Hit and Run New Orleans

I mentioned in the previous chapter that we are the type of people who care about beignets. This is a beignet place outside the tourist district in a much more local inhabited chi-chi part of New Orleans. The beignet was like a deep fried croissant. Maybe that’s not what a traditional beignet is supposed to be like? I don’t know, but I liked it.

Photography-wise, for color on this trip I shot exclusively with the x-100 just like I used to in the old days. New Orleans is a colorful town with colorful people. They need to be shot that way.

I didn’t approach my few days in New Orleans as a journalist, but I was fortunate to get this shot of a man reading a newspaper while enjoying an early morning cup of coffee. Depending on how old you are, or the state of your memory, you may not be aware that reading a physical newspaper on a beautiful morning with a hot steaming cup of coffee was recognized as one of life’s great pleasures. This could possibly be the last photograph of such a thing.

I chatted with this guy for a few minutes. He told me stories of moving out to California and joining the navy and going to Vietnam to clear mines and a lot of mumbling I couldn’t understand. He said people took his photograph all the time. I quickly got the impression that there are a lot of characters in New Orleans that like to have their photograph taken.

Imaginary Lola looks at home in old New Orleans. She’s dressed up in French finery of the period. Looks like she owns the place.

The real Lola with the real Mississippi River bridge to Gretna in the background. She is most definitely not amused. In the immediate aftermath of Hurricane Katrina, you may recall, heavily armed racist scumbags from Gretna blocked the bridge to keep desperate people from getting out of New Orleans, fearful that some poor person might try to steal a loaf of bread, which would make Jesus cry.

I was lucky to stumble into Dr. Bob’s Folk Art where I met Dr. Bob and the woman pictured above whose name I caught but characteristically don’t remember. Dr. Bob’s a great artist and a great humanitarian. We were actually in the same field in southern Indiana back in 1972. Bull Island was a giant Woodstock-like festival that turned out to be an epic disaster and was the death knell for that era of large hippy rock fests. Dr. Bob was there and so was I, though I was only 12. One day I flew over the festival in a small plane. The next day my dad took me on the back of his motorcycle. We drove right up to the stage. My biggest memories were the nude people swimming in the river and the drug dealers selling their stuff in little stands along the way. I probably saw Dr. Bob. I took pictures but they have somehow disappeared, which is a mystery because I never would have thrown those away. Maybe Dr. Bob was in one? Probably.

That’s all for my little hit and run New Orleans photographs. It’s a new year and I’ll be going in a different direction photographically. These pics give something of a hint at what’s to come. I’ll be using just one fixed lens camera for the foreseeable future, shooting what I see in the most realistic perspective possible. It’s going to be difficult, but hopefully I’m up for the challenge.

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