That, I do believe, is the title of a Cajun waltz. I, too, departed for Texas and spent three days in an area of which I had until recently had no awareness. There I witnessed and participated in more wonders than I can recount. In one mode I was Professor Zero, Girl Detective, walking into a barbecue joint that resembled more closely a mafioso bar once you got inside, going up to the only person in the place and saying, “I’m looking for Carlin.” “He won’t be back until 7:30,” said the man. Now, I had no obvious way of knowing who Carlin was or why Carlin should be there. But “It is about a piece of property,” said I, whereupon the man at the bar reached for the phone. “Carlin will call you by seven,” he reported, but at six my phone rang.
The call was from Carlin’s number, but there was a woman on the line. She knew what I had been calling about, so I explained myself and asked my main question, which was whether we could speak further. She said we could, so I asked who I was speaking to. “This is Arletty,” said she, and I knew who Arletty was because her name was on so many of the documents we had just pulled up at the county courthouse.
***
This hidden part of Texas is truly beautiful and I drove home mostly on country roads. Texas Highway 21E leads over Bayou Palo Gaucho to the amazingly beautiful reservoir at Toledo Bend, on the Sabine River, where the road changes its name to Louisiana Highway 6E. These roads, really one road, were an old Indian trail which under the Spanish became El Camino Real. Riding over them past the Indian mounds I found I had an old CD of Pete Seeger and his contemporaries, to which I listened and felt somehow one with time.
Songs which made some impression upon me this time included I Dreamed I Saw Joe Hill Last Night and Kisses Sweeter Than Wine. What most impressed me was a line from Where Have All the Flowers Gone?, a song I cannot normally listen to because it seems so hackneyed. The line is: [Where have all the young men gone?] They’re in uniform, every one. [When will we ever learn?] I thought about my students, some of whom are dead and others of whom are on second and third tours of duty.
***
And Texas is part of Greater Mexico, which is why I am always right at home as soon as I set foot in it. And as the sun set I was crossing that Sabine River and leaving the newly discovered land of East Texas, which for various reasons, some having to do with the Caddo culture, I had renamed “Bright Mexico.” I entered French territory and soon turned South in the dusk. I passed from piney woods and rolling hills down towards the marshes, as the heat and humidity increased with every mile. There was a fairly long stretch to drive on I-49 before I could take the old U.S. Highway 190E over the beautiful Huey P. Long Bridge to Maringouin. After Alexandria the land drops low and flat. Soon I was over the river and standing by my own pier.
***
And in Texas we were two girls from South Louisiana, one not from there originally but who has seroconverted, and another who is originally from there but who has been living and working elsewhere for some time. And we talked about how relaxing it was to be in a less complicated place, where it was not so customary for people to trample upon one another 24/7 as it is back home.
And I am the last person to deny that South Louisiana has a culture but what that phrase “South Louisiana is the best place/one of the best places in the world” means to me has a lot to do with who says it. I hear it from people who appreciate what the area has to offer, and I understand and agree with that, but most often I hear this phrase from:
+ Parents who want to guilt trip children into staying close to home, or frighten them out of experiencing anything else;
+ Other persons in positions of power who would like to perpetuate the underdevelopment (e.g. perpetuate poor funding for education, arts, affordable housing levees, and so on) which benefits THEM, and so do their best to promote the idea that things are just wonderful as they are (so long as we get a few more franchise restaurants, a bit more “gaming,” and a lot more Creationism, of course);
+ People who “like” it because they think, or know, they can get away with more here than they can elsewhere.
I realize this sounds sour but I have good reason to say what I do, and remember, this is my free speech zone right here.
***
And this afternoon our French friend took us to Pont-Breaux for a wonderful, slow, sunset ride through the cypresses at Lake Martin. And I was enchanted, and this tourist (I adore him, but he is a tourist) told me once again that I do not appreciate our great state enough, because I am a snob from California and must look down on Louisiana because it is not moneyed enough for me. And I am a state worker, not a tourist, and I have been a state worker here for some time.
And when I was sixteen and blonde and wrinkle free, I was more tolerant than I am now of people who told me that since I was from California I had no right to opine on politics elsewhere, because one knows that people will say such things to girls. When I was older, they would not presume to lecture in the same way. Or so I thought, unaware of this.
And when I am angry, I am skilled at making articulate, on point speeches which devastate the opposition. I am less good at saying simply, “You have hurt my feelings. I can explain why if you are interested. In the meantime, I am going home.”
Axé.
coldhearted scientist وداد 
Of course, I wrote this post while ranting and raving via Facebook Chat with another Cajun friend about the evils of French influence in Louisiana, which according to us included:
+ the disorganization and the lack of infrastructure
+ the self serving attitude of doing whatever serves one’s present purposes, with no thought to others or to the future
+ the idea that it is all right to trample on everyone, including other French people, because one is superior/entitled or has the right to project one’s everything into everyone.
We have rather prejudiced views, of course, but we believe that to some extent, these views are based on experience and insight.
And you’ve got to realize that a thread that ran through our conversations in Texas was that Louisiana was constantly exhausting and draining because one has to constantly navigate oneself through what amounts to abuse … which is inevitable if you interact with anyone (and is not just something you “attract” to yourself because you are “flawed”).
Upon arriving home I only dealt with Mississippi people for the first few hours and they were as relaxing as the Texans. And then I dealt with a true Cajun from the waterways, and this was also relaxing. But then … Louisiana “civilization” … and it was like getting hit again.
I’ll be God damned.
Plantation culture + exploitative carpetbaggers + French royalty + large amounts of alcohol, tobacco, and irresponsible sexual activity, ostensibly to dull the pain of items 1, 2, and 3, but really just to add to the chaos = our messy culture here.
I’ll be God damned if I do not find a way to avoid ALL of it.
P.S. And I will stop ranting about this now, because the best way to win in this matter is to get over it, but an important point to add is THE SEXISM. This most fundamentally is, I think, why French tourists and the tourism board, and a few other authorities, see no problems, whereas two girls from South Louisiana, escaped to Texas, did.
I could theorize much more about all of these elements but it would only be speculation, so I will give these matters a rest.
But there is something going on here and it is why I go into culture shock upon returning, after having come back to normal by bursting through the looking glass to another state or another country for just a few days.
I cannot put my finger on it. But a friend elsewhere said out of the blue the other day that as a resident of Louisiana I was an abused person by definition. It rankled because I do not like that idea at all. But I wonder if there is in fact something to the concept.
I can’t put my finger on it. But the key words which keep coming to me are the chaos and invasiveness which reign. SOME of that has to do with Frenchness, I am convinced, but that is an intuition/insight, not a scientific statement.
P.P.S. And I know that the best way to win this battle is to get over it. So I will be quiet. But the other element is that I am so tired of Easterners and Europeans telling me that because I am from California, I should be stupid, lazy, a “hippie,” a “liberal,” “crazy,” a druggie, a moneyed snob, or an easy lay. I must find some aggressive way of throwing these stereotypes back, because I am really tired of laughing them off and then dealing with the fact that people secretly believe them.
OK, I think I have it, y con esto termino:
It is about the deep investment people have here in hobbling each other, so as to keep each other down.
I think they the party+religion atmosphere is bread and circus, to distract people/keep them drugged.
This is NOT meant as a slur against the brave people of Louisiana, who are many. It is a note on a phenomenon.
Coda: It is also EXACTLY what Reeducation said: I am a snob from California who needs a slap in the face, a religion, and a beer.
I will be God damned.
And: I hate it that every time I go out of town and get back into balance, some sort of unexpected abusive scene happens out of the blue, to knock me off center.
I am going to have to work on responses to this discourse about California. Like: “Yes, perhaps I am better than you. A snob, no, because I am not sine nobilitate. But I am less cruel than you, and I am above the kind of mud slinging in which you wish to engage.” Or something better than that.
I’m experiencing some cajun food here, although I’m not sure It’s authentic.
Delivered my paper at Oxford successfully today. Ppl seemed to find it interesting.
Here are the books I have previewed. I’m going to buy one. Which do you suggest?
Martha Field: Louisiana Voyages
Carl Lidhahl et al: Swapping Stories: Folktales
Ian McNulty: A Season of the Night: New Orleans
Emily Toth: Unveiling Kate Chopin
I know so much about Europe and so little about my own country!
Hattie – Well of the 2 authors I’ve met, Toth and Lindahl, I found him to be the most fun since he likes the kind of gritty/ethnic Houston neighborhoods I do. I’ve heard good things about her Chopin biography, though, and about the McNulty book too, which has the advantage of being new and topical. Personally, I’d most love to read the Field book (although it’s from the U of MS P, not LSU, I am sure they need help just as much).
Jennifer – congratulations on having done it! 🙂
I’m sure the Cajun food isn’t really Cajun, it usually isn’t. Still, it is funny.
I’ll get the Lindahl, which is an amazing bargain at $10.00 downloaded onto my Kindle. It’s a motherlode of information and stories of all kinds! If I never get to Louisiana, I will know a lot about the place anyway from this book, I am sure.
I’m just winding up reading *The Bluest Eye* and concluding that her subject is how adversity crushes the souls of children. Those quiet children standing around who never get noticed except to be bossed around or punished if they are “naughty.”
She’s so great.
I should read The Bluest Eye, I never have. E. Kitty Glendower recommends it too. I am sure Morrison is right but I am afraid to read the book because that happens so much here and because I relate to it too much from some aspects of my own background.
I’ll be interested to hear what you think of the Lindahl.
And I’d post as FB status that I am on strike against having one more member of the French department I’ve been nice to, be mean to me. They have a PATTERN of doing this, I notice, and it is not something they have conspired to do — they are just like that. I believe they come to the U.S. from France because they think they can get away with that kind of behavior here.