(This is an old blog entry from several years ago that I’ve moved here for safe keeping. Enjoy!)
Simply stated, walking down Carrollton Avenue in New Orleans is a breathtaking experience. The clanging of the streetcar as it rocks and sways by, carrying natives and tourists to home, work, and play, is a sweet sound that has no rival. The majestic drape of the oaks provides a canopy of color and coolness in the heat of day. Night brings an air of mystery. Grand mansions fuel fantasies of their occupants’ privileged existences. Lively restaurants are filled with a rainbow of people and personality. I love Carrollton Avenue! It’s what first comes to mind when I think of home and when I go there today, the sense of nostalgia is almost overwhelming.
My earliest recollection of childhood involves walking down Carrollton Avenue at night. It’s a brief but vivid memory, filled with a myriad of colors, feelings, and sounds. I had on my favorite shoes: a pair of bright red, patent leather Mary Janes. My mother was 20 years old and probably feeling the freedom that comes with being young, beautiful, and recently unshackled from an alcoholic, abusive husband. Long, thick, black hair hung to her waist. She was tall and thin in her hip hugger jeans and blue halter. Shaggy, her friend, was similarly dressed, but she was short and round and she paled in my mother’s goddess shadow. They were both barefoot, and I felt very superior in my red shoes. Who walked barefoot when there were red shoes to be worn?
For those who don’t know, walking down any Big Easy street at night is an adventure unto itself, and Carrollton Avenue is no exception. Even in 1970, navigating the cracked, root-raised, sometimes cavernous sidewalks of New Orleans was tricky for nimble feet, but when presented to a clumsy, barrel-bellied three year old in red Mary Janes, the task was daunting. My mother had to hold tightly onto my hand to keep me from falling when I slipped, which I was doing frequently. She and Shaggy were walking very fast, talking and giggling loudly. I was pulled along beside them, alternately slipping and running to keep up.
As was the case through much of my childhood, I wanted to be at my grandmother’s. Mabel lived in the upstairs of a house on the corner of Spruce and Dublin. The smell of candle wax from never-ending novenas and a slight hint of old cigarette smoke permeated the air, mixing with the scent of fresh laundry and a light perfume. In the mornings she would cook grits with salt and butter, and would add some of her dark roast coffee to my warm milk and sugar. Lunch time brought hot ham on crispy French bread, or potato salad and fried chicken. In the mid-afternoon, strangers came with money to offer for a card reading that Mabel gave at the kitchen table. In the evenings she would bathe me in her big clawfoot tub, and I’d secretly spray her Jean Nate’ on my arms and legs. I was then wrapped in a warm robe and fed roast and rice as I watched her little TV. It was a place of comfort and happiness in my baby mind.
On that dark night, however, I was with my mother but I wasn’t entirely unhappy as she walked, and I ran, along. The streetcar rolled by and I thought about riding it and how I could let my feet and legs stick out into the aisle so everyone could see my beautiful red shoes. I peered into a big yellow house, wondered out loud who lived there and asked my mother, “Do they have any little girls for me to play with?” I kept looking up at the big white moon through the trees, but the oaks were heavy with leaves and I could only get glimpses of her bright beauty. I imagined the oaks could touch her, and I wanted to climb to the top of one so I could touch her too. As I ran and slipped, I felt that the moon knew me. She knew I was running and slipping as I gazed up at her, and she knew I wanted to be in the warm water of my grandmother’s bathtub. She saw my red shoes and agreed that they were beautiful. The moon loved me, and I loved her back.
Suddenly the reverie and wonder of my stroll was shattered. My mother and Shaggy began screaming and jumping, then began to run. In the confusion, my mother released my hand and as I tried to follow, I slipped to the ground. By the light of the bright white moon I could see the source of their terror: dozens of cockroaches crawled and flew everywhere, and my legs – my red shoes! – were covered in large black bugs! An intense fear overtook me and I began to scream and scream…
… and my memory of that night ends there.
Thinking back, I recall that I had several dreams of cockroaches after that night. One especially memorable one had a human-sized, furry cockroach sitting on the steps of our apartment with me, and it kept putting my fingers in its mouth. It spoke to me in words that I couldn’t understand, and I was unable to say anything in response because I was convinced that if I said even one word, it would bite my fingers off.
Shortly thereafter, life took another turn as it is inclined to do and I went to live with my father in Maryland. When I returned 4 years later at the age of 7, I lived with Mabel for a while in her Spruce and Dublin house. She and I took many more walks under those historic oaks. I have other memories of childhood on that avenue as well – some good, some bad – but none as horrifically terrifying and mystically beautiful as the first. I do remain absurdly frightened of cockroaches; that early memory is never far away when I see one. In spite of it, however, I am still in love with red shoes and the moon… and Carrollton Avenue.
