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L was reading David Copperfield and giving me character sketches that reminded him of people we know – he said the theme was that parenting in general turns children into monsters. And he referenced his own doting J and her inability to discipline her flawless son and how that might have rendered him petulant and self-serving in recent gender exchanges. And I like to fall back on my favorite WC Fields line which is “parents fuck up the first half of your life and kids fuck up the second half”- and my retort which is I didn’t have kids because my parents dbl f’d my first half. I keep trying not to laugh at all this incredible crap that has happened in my life but today when my accountant’s associate sent me an email with her usual 10 questions to get started, question #6 was hilarious and I quote – Correct me if I’m wrong but I vaguely remember you mentioned that you gave birth in 2005? If so, please provide the child’s full name, ssn & birth date. – I won’t tell her what I actually gave birth to in 2005.

N’s sister P is in from NY with her husband A and with them are 1800 high school kids from around the US who are here to work with Habitat for Humanity in the 9th ward gutting houses. A brought his class of teenagers over to the Parkway and N, the Snake, and P and I met them there for dinner. The owner, J, came over to the table to check on us since he remembered the Snake from his and N’s unwedding that was held there last May – and I asked him when they were putting catfish back on the menu – and he said well we have shrimp and oysters on now but they are not up on the board – we serve them on Friday and after 4 but you have to ask. Do you want some? And we all said oh we just ate, no, but thank you, and he left and came back in about 10 minutes with big platters of fried oysters and fried shrimp and cocktail sauce and we all ate like we had not had food in three months. And the woman sitting next to me said, everyone is so nice here. I thought of the guy in the American Can video recently circulated who said in New Orleans people said hello and how are you and they don’t do that in other parts. He was sad that it could be gone forever now.

N said I cried again today. And I said I cry everyday sometimes twice a day – sometimes all day. N said I’m back to once a day. It had stopped.

Washington Irving wrote: “There is a sacredness in tears. They are not the mark of weakness, but of power. They speak more eloquently than ten thousand tongues. They are messengers of overwhelming grief…and unspeakable love.”

Then the woman next to me asked me if I am from here I told her I had just returned from California about 10 months ago. She said oh didn’t you love it there and I said absolutely not. And she said well what do you see as the major differences between here and San Francisco and I said the people. And I referenced the video and how that is true about New Orleans more than any place I have been except maybe Bali – people are friendly and generally interested in your well being – unlike anywhere but especially California.

The kids were adorable – young, smart, excited, enthusiastic. When we left N was thanking them for coming and doing everything they had done and she welped up waving goodbye.

I was speaking to one of my VIP media sources today who offered up an idea to get some PR for New Orleans because he said the rest of the world doesn’t understand what happened here and you need to localize the message so they get it and maybe offer help via money or brain trust. So I’m going to contact an advertising acquaintance here and see if I can’t help that to happen.

S called from Hawaii – having gone to the grocery and being in cell range – he said he might have a design project brewing here in New Orleans that could be interesting.

I worked on anger management this morning and later tonight – managing to get angry – at the end my attempt seemed contrived and inordinately harsh – I am not going to dally with anger unless it comes to me on its own accord. L said earlier that his mother’s doting may have caused him to be a misanthrope because he finds himself in a world that is not working out like he wanted it to be – but despite my world not working out the way I wanted it to be or would like it to be I don’t want to study anger – I want to proceed with love even if that sometimes doesn’t serve anybody. I saw enough anger as a child to allow me to spend the second half of my life without it.

This entry was posted on Wednesday, March 22nd, 2006 at 9:23 pm and is filed under Main. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.