THERE IS A HOUSE IN NEW ORLEANS is Completely Fictional...totally...there...now I won't be in Trouble...tho being In Trouble is half the fun of Mardi Gras...o let's simply forget what is real and what is not for these few days in the deep South...let's just go about havin' a really great Bon Bon Temps!....

THERE IS A HOUSE IN NEW ORLEANS

My cousin Pete would kill me if he read this. It's his confession, rather than mine, is the reason. He was much older than I and should have protected me. But he didn't, and I think he still feels a bit guilty for it. He once ever wrote me that he hoped his hadn't "...ruined my life." I had answered him back in a huff, busily explaining that it would take a lot more than our little adventure to "ruin my life' - that in fact, my life was totally fine, although that wasn't quite right either. What he did was open my life to a LOT more possibilities, and that most folks just Dream about those possibilities rather than living them through, or out, of whatever their fantasy or life-dream had been....

So, this is all about New Orleans. New Orleans about a half century years ago, that is...
Ahhhh, New Orleans....

The clarity of hard shadow and hard sunlight on shuttered walls. The poetry of magnolia blooms luring a girl with their sugary sweet perfumes. The crunch of tiny river shrimp in young teeth when you are hungry for delight. The press of hot, sexy bodies when you're dancing slowly to glow-worm jazz wails. The sheen on the water of a deep south lake in the morning with the shore birds on wing. The smells of foods and bodies and streets and incense in the French Quarter in the twilight. The swish of the silk cape that Cecelia wore. The ribbon of her dark black hair in a sultry breeze. The tinkling sound of demitasse cups of strong, black, thick coffee at The Three Sisters. The dank and disturbed feel of the moss hanging off the cypress. The colors and frightening twine of the parades in the streets below...

New Orleans at Mardi Gras....

The Plane Ride....I was nineteen years old. No matter how much older you are than nineteen, I am sure you remember being nineteen. It may have been a terrible year. It may have been a beautiful year. But, for certain, you can recall how it felt to you, how you felt. The world was opening up to you, for better or for worse, and you were opening up to it. If sorrow happened, if great loss happened, then that hardness of life stayed with you, and you know where it is inside. If all the possibilities of the wonder of life and love opened to you without struggle or pain, then you had a lucky, lucky start into the Big Bad World. Look back, and you can see yourself there...
Looking back, I was going forward into the world, confident, smart, lovely, lively, and possible.

I had left behind a narrow, small town and its people and its ways, or so I thought. There had been pain and loss in doing that, but I shut it up in a box and threw away the key, or so I thought. At nineteen, healthy and so alive, I was sure, very sure, that the future ahead was bright for me, and I had all the right stuff to make it all happen! I saw change as a huge wave, and I was on the crest of it, and I would not be ever beaten by it into the sands below. Nineteen, and all the drama and the stage and all the parts were mine! Never before or since has this clarity been owned so thoroughly by me.

So, then, The Plane Ride to New Orleans, to visit my darling old cousin Pete, was charged with immense excitement and possibility for me! I was invited to Mardi Gras! I was leaving the Chicago Area and Nursing School and Loyola U classes for a week of, (I hoped!) worldly debauchery or, at least, Much Fun! This plane ride was obviously the beginning of a True Adventure!

Everybody, it appeared to me, was drinking copious amounts of alcohol, and they were all in various states of high euphoria! The plane was loaded with Revelers on their way to the Big Wipe-Out Party of the month, in exotic, beautiful New Orleans! We were all leaving snow and slush and bone-chilling winds, and cabin-fever depressions. The Cure was just a plane ride away! I plunged myself into the melee of dancing-in-the-aisles young studs and willing young ladies. I even affected a slightly different accent, so as to sound less obviously mid-western! I batted my eyelashes! I laughed loudly at immediately forgotten jokes. I was already having So Much Fun!

Two young men became my favorites as the journey progressed through the mile-bending skies. They were Northwestern friends, and were competing vigorously with each other for my maidenly attentions. They flattered, cajoled, acted upon the stage with great abandon! They were erudite, respectful, silly, attention-seeking, attention-getting, bold, sincere, all at the same time and in sequence. I fell immediately in love with them both! By the end of the journey, phone numbers and names had been carefully written, folded, and placed in safe places. We were going to meet, and often! They would save me from my old (nine years older...) stodgy cousin! We would go dancing in jazz dives, cavorting on the waterfront! We were the Three Musketeers of the Mardi Gras! I prepared to introduce my new fellows to my cousin Pete, as soon as we disembarked! He, of course, would be pleased not to have his little cousin tied around his neck day and night. We would both have an "out", yet I would have my chaperon when in need. The perfect scenario was planned and ready for its execution!

Happily, we three toddled off the plane together. Right there, waiting was Pete. Running up to him, I gave him a big cousinly hug. Which he, very unexpectedly, returned with a huge crush of my exuberant self, into his arms, with a very sexual kiss on the lips! I was completely discombobulated. This was my 'old' cousin Pete, for heavens sakes! A bit taken back, I turned and introduced him to my two new 'friends', who were justifiably looking a little confused. "This is my Cousin, Pete. Pete, these are my friends. We're going to get together here in New Orleans sometime, when you and Cecelia want some time without me around!" I spoke lightly, but very clearly, to make sure that my new fellows weren't going to bolt. Cuz that's what it looked like they were going to do. They were looking straight at Pete, who was looking straight at them. It was a challenge over territory, Me, to be precise. I was very confused myself! What in the world was going on with Pete? Firmly, he informed us all that All of my days and nights were planned, and we would be too busy for me to see any "friends". Then, calmly and firmly steering me away by his hand on my elbow, he called out, "Nice to have met you.". I was half-turned back, calling myself! "See you guys soooooooon!" to a pair of upturned faces with frozen smiles, who I sensed I was never going to see again! What was up with Pete? I asked him.

He tersely replied that he had been disappointed to see me with 'Two Men', who were obviously strangers, and he hoped I hadn't given them his number. I muttered something to cover that one, and he went on. "Cecelia and I do have too much for you to do to find the time to party with strangers. Your Mother would be upset with me if I didn't chaperon you better than that." Well, that took care of that. If he was going to tell on me to Mom, my gig was up before it had even begun. I resigned myself to a "good time" with my 'old' cousin and his even older girlfriend. I was determined to enjoy myself anyway. This was going to be an Adventure, wasn't it?

My cousin Pete was, and has always been, a very attractive guy, mind you. He's very tall, thin, fit, nicely dressed at all times, somewhat conservative in tastes, with a big, generous smile and a good, German Catholic disposition. He was, in many ways, a bit prudish and old-fashioned, but, he did 'go with' Cecelia, and had done so for years. Cecelia was a lovely, exotic lady, older by quite a few years. Her family were an old Creole Catholic one who had lived in New Orleans forever, we were told. She lived with her mother, and was not going to marry until her mother died. We of the Midwestern Clan were in total awe of her. And, we couldn't figure out what she saw in Pete. I mean he was a great guy, but she, she was Foreign, to us, and therefore superior to us in every way! I was very pleased that I would be spending a whole week with this woman, who, I was sure would introduce me to the proverbial 'ways of the world' as no one else could!

Pete actually lived and worked in the Famous French Quarter, too! He had been in the army in New Orleans, years before, and had fallen in love with the old city, especially. His house was on the very edge of the oldest streets of the city, and he could walk to his office in the main square of the wonderful and exotic Quarter. Cecelia had a Boutique Gift Shop right there on the Square too. This was going to be So Much Fun! On the way to his house by car, Pete was answering my questions, but he seemed a bit preoccupied. He finally blurted out that he intended to be my escort everywhere during the week, just as if we were dating or something. I took this lightly at the time, and said something like, well, yeah, but not like a boyfriend-girlfriend dating, right? right? He laughed, but didn't actually reassure me. I decided I hadn't heard him quite right. After all, this was sophisticated New Orleans! What did I know about its social expectations! I was just a small-town Illinois hick! Yes indeed I was...

The first couple of days in the old city were all sights, sounds, tastes, sensations! Especially, colors! All soft with the misty rains of February in the Deep South. Greens that were grayish as old lace. Blues all faded in the humid air. Black, very black, past the black of shadow. Stark, almost. White, very white, as if someone was painting it on over and over all of the time. Greens like Spring.

The sounds! Around the block came three men, all in costume. Drinking at noon! Staggering a little and happy as songbirds! As they rounded the corner..."I'd give my left nut for a ham sandwich!"....the drums and horns and woodwinds of the parades below the deck of the architecture office where Pete worked...their odd mourning, deep and sincere, right in the heart of such joyous jazz rhythms...the calls of the dock workers, late, late at night, calling out cautions and commands one to the other, with deep, soft tones of Louisiana delta men....

The tastes! The coffees, rich as sin in their tiny, eggshell cups...the river shrimp in their full, salty, crunchy little cardboard containers. The pastries and soft, soft breads, all melting into sugars and perfumes of sweetness, cloying and undeniable. the mounds of gumbo with unimaginable depths of flavor and succulence, down, down to the bottom of the bowels. The juleps! crisp and cool with the nibbles of mint on your lips all the day....

The buildings! the wrought-iron everywhere! The brick streets! the people! the parades! They all twined around each other... lively ghosts in full display, weaving in and out, in and out, until you were dizzy with delight and sensation...

And, of course, Cecelia. Ah, Cecelia. I could not get enough of Cecelia. I had a complete crush on her from the moment I first laid eyes on her. She was a Movie Star. A Stage Star. a Goddess. She knew Everything There Was To Know. I followed her around like a puppy, picking up any crumbs she threw my way, and hiding them in my pocket to savor later...Her clothing! She looked like a model from France, I was sure! (Although I had never seen a model from France...) All silks, and linens, and light wools, and Isadore Duncan scarves around her neck! And gold jewelry by the ton, all on her arms and ears and neck and even in her dark, thick, glorious hair! Her porous honey white jewel of a face, blemish-free

And yet, I was not to see her very often. She was cordial enough when we were all together, but I certainly didn't interest her...she was more interested in watching Pete while he was with me. She would arch her eyebrows up, one of them usually, and look, well, serious, in a bemused sort of way. I was starting to catch on that she was a bit jealous of the time he was spending with me! This struck me as pretty strange, as I felt I was hardly competition for a Woman of the World as she was! Also, I was totally out of my element in every, every way.

I had packed my lightest winter clothes, and they were too heavy for the sultry time of year. I was sweating really copiously much of the time, which was Not Attractive. My long blonde hair was not fluffy and lovely - it was dangling straggly and damp and my curlers at night were not correcting that problem at all. Also, the warm damp was contributing to my face breaking out in its monthly bloom of acne lesions...so attractive! I was basically not being entrancing. I was being nineteen years old, and a bit awkward, unsure, and besotted by my wondrous surroundings. The pinnacle was approaching! I was going to go to a dance with Pete and Cecelia - not a Mardi-Gras Ball, but big party on an Island in Lake Pontchartrain, with jazz bands and buffets and wine and everything! I dressed in my best sexy dress, modest of course, but stylish. I put on makeup carefully, my earrings, and heels, which I rarely wore. I was very excited! Off Pete and I went, but, no Cecelia. Pete said she was home with a "headache". No matter, I supposed. Surely guys would ask me to dance!

Well, this party was so very wonderful, I can still remember it like it was just yesterday night! The lake at night! the stars! the boat to the island! the band of dark, sexy, sensual musicians. the glints of light on the gold of the horns. the wails and sobs and compulsions of the music itself. and the dancing!...occasionally, some one would ask me to dance. But Pete always was giving me punch - laced with something, I hoped, although it didn't seem so. He was watching my every move. He practically followed me to the Ladies Room. I was starting to feel a bit over-chaperoned! What harm was a little dancing going to do? I was only dancing with him, and it seemed to me he was dancing way to close for a cousin. It was starting to feel a little erotic, and I was uncomfortable, a bit. After all, I was only a nineteen year old woman! My body was willing, but I had standards in place from my Catholic upbringing. I allowed my self a few little sexual twinges, but, shoot, this was my cousin breathing heavily around here. It didn't seem good. Still, we danced on. We looked, I noticed in the gilt and smoke of the mirrors on the wall, like a very well-suited, attractive couple...

Before I go here, I should mention something that had happened a day or two before. Every night at Pete's house, I slept on a cot on the sun porch. He slept in his own bedroom with a huge amour that I really appreciated. My sun porch little space was quite nice, though. Each night, I took a shower, and put on my way too warm, cotton nightgown...modest, I might point out. I set my hair in my curlers...I slept well, tired from all the sights and the sounds of the day. One morning, however, as I was just waking...

I was awoken completely, by my good old cousin Pete doing the crushing-me-in-his-arms thing, with the passionate kissing and everything. All that saved me was my awareness that I had to pee, and soon, that I was in curlers and even had acne medicine on my blemishes, and was sweating in a nightgown that covered me head to toe. The whole situation was just ridiculous! I, at once, began scolding him with injunctions about how we were cousins, First Cousins, for heavens sakes! And he was thirty years old. and, of course, I loved him as a cousin and all, but that was it. and what was he doing this for anyway? what about Cecelia, who would kill him and me too if she ever found out, and so on and so on and so on. I was jabbering so, that I got him to be pretty embarrassed and contrite. It was just having a woman in his house, he explained, quite sorrowfully. (I didn't know what that meant, and I didn't want to know.) He was very, very sorry. wouldn't happen again. promise.

I hadn't even felt flattered by this attention, much...it was a little flattering, and could be used in pretend situations, like the dance. I could pretend and he could pretend we were boyfriend and girlfriend, with no harm done...

We came 'home' from the dance. I was scooting towards my little porch perch, when he attacked again! Into his arms I was swooped and covered with kisses and kisses all over my face and shoulders! I was both very turned-on, as we used to say, and totally horrified. Finally, in honesty and in desperation I screamed, "Stop it, Pete! I'm a Virgin!" I was coming from a place where I just didn't want my very first sex act, the giving-over of my virginity, to be with my first cousin! It was Not the kind of memory I wanted to have for life! Then, to my complete shock and surprise, he started to cry, and cried out, "So am I!" I sat down, hard, on his hard, single bed.

I did not know what to say. He did not know what to say. But then he did say what he wanted to say. He told me that he was in love with me. He had been in love with me for a couple of years. He had looked into it. First cousins could get married in Spain. in the Catholic Church. (He assumed we were both Catholics. I had "fallen-away" from the Church just that year. By now, I was so besotted with all the experiences and sensations I was going through that I didn't know what to think or say anymore. I told him I had to get some sleep. I felt pretty vulnerable, tho safe enough. He was my cousin, who I had known since childhood. He wasn't (by his own definition), a rapist or something. He obviously sincerely loved me, although that seemed a little far-fetched. I was flattered a bit, too. What power my nineteen year old self had! It wasn't that useful a power, if it was attracting cousins and all, but it was power, all the same. Heady stuff. We would sleep on 'it', whatever 'it' was!

It was the morning of my last day in New Orleans. It was drizzling and very gray, a tattered gray, a despondent gray. We breakfasted quietly. We went out to coffee with Cecelia, who was solicitous and kind. Of course, I was leaving. That was a good thing. That's what was behind her eyes. I agreed with my eyes. Women have ways of speaking without talking. Pete drove me to the airport. He spoke seriously, the whole way, about how we were to marry. He would be in touch with me soon in Evanston, at the Nursing School. We would begin our courtship. Eventually we would tell our parents. I agreed nicely. To my very tired soul, I just wanted to get on that plane. New Orleans had conquered me. I was already writing poems in my head about the hundreds of sensations and all the experiences. I wanted to be back in the winter and the slush and to just write it all down, write it all down!

We were all subdued on the plane. The party was over. many of us slept. I slept the whole way 'home'...

A couple of weeks went by. I had received a post card from Pete, telling me he would be "back in town soon" and that we would talk. Instead, he finally called. He told me he had talked with his Mother about his plans She had been very angry with Me, it turns out! She had assumed that I had seduced her son, my noble cousin! I was furious! I didn't do anything wrong! What was going on! He said he would call again soon. He didn't.

I was actually glad it was over. I had no idea how to extricate myself from such behavior! I had no idea what had happened! not for sure, that is. I just thought, in my young, obscure, cloudy perception, that it hadn't been 'normal' in some way. I began dating people my own age, who were not cousins or strange guys in any way that I could tell. If they started behaving badly, I dumped them at once. I started to take some control of my own romantic destinies a bit. It was refreshing. I didn't look back.

Two Christmases later, I was married to my children's father. I was happy, with my new baby, my elder daughter, in my arms. We were at his mother's home, my auntie and godmother. She was cordial, now that I was safely out of action in her son's life...

I was playing a bit with the wonderful huge train set he and his brothers had down in the basement, still up and functional, tho their childhoods were long over. He came downstairs. We chatted lightly. Then he suddenly said, "I always knew you'd get married right away. You were so eager to be married." I looked at him, straight into his face. I said nothing at all. I went upstairs.

I will always remember New Orleans as it was then. My cousin never married. He and Cecelia are still together, in separate homes, though. He's in his seventies and she is in her eighties. I have no idea if he is still a virgin or not...

You know, there should be a New Orleans Jazz CD about in this house somewhere. I should play it, right now...
I think I shall....