As a freshman in college during the '60s, I joined a precision marching group called the Fusileers. The college I attended required two years of ROTC and the national paranoia concerning Vietnam hadn’t yet set in. Besides, we got to do some neat things like taking trips to Mardi Gras and marching in parades.
In 1965 I went with the Fusileers to New Orleans to march in the Iris and the Venus Parades. Although I didn’t know it at the time, Venus is one of the older Krewes, or carnival clubs. We arrived at Jackson Barracks, an old army post on the Mississippi River named after Andy Jackson, in an old bus we called the Golden Goose. The night before the parade most of us left the barracks on foot in groups of five or six and made our way toward Bourbon Street. My group stopped at a neighborhood bar, drank Regal Beer for twelve cents a glass, and sampled the gumbo. We made it to Bourbon Street around dark.
I bought a fifth of Early Times at a drugstore a block or so from Bourbon Street. Most of us got separated in the throngs of people crowding the French Quarter. John T, the last member of the Fusileers that I’d arrived with to the Quarter disappeared down Conti, towing a college girl he’d just met. It didn’t matter because I wasn’t alone.
Comforted by the gentle caress of Early Times, I followed the drunken mass of humanity pressing against me to the entrance of Pat O’Brien’s Irish Bar, the crowd funneling into the courtyard informing me that I’d found the place to be. When I finally made it into the enchanted courtyard I realized my instincts had been correct. The courtyard was a compilation of flowing fountains, Spanish tile, potted plants, and lingering mystery. I soon found my own college girl in the mass of humanity packed into the magical place. Or I should say she found me.
“Can you help me?” she said, grasping my hand a bit too tightly.
“If I can,” I said.
Blond hair draped her shoulders laid bare by her orange, University of Tennessee sleeveless tee shirt. She was looking me straight in the eyes as she squeezed my hand, so close I felt as if she were reading my mind.
“Can you go into the men’s bathroom and see if my boyfriend is there?”
“How will I know, even if he is?” I asked.
“Call his name, Tom. Tell him Susie is looking for him,” she said.
The mob in the men’s bathroom didn’t respond when I shouted out Tom’s name nor did anyone even give me a glance when I told them Susie was looking for him. I didn’t even feel like an idiot because everyone else seemed far more screwed up than I was. Susie grabbed my arm, pulling me close when I walked out the door.
“Well?” she said.
“He’s not in there,” I said.
“You sure? Maybe passed out in a stall?”
“No,” I said, hoping she wouldn’t let go of my arm.
She didn’t, drawing even closer, one arm around my waist, her dark eyes darting around the people in the courtyard.
“Can I stay with you?” she asked.
“Sure.”
“Then let’s go into the bar. I’ll buy you a Hurricane.”
She pulled me into Pat O’Brien’s where dueling pianos were serenading loud and boisterous patrons from some university or the other. The tables were full, standing room only as she ordered drinks at the bar.
“What is it?” I asked when she handed me the icy glass with a syrupy concoction.
“Hurricane,” she said. “The signature drink of New Orleans. Don’t drink it too fast or you’ll be sorry.”
“Wow!” I said, sipping the alcoholic nectar through two red straws that I couldn’t from my lips seem to unlock. “I wonder what happened to your boyfriend?”
“He’s a chicken shit,” she said. “A man was following us. Someone in the crowd told us he was a professional boxer.”
“What did he want?” I asked.
“Me,” she said. “Tom got scared and deserted me. When we finish our Hurricanes will you take me back to my room?”
“Sure,” I said.
“You can keep the glass. It’s a souvenir. Why don’t we just go ahead and leave? We can finish our Hurricanes on the way to the hotel.
She began pulling me through the crowd toward the exit. She let go of my arm when we reached it, recoiling when she saw a short, prematurely bald man glaring at us. Before I knew what had hit me, the man smacked me on the bridge of the nose with a roundhouse right that snapped my head back. The unexpected punch sent my glasses flying across the crowded bar and the Hurricane glass crashing to the tile floor.
As a freshman in college, I was around six feet tall and weighed about one hundred thirty pounds. I must have looked meaner than I really was because the man who had sucker-punched me had hurried away, melting into the Mardi Gras masses outside on the street. Susie, my new Tennessee girlfriend, quickly clutched my arm as someone from the crowd retrieved my glasses and handed them to me.
“Let’s hurry,” Susie said. “My hotel isn’t far away. We’ll catch a cab.”
When a cab pulled to the curb in the darkened outskirts of Mardi Gras mania, I held the door for her as she entered.
“I can’t go with you,” I said. “I’m a soldier. I have a twelve-o’clock curfew and need to get back to the barracks.”
Her dark frown and tightly crossed arms were like a slap in the face as the door shut and the taxi hurried away into the night.
Though I don’t remember how, I made it back to Jackson Barracks, albeit without my Hurricane glass, before the witching hour. Cut nose, broken glasses and the recent memory of Susie’s warm breasts pressing against my arm were my only souvenirs. I stayed up the rest of the night reading the Terry Southern erotic classic Candy, thinking of Susie and what might have been.
Mardi Gras that year was my first taste of crazy and surreal Carnival. I’d lapped it up, maybe because I had viewed it through tired, near-sighted, hung-over eyes. Even though my feet hurt like hell the next day, after the seven-mile parade that lasted six hours or so, I would gladly have done it again. With another seven-mile parade on tap for the next day, I never returned to Bourbon Street or Pat O’Brien’s.
Soon after the trip, things got worse in Southeast Asia. John T. dropped out of school, was drafted, sent to Vietnam, and died within the year; one of the war’s many victims. I didn’t sign up for the third year of ROTC and quickly forgot my childhood dreams of becoming a soldier. I had my face rubbed in my childhood dreams when I was drafted shortly after graduation and quickly learned the truth about the old saying, “Don’t wish too hard for anything. It might just come true.”
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P.S. - Though I didn't attend my first Mardi Gras until I was seventeen, I'd already visited New Orleans many times. My brother Jack and I spent time there with our Aunt Carmol, a schoolteacher. My first wife Gail grew up in Chalmette, a suburb of the city. Though my first French Quarter Mystery, Big Easy wasn't published until 2010, I knew I was destined to write a series that would include the dirt, trash, innuendos, and accusations about people, places, and events I'd gleaned through years of listening to the people around me. Hope you'll give them a read and see for yourself. Eric
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- Born near Black Bayou in the little Louisiana town of Vivian, Eric Wilder grew up listening to his grandmother’s tales of politics, corruption, and ghosts that haunt the night. He now lives in Oklahoma, where he continues to pen mysteries and short stories with a southern accent. He authored the French Quarter Mystery Series set in New Orleans, the Paranormal Cowboy Series, and the Oyster Bay Mystery Series. Please check it out on his Amazon author page. You might also like checking out his Facebook page.
