Fire and Joy in the Bywater
Sick of tragedy. Sick of cancelling
Yes, I’m supposed to be driving 17-Mile Drive in Monterey County with CJ today, but I’m not. We’d planned a quick trip to California to visit California State University for grad school, and enjoy a little bit of warmth. But for the past week—this is nuts—I’ve been having ominous premonitions about the trip. Nothing based on concrete knowledge, just the overwhelming unease that’s apparently part of daily life in ICE’s America.
Then there are actual reasons. CJ returns to Kansas City for school next weekend, and they have stuff they need to do at home before they pack up again.
And, paid subscribers who watch my goofy little videos on Tuesdays know that I recently started physical therapy for the vestibular migraines that have been ruining almost everything in recent months. I have a wonderful therapist who’s the first medical professional I’ve worked with who really seems to get what this condition entails and what fixes it.
The exercises look stupidly simple on paper. I’m tracking pens with my eyes and doing tasks that involve slowly nodding and shaking my head. They’re handing my ass to me on the regular. That said, I am starting to feel some improvement. More importantly, I have a better grasp of just how ill I have been for a long time. That part blows me away daily. It’s been really bad. But when you don’t know what it feels like to live without a condition, how do you know how bad it is?
So, canceling the trip was also part of a decision I recently made to go very, very easy on myself until I get some solid, quantifiable improvement.
The first day of physical therapy, I took a vestibular migraine screening survey. Scores over 20 require treatment. 50 is considered “handicapped” by the condition. I scored a 74.
(I told you I was sick.)
In early February, I’ll take the survey again to see how six weeks of therapy have helped. Until then, I’m not planning anything. Might only leave my house for therapy appointments, which is pretty much where I am now.
That said, I wish I were in New Orleans. Specifically, my favorite neighborhood, the Bywater.
I mean, I pretty much always wish I was in the Bywater, making friends at Elizabeth’s, drinking a frozen Paloma at Bud Rip’s, reintroducing my body to salad at Pizza Delicious, then going next door to record-shop at Euclid.
Today, I wish I were in the Bywater and able to help. I don’t know how much national news coverage this is getting—How do you even squeeze in every awful thing that’s happening right now?—but last night an outbreak of arson attacks destroyed eight cars and a house in the Bywater.
Goddamn, I am sick of writing travel posts based on the latest tragedy.
But here we are.
The latest news report says they don’t know who did it.
One of my favorite places fell victim—Bywater Bakery lost its delivery van to one of the fires.
And now for the part where I tell a story about a place struck by something awful.
On the last day of my 2024 birthday trip to New Orleans, I planned to walk down the block to Elizabeth’s for breakfast. But, being a Saturday morning, everyone in New Orleans was already at Elizabeth’s. I knew nothing about Bywater Bakery other than it existed and was nearby. At least I could grab a coffee and a pastry, right?
I heard the music coming from the bakery before I parked my car. Two men standing on the street corner, one with an accordion and the other with a washboard. The accordion player was singing in Cajun French, and there was an available table on the sidewalk. Kismet strikes again.
A large group of retirees sat at the table beside me. They talked and laughed, clapped along with the musical duo, and were clearly having themselves a time despite the lack of alcohol on the menu. As they left, one of the women stopped by my table, just to wish me a good morning. We chatted a bit. She and her husband retired to New Orleans from some northern city that escapes me. They settled in the Bywater and were giving some out-of-town friends a glimpse of their regular New Orleans life. She was also a writer, and we talked about the inspiration of being in the neighborhood by Desire Street.
“Did you notice all the people sitting on their stoops on your way here?” she asked. I had noticed, but hadn’t gone much deeper. “Happens every week. We all sit on our stoops and listen to the music from here.”
Who wouldn’t want to live in such a place? I might have asked her to take me home with her.
Since it was getting late and tables were emptying, I lingered for a while, enjoying the duo and my coffee and the kind of glorious autumn morning that only occurs in New Orleans. When the duo struck up a zydeco take on “Squeezebox” by The Who, I begrudgingly decided that it was time to leave because I wasn’t going to witness anything better than that: a bakery with kind neighborhood patrons and musicians whose work floats over the neighborhood, bringing people out of their homes to share in one of the things that makes New Orleans unlike any other place in the world: the music in the air.
As I left, I tipped the band and thanked them, then joined them in singing the song about the mama with a squeezebox keeping Daddy up all night long as I walked away, laughing. Because walking down the street, singing and laughing fits in just fine down here.
When I got to my car down the block, I couldn’t miss the bumper sticker on the vehicle in front of me:
Don’t postpone joy.
Granted, I might not have followed that directive this week when I cancelled the California trip. But I’m preparing myself for future joys by giving my broken brain time to mend so that maybe I can dance next time I hear The Who: Zydeco Style.
Wanna buy me a café au lait next time I’m at Bywater Bakery? I’d appreciate it!
