we waited on the corner.  Just as I was taking a picture of the retreating wedding carriage down the street, I realized a small group of people stopped for me to finish the shot.  One woman and three men comprised the group.  One of the men was very tall,  very big, wearing a dark suit that barely fit his solid bulk, and sporting an ear-bud in his left ear with a cord disappearing beneath his shirt collar.  Another man, similarly dressed and outfitted with an ear-bud, made up the second person in group.  The other two, clearly man and wife, were dressed in light to darker shades of blue.  The man in blue, smallest of the three men and white-haired, asked if I got the shot.  When I replied, "Yes, thank you" they passed us and moved on down the street.  Later I verified online that the couple were Governor and Mrs. Steve Beshear of Kentucky and their secret service agents or equivalent.  Evidently, the Big Game was important enough to bring out the governor.

Moving on a little farther, we came upon one of many groups of musicians set up in the street playing their distinctive music.  This group sounded more than amateur.  The Souzaphone was stenciled with the name Doreen's Jazz of New Orleans, phone number and web address.  The group was made up of clarinetist Doreen, her husband the Souzaphone player, a nine- or ten-year-old girl, perhaps their granddaughter, on drums and a guitarist.  When the woman, seated in a folding chair, raised her clarinet to play, oh my, the sounds that came from that instrument.   She was clearly Doreen, the group's namesake.  And, this was the next best thing to going to the Preservation Jazz Hall, closed until 8:00pm that evening when we would be on our way back to Baton Rouge.  We stayed around to listen until they wrapped up the concert just before the parade in the Quarter was to start.  Doreen has a low, melodic, sometimes growlly voice.  She plays a mean clarinet.  The other musicians on the Souzaphone and guitar were equally good.  Dorian, the young drummer, played with an expertise of someone much older.  Well, this non-amateur group dubbed Doreen's Jazz of N.O. was also selling CDs, one of which we bought and listened to all the way back to Baton Rouge.  Subtitle of the CD?  "New Orleans' Best Kept Secret."  And the group probably was.

Today, we have been hanging out with Lindsay and Jeremy.  First, was Sunday worship with Lindsay.  Next, we returned to the house to join Jeremy in search of a restaurant (mmm-yummy Mexican food) and a driving tour of the LSU campus where Jeremy is a doctoral student in theater.  Back to the house for rest, relaxation, blogging, napping, laundry, and a wonderful dinner made by Jeremy with Lindsay's assistance.  Good food, good friends, good conversation.  How better to end a long-anticipated visit?


Until next time...
Pam