There's a benign argument to this city. It's strung out like two passive aggressive lesbians in the ninth ward that give each other mo halks before bitching about the others over played cover songs. The hair standing on end, holding together the shaved parts like Frenchmen St.. The duality of anarchists and down to earth construction workers... throwing hammers at each others thrift art work right on esplanade between Mid City and the Marigny.
Whose tax payers dollars are paying for squatters?
Whose 'live in' volunteer work for city revitalization will bring back the soul of New Orleans?
Whose conservatism will keep it warm in the south?
Whose starving artists will attract all the street performers? What about those illegal animals, fire shows, the ones with instrumental experiments bellowing from within dreadlocks that are no longer rastifarian?
The two tag teams call secretly through beer cups on threads of logic that are dicey enough to break up the unity once formed in this city among french prostitutes and hobos. The only neutral ground cheered over shots, vowing to ignore bourbon street's din of 67 year olds in hawaiin shirts taking pictures of transsexual strippers, burnt out tourists, and college girls flashing their tits for mardi gras beads. You can hear their own spite, secret as north eastern racism. It creeps up right in between the drive by shootings and the brass bands. Sometimes lurking in the shadows of the over grown white pot bellies in uptown there are pick up trucks full of paint and renovated vw busses having a stand off.
Everything in this town is outdated, including their argument, that's what makes it so compelling. Modernity never has had such sturdy foundation, the worshipped maple wood etched in Banksy says it all.
What better solution to post apocolyptic reckage than a bunch of kids marvelling at garbage with the pride of poverty? It's as if their reinventing shot gun house architecture, taking the pillanders and flying buttresses out of classy. The old banjo player with a cigar and harmonica whose been on minimum wage his whole life can pop a squat next to a kid with rip off pants and a stolen acchordian on the mississipi. They both drink cheap whisky and have friends on crack. One lives in a tree house, and the other in rocking chair. New family portrait to toss on the fire place next to photos of Saint's fans and soul food recipes.
Esplanade can wrap its arms around the construction companies and the north eastern environmentalists alike.
Maybe this is a fantasy. A head trip of youthful socialism, rural liberalism drawn in to the sodom of the fast lane in the slow motion guise of an afternoon stroll, the 'walk in the park' that New Orleans holds so dear. With a mustang going at a top speed 30 miles an hour down main street, who can resist? Disclaimer granted... I hope these two paths merge, meet in a ware house of folks who were republican until Katrina, and impoverished side shows that tap dance with cans only wishing they were cool enough to be 10 years old like the locals in Jackson Square.
Make way for the whole population to recognize a common ambition among all, regardless of socio economics, to invent a middle class life style that spits on the consumerism associated with materialism, like diner milkshakes that are actually vegan.
