Rebel House

Submitted by Mo on November 17, 2005 - 01:08.
Why would I come to New Orleans? Most others will say it’s a beautiful and eerie town. They’ll mention how a full moon shines from high and pushes shadows through quaint Creole townhouses onto openings of double gallery chateaux’s, draping grey against shutters and white upon beams and porches.

Perhaps he or she will reminisce of romantic evenings floating down Chartres street with a beautiful woman or man where they kissed and made love next to the statue at St. Louis Cathedral. Or maybe they went to City Hall to watch the vampires dance to the bump and howl of old jazz. I find all this enticing, but it’s not why I came.

I have in my possession an old blue cardboard container with the words "Mo’s Box" bristled in pink paint. I got it last year after my siblings and I split the family fortune. I’m here near New Orleans because within this box I found my great grand father’s ripped journal. Within the journal I found a note, he wrote about New Orleans and a house he found just outside the city. His note reads:

… I've been here twice before, it’s one crazy town. Kinda shocking actually, and comforting. When walking, the scent of sewage, the scent of locals sludge, is at most at arms length. If I don’t step through it on this step, it will waft through in three steps or four.

I’ve been told it’s because the town is eight feet beneath sea level, low enough for the city to have a system of levees to keep the Mississippi and Pontchartrain from spilling over. The city also has a system of canal’s and pumps to keep the land dry. However, saturation and rain keep the sewage close enough to the surface for the acid scent of death to slough any sexy New Orleans event you might attend, Jazz Fest, Mardis Gras, graveyard tours, and voodoo calls.

It’s a racially charged town, goofy and divided. A rich history of French, American, slave, black, gay, confederate, and tourist. All slowly stirred into a dark roux of jealousy, despair, alcoholism, murder, dancing, food, hatred, confusion, and the long touch of love. This town is bloody perfect.

It’s a small mildly liberal haven in a county in a state of fear and turmoil. Outside the city is where you’ll find all the remaining rebels this fine country offers; those desperate enough to cash in the true freedom New Orleans holds in order to express their own intense dreams of southern resistance.

Last time I was in New Orleans, on the way back from photographing crocs outside town, some friends and I found a solitary shotgun house. They’re called shotgun houses because they got long straight hallways connecting front door to back. Any gun toting shotgun house owner can shoot from the back door and kill any unwanted jackass rushing through the front.

This particular house has no neighbors and no friends, yet for some reason it has a low link fence that surrounds it and an army of 17 confederate flags on patrol. The owner is a hundred years scared of union ghosts and zombie negroes. He’s shit scared that blacks and blues might shoot through his front door and ruin his meaty pig burning, tobacco spitting, Klan party barbeque out back.

Confederate flags are everywhere; high on plastic pikes in the front yard, nailed over the house, one on the front door, one on the car. Them flags are everywhere.

Black boy that I am, having grown up in forward thinking towns like New York and San Francisco, never having dealt with this kinda anger, am absolutely petrified. I’m scared enough to sit just outside the fence and snap some pictures. Honestly, this is a total tourist trap. It’s a deep south Disneyland. Only problem is, I can’t hop the fence, cross the yard, pass the flags, walk the porch, greet the door, and find the artwork inside. It’s gotta be beautiful in there.

This guy, this redneck, this complete asshole, needs a woman’s touch and some serious southern hospitality. He’d likely gut me from crotch to chest if he found me snapping photos of his ratty chicken fucking rat mullet lifestyle. I hope my ancestors drink Mad Dog and piss on his fucking floating backyard grave.

Now Orleans is sunk, a city submerged. Apparently there wasn’t enough cash or dirt to keep the water from turning this land to Atlantis. Actually, it’s not all submerged. But in most parts you get to wear mud gear; waterproof fishing attire to keep old sewage from turning toes, ankles, and calves to raisin skin. In other parts shallow paddle boats are needed. Some find it romantic, I find it sexy, sick, slick, and wet.

But screw the French Quarter, fuck the Garden District, forget moons over Bourbon Street and the muddy Mississippi that’s swamped the fun of Mardis Gras and Jazz. I’ve left that, the safety of the sunken city.

When near dark, I rented a man and his swamp boat. We fanned over water, through neighborhoods and marsh, over highways and past wolves and graves, past the Mississippi, over Highway Ten, aside Lake Pontchartrain, through Irish Bayou Lagoon and Canal. We sailed into Slidell. Sly – fucking – dell. I’ve learned to love this spot.

Right now I have a camera and a hatchet in hand. I got a bladder full of Mad Dog, a messenger bag of whisky, bottle of holy water, a notebook and stopwatch, and of course, two more bottles of Mad Dog.

The man and boat have left. Right now I’m alone, knee deep in mud and crawfish shit, staring through a sunk stuck link fence. Right now I’m staring at a grey shotgun house. It has white plastic poles throughout the yard laced with moldy hole ridden confederate flags. Poles angled at random; one left, one right, one back. There are other flags, many more than when my grand father visited. Most bleed rebel red, white, and blue into the moat surrounding the house.

I’ve never had to piss so bad, I should have taken it easy on the Mad Dog. Pain creeps from a spot just below my belly button up my abdomen and around my love handles. I have to contain it, this wino juice exists in me for a purpose. Song, I should sing, create a tune, a war chant, something inspiring …

Water water everywhere, and all the boards did shrink,
water water everywhere, nor any drop to drink,
we don’t need no water, let that motherfucker burn,
mad dog in my bladder gonna make that rebel churn
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( categories: Fiction | Mo Berry )