The New Orleans Saints
By the time the game got started I'd been excited for hours. So needless to say I was screaming from the start. I had the dogs with me and they quickly got immune to my screams of "Take him down!" and stopped jumping off the couch. I was pleased with Heartly, praising Jesus that we had gotten rid of Carney, but other than that was more annoyed by the first and second quarters than anything. Half-time was...retarded. I really can't stand The Who, so I spent that time getting ready because I knew I would be going down to the Quarter once the game was over, win or lose.
We all know how the second half turned out and I'll just sum it up by saying that the off-side, the conversion and Porter's interception are the reasons my voice is so jacked up today. So worth it. Once the game was done, I couldn't believe it. I kept looking from the screen to Mom and back again. A moment of guarded optimism because, this, well, really? Not really. Yes? Really? OMFGYESREALLYSCREAMINGNOW! And screaming inside wasn't good enough, I had to go out onto the porch and scream.
And within minutes I had my bag and was racing out the door. Mom drove to the ferry and we got on. And that's really when it sunk in. Because everyone, and I mean everyone we saw was screaming. And crying. And hugging. And jumping. On the pedestrian area of the ferry people were stamping their feet and giving their lungs one hell of a work out which the staff all got in on. That's when the picture taking began.
Riding that boat across the Mississippi River was wonderful. Watching the CBD and Quarter get closer and closer, the fireworks and lights. You could hear them. Across the damn river you could hear them.
I watched people getting off the ferry, their celebration an infectious thing. If I hadn't been delirious with joy in my own right, I'd have caught it against my will. I walked down Decatur Street, every car honking, people running into the arms of friends, loved ones, strangers. Hugging, high fiving, sometimes embracing themselves and staring into the night sky as tears rolled down their faces.
Down to Royal Street and I caught wind of the first band of the evening. The musicians were out en force last night. Every man and woman who knew how to play an instrument seemed to be out on the streets. If they came out solo they were soon joined by others, making triumphant music that was soon accompanied by a circled crowd or a trail of people chanting our now famous rousing Saints call. Dancing. And here's where I saw it. Joy. The likes of which we stop feeling around the age of 10. That pure, unadulterated joy. No malice, no cynicism, no doubt. Just happiness. As adults, we never get that in a group. An entire city felt it together. It dawned on me when I saw people dancing, not like no one was watching, it was different than that. It was dancing like no one was watching because they were all dancing too. And they were. I'm certain that from now on when I hear those first few trumpet notes of that song, I will be left with chills.
Then to Bourbon Street. For those of you who are expats or far away lovers of New Orleans, you know Bourbon. You know to avoid it if you can and certainly when there's a crowd. The Big Ugly. The Big Sleazy. But not that night.
No pushing and shoving and exploitation happened within my view of that famed street. I wasn't even annoyed(!). It was just...love. That sounds so cheap considering how the word love is used. Even by me. But it was love. It was unreal. Surreal. Like the Mardi Gras after Katrina only this had no sadness attached. No bitter in the sweet. It was euphoric. I stood on Bourbon Street for 3 hours and even though I was in an agonizing amount of pain, I didn't mind. I could feel the pain, it just didn't register as something important.
I had conversations with strangers. I watched them be as buoyed by that moment as I was. I saw 400 people spanning an entire block do the butt, the electric slide and get strokin together. I saw grown men find themselves so overcome (not by alcohol) that they needed assistance standing. When they sat on the steps I was standing on, they cried into their hands and looked up at me, smiling, saying, 'I can't believe it. They did it. We did it.' Their faces in awe. It was like our city was a church that night. We Second Lined like there was no tomorrow.
And I stood out there and I took pictures but the best moments were impossible to capture on camera. Either I was too busy celebrating along with everyone else or the camera simply could not hold all that it was. Words can't either. You'll just have to trust me when I tell you that it was a defining moment in that I know I will never see anything so pure ever again.
I was there. I saw it.
And it was incredible.
It was transcendent. Beyond the invisible lines that cross us all daily. So slight and insidious we can sometimes fool ourselves into forgetting their existence. Beyond race, religion, gender, sexual orientation and economic status. Beyond boundaries and morals and politics, it happened.
We forgot. We forgot our sadness and frustrations and our bullshit. We forgot it because there simply wasn't room for it.
We came together in a way that could only happen here. Could only happen now.
We rejoiced and we danced and we loved long after the night and into the morning.
If you weren't here, I can't explain it to you any better than that.
We all know how the second half turned out and I'll just sum it up by saying that the off-side, the conversion and Porter's interception are the reasons my voice is so jacked up today. So worth it. Once the game was done, I couldn't believe it. I kept looking from the screen to Mom and back again. A moment of guarded optimism because, this, well, really? Not really. Yes? Really? OMFGYESREALLYSCREAMINGNOW! And screaming inside wasn't good enough, I had to go out onto the porch and scream.
And within minutes I had my bag and was racing out the door. Mom drove to the ferry and we got on. And that's really when it sunk in. Because everyone, and I mean everyone we saw was screaming. And crying. And hugging. And jumping. On the pedestrian area of the ferry people were stamping their feet and giving their lungs one hell of a work out which the staff all got in on. That's when the picture taking began.
Riding that boat across the Mississippi River was wonderful. Watching the CBD and Quarter get closer and closer, the fireworks and lights. You could hear them. Across the damn river you could hear them.
I watched people getting off the ferry, their celebration an infectious thing. If I hadn't been delirious with joy in my own right, I'd have caught it against my will. I walked down Decatur Street, every car honking, people running into the arms of friends, loved ones, strangers. Hugging, high fiving, sometimes embracing themselves and staring into the night sky as tears rolled down their faces.
Down to Royal Street and I caught wind of the first band of the evening. The musicians were out en force last night. Every man and woman who knew how to play an instrument seemed to be out on the streets. If they came out solo they were soon joined by others, making triumphant music that was soon accompanied by a circled crowd or a trail of people chanting our now famous rousing Saints call. Dancing. And here's where I saw it. Joy. The likes of which we stop feeling around the age of 10. That pure, unadulterated joy. No malice, no cynicism, no doubt. Just happiness. As adults, we never get that in a group. An entire city felt it together. It dawned on me when I saw people dancing, not like no one was watching, it was different than that. It was dancing like no one was watching because they were all dancing too. And they were. I'm certain that from now on when I hear those first few trumpet notes of that song, I will be left with chills.
Then to Bourbon Street. For those of you who are expats or far away lovers of New Orleans, you know Bourbon. You know to avoid it if you can and certainly when there's a crowd. The Big Ugly. The Big Sleazy. But not that night.
No pushing and shoving and exploitation happened within my view of that famed street. I wasn't even annoyed(!). It was just...love. That sounds so cheap considering how the word love is used. Even by me. But it was love. It was unreal. Surreal. Like the Mardi Gras after Katrina only this had no sadness attached. No bitter in the sweet. It was euphoric. I stood on Bourbon Street for 3 hours and even though I was in an agonizing amount of pain, I didn't mind. I could feel the pain, it just didn't register as something important.
I had conversations with strangers. I watched them be as buoyed by that moment as I was. I saw 400 people spanning an entire block do the butt, the electric slide and get strokin together. I saw grown men find themselves so overcome (not by alcohol) that they needed assistance standing. When they sat on the steps I was standing on, they cried into their hands and looked up at me, smiling, saying, 'I can't believe it. They did it. We did it.' Their faces in awe. It was like our city was a church that night. We Second Lined like there was no tomorrow.
And I stood out there and I took pictures but the best moments were impossible to capture on camera. Either I was too busy celebrating along with everyone else or the camera simply could not hold all that it was. Words can't either. You'll just have to trust me when I tell you that it was a defining moment in that I know I will never see anything so pure ever again.
I was there. I saw it.
And it was incredible.
It was transcendent. Beyond the invisible lines that cross us all daily. So slight and insidious we can sometimes fool ourselves into forgetting their existence. Beyond race, religion, gender, sexual orientation and economic status. Beyond boundaries and morals and politics, it happened.
We forgot. We forgot our sadness and frustrations and our bullshit. We forgot it because there simply wasn't room for it.
We came together in a way that could only happen here. Could only happen now.
We rejoiced and we danced and we loved long after the night and into the morning.
If you weren't here, I can't explain it to you any better than that.