New Orleans
We lived in the garret we had rented on McDaniel Street, near Lafayette Park.
Lafayette, we are here.
Every day, I walked in to the campus, to the Anthropology
Department, to see if George Percy had called.
We didn't have a telephone.
Or a car.
If we needed to go anywhere, we took the bus, or walked.
A student didn't need a car. Or a telephone.
There seemed to be a delay.
In getting a vehicle for us to drive, in Tallulah.
Finally, I decided that
if we flew to New Orleans, and stayed with George and Susan Percy, that would put
some pressure on George, to put some pressure on Bob Newman, to get things moving.
Get us a vehicle.
George met us at the airport.
He and Susan lived
on Prytania Street, not far from where Larry and Hazel now live.
George went
out to the campus every morning, to call Bob--he had a phone, and a car--and Susan
went off to work, so Brenda and I had the house to ourselves, and could do the kind
of things newlyweds do. I think they were giving us some privacy.
This was
like a honeymoon in New Orleans, the honeymoon we didn't have. Except we were broke.
We could ride the streetcar down to the French Quarter and walk around gawking at
the natives, like tourists.
I had read The Moviegoer, and thought
Walker Percy had a real feeling of place in his book. I felt like I knew New Orleans.
I had read John Rechy's City of Night, too. I didn't know that New
Orleans, the New Orleans of queer hustlers, and homosexuals. I guess that's who
we gawked at.
Later, we were to live in New Orleans. But we didn't know
that then. We thought we were just there on a visit.
Because we didn't have
any money, we didn't eat out at any four-star restaurants.
This was before
the New Orleans Underground Gourmet was published, so we didn't know about
neighborhood restaurants that served delicious food, cheap.
Discovering new
cheap neighborhood restaurants is one of the chief pleasures of living in New Orleans.
Susan was an indifferent cook, and George was a picky eater. All he liked was hamburger,
burned, Italian spaghetti, and chili. As Brenda was to find out, when she cooked,
on the dig.
Susan worked for the West Bank Advertiser and her friend,
Marcelle Bienvenue, was a writer for the Sunday roto magazine in the Times-Picayune.
Marcelle was into food, and later helped Chef Emeril co-write a couple of his books.
She wrote a book called Who's Your Mama, Are You Catholic, and Can You Make a
Roux?
That was about it for New Orleans, the first time.
In and
out.