nothing works that way

There are still blue tarps tacked across some of the roofs. You can see them as you descend into the airport, named for the musician whose childhood 'second home' collapsed during the same hurricane that birthed the lingering polyethylene bandages.

It was the Karnofsky Tailor Shop in the early 1900s, when Louis Armstrong ran around with the Jewish immigrant owners' sons. His first job was playing a tiny tin trumpet in the back of their cart as they drove it through the neighborhoods. The Karnofskys invited him to dinner, and as an adult he still kept boxes of matzoh in his kitchen cabinets.

The building should have been enshrined years ago. But it wasn't, and now it's gone. Something about permits, i think. Nothing works that way, my dude, the bar's bathroom art tells me, barely a mile from the empty Karnofsky lot. nothing.

*

We were in New Orleans again for a conference M was presenting at. Our second return since we first left for good. Two weeks until Mardi Gras, and the town is counting down the days. Nearby, unseen high school marching bands practice their routines for the parades, and the costumed tourists dance across broken sidewalks with glittering bullseyes on their backs. As if they think getting jumped is part of seasonal celebrations.

i used to worry about the crime. For example:

the people living in the house directly behind us must have pissed someone off, because there were at least two warning shot drive-bys in as many weeks. One of them happened while M and i lay in the bed. The bedroom had a door directly into the backyard, and when the shots rang out  i threw myself over M and rolled us onto the floor as one of the bullets pinged through something metallic outside.

i'm so tired of these motherfuckers, a woman yelled in the street after the shooters sped off. After a time i went into the backyard and searched for the metal ricochet. The house behind us had a corrugated tin shed that served as part of the property fence, and there was a nickel-sized hole in it.  i couldn't be sure if it had always been there and i just never noticed it before. For some reason it looked like the hole was made via our side of the shed, but i couldn't be sure of that, either.

M and i giggled about my stupid gesture of protection, and fell back asleep. A few days later i found a bullet in the backyard garden, not far from the fencing.

*

M patiently explained to me how much of the city's crime in all likelihood would never truly touch us. Drive-bys like the ones behind our home often happened because they were taking care of their own issues, however destructive and misguided those solutions may be. because what were they going to do? Call the police? Please. Nothing works that way, my dude. nothing.

*

M's statistical logic and cold rationale made me feel both better and much worse. But now, a few years later, i worry about the crime again. i used to roll my eyes at White People fretting about it, because it was so pointless and performative. But since we moved, three of our friends had their cars broken into. One of them had it happen twice. Friends of friends got mugged, and lifelong New Orleanians complain it's been a long time since it was this bad.

And the city continues to sink into the ocean, and the waters wait for the opportunity to finally reclaim what should have been theirs years ago.

But this visit, i missed living there more than i did the first time we went back. maybe because it feels like it's one of the only places in the country that knows the score. The stray bullets bury themselves in the earth like seeds, and the children rehearse their marching band eulogies for the parades.

(((EC)))