New Orleans comes around Decatur

I have an interest in New Orleans and a few weeks ago I found yet another source by which to experience New Orleans – albeit from a distance. At the Decatur Book Festival held three miles from my home was a featured book reading by New Orleans musician and author- by surprise, Paul Sanchez. He came to read from his book Pieces of Me and to play his music to other New Orleans worshipers, owners, and people like me perhaps who can be called proud borrowers of the city.

It’s hard to own something when you’re not so sure you really own it. Actually, if you are not a native of a place, you don’t reside there, and you don’t plan to do more than just visit occasionally, then just how much interest should you have in the place? Does simply adding up a place’s significance in one’s life give you some degree of ownership? I do struggle with my ownership of New Orleans. I have been a visitor there since I was about was about three years of age. My major connection to the city is my parents; they owned the city in their hearts since they met there while in college; it could be said I really owe my existence to the place. With the availability of news from the Crescent City on the internet and a growing list of available books - not only on the recent disaster of Hurricane Katrina, but on the unusual culture of the place, it has become increasingly easy to become a devotee of the place while only getting one real visit per year. This book festival event was probably full of true New Orleanians many of whom perhaps remain in therapy because of Hurricane Katrina, and so this event with Paul Sanchez was spiritual to many in that room.

Sanchez is a native New Orleanian and he was chased away, at least for a time, by the flood waters of Hurricane Katrina. As a musician who used to be in a fairly well known New Orleans band, Cowboy Mouth, Sanchez can draw crowd just for his songwriting, guitar and voice, but the storm made him an author. Displaced from New Orleans he started an internet blog and in time someone who could get him published took notice of this. Between doing songs from his career on this day, Sanchez read from his book Pieces of Me and held his audience’s attention with his stories of place, displacement, and being home again. Those in attendance joyfully responded to his narratives, like the one about folks owning a pet goat in the French Quarter’s urban setting as if it was just another dog. From the book, another story about a fruit and vegetable vendor who creeps through the streets via a pickup truck while announcing his products in songlike cadence over a loudspeaker, only occasionally this guy forgets to silence the microphone for a call on his cell phone, therefore further entertaining the neighborhood. And then there is a hard story for Paul Sanchez to tell, about his changed life after being hit by a taxi cab during a Chicago bike ride while on tour. This accident caused him to black out for months at unexpected times all while trying self diagnose and hide these occurrences from friends and family; tough stuff separate from losing a home in a flood.

People around me at this event were rattling keys and clicking their fingers with approval to the stories he told. I heard yeses uttered as he spoke, almost like it was a lively church service on a Sunday. These were human stories with a sense of place that many recognized could only happen in New Orleans and sadly some of these stories could have been told after Katrina nearly washed the place away.

I bought Paul’s book and a CD called Stew Called New Orleans that he recorded with another New Orleans musician, John Boutte. After the reading, I went back outside and I ran into someone I knew at a book booth out on the street. As I related the story of this Paul Sanchez book event, just talking about it seemed to be oddly poetic to me; New Orleans has that effect even in casual conversation.

I remember days after Katrina defending this city below sea level with its contrasting mix of wealth and extreme poverty. At times New Orleans seems to have only have history and culture on its side in a country conflicted in a constant debate on worthiness. I will stand by my understanding of the place and my awkward ownership like the people with me at this book reading. I told Paul Sanchez after he signed my copy of Pieces of Me, thanks for coming here. Yes Mr. Sanchez, thanks for bringing a piece of New Orleans in you to Decatur, GA for an afternoon
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