Things to Recommend doing in Louisiana
Going out for dinner at a restaurant on the water, where it's almost warm enough to eat outside along, I think, a bayou, or perhaps a river. In January.
Marveling at Southern women. Full of the gift of gab, generous, hospitable, and very business savvy. And they know things. Yesterday, the owner of a bed and breakfast who was generously showing us to a property owned by a friend was the only person in the car who knew how to release the emergency brake on my rental car. Otherwise, we'd still be sitting in the gravel in front of her house.
Visiting the pool house of a local resident, as a potential place to move to instead of the very sterile, stuck-by-the-expressway motel that we're lodged in. Taking in the exquisite pool, the over-the-top four poster beds, the fireplace in the living room, the French doors.
Drinking great coffee. Community Coffee is the brand in the motel and at the coffee shop that is close enough to walk to, if we stay on the berm and keep our eyes on the traffic. Dark, rich, without the burnt quality of the big-chain coffee places (referred to as the S Place at the tea shop I frequent).
Trying to learn to accept that I don't always have to know where I'm going, even though I'm doing the driving. There's something about holding the keys and being the only adult behind the wheel that puts you immediately into the role of Mom, even if your passengers aren't expecting you to be in charge.
Learning lots and lots about yoga, asanas, breathwork, the philosophy and texts of the practice. Today I learned that I've been breathing backwards, or at least, upside down. Breath comes in at the top and then moves down to the diaphragm. In contrast, I was taught to begin by letting the belly expand. "My belly breather," the teacher affectionately referred to me. Not the label I was hoping to come away with.
Buying a map of New Orleans and of St. Tammany Parish, even though I sincerely question whether the map accurately depicts the current condition of the area. It's very odd here. In some places, much evidence of the devastation. As we were wending our way for hours from the airport out to the town we're now in, roofs still missing, bridges with new supports standing along side, roads that dead end or turn into one-way streets unexpectedly. And apparently something called Katrina Brain: a condition in which people who've lived through the last 18 months have difficulty concentrating or remembering information. Meeting after support meeting in the local paper: two columns of meetings for Alcoholics Anonymous alone. Yet, in other areas, no sign that anything untoward took place. Very unsettling.
Marveling at Southern women. Full of the gift of gab, generous, hospitable, and very business savvy. And they know things. Yesterday, the owner of a bed and breakfast who was generously showing us to a property owned by a friend was the only person in the car who knew how to release the emergency brake on my rental car. Otherwise, we'd still be sitting in the gravel in front of her house.
Visiting the pool house of a local resident, as a potential place to move to instead of the very sterile, stuck-by-the-expressway motel that we're lodged in. Taking in the exquisite pool, the over-the-top four poster beds, the fireplace in the living room, the French doors.
Drinking great coffee. Community Coffee is the brand in the motel and at the coffee shop that is close enough to walk to, if we stay on the berm and keep our eyes on the traffic. Dark, rich, without the burnt quality of the big-chain coffee places (referred to as the S Place at the tea shop I frequent).
Trying to learn to accept that I don't always have to know where I'm going, even though I'm doing the driving. There's something about holding the keys and being the only adult behind the wheel that puts you immediately into the role of Mom, even if your passengers aren't expecting you to be in charge.
Learning lots and lots about yoga, asanas, breathwork, the philosophy and texts of the practice. Today I learned that I've been breathing backwards, or at least, upside down. Breath comes in at the top and then moves down to the diaphragm. In contrast, I was taught to begin by letting the belly expand. "My belly breather," the teacher affectionately referred to me. Not the label I was hoping to come away with.
Buying a map of New Orleans and of St. Tammany Parish, even though I sincerely question whether the map accurately depicts the current condition of the area. It's very odd here. In some places, much evidence of the devastation. As we were wending our way for hours from the airport out to the town we're now in, roofs still missing, bridges with new supports standing along side, roads that dead end or turn into one-way streets unexpectedly. And apparently something called Katrina Brain: a condition in which people who've lived through the last 18 months have difficulty concentrating or remembering information. Meeting after support meeting in the local paper: two columns of meetings for Alcoholics Anonymous alone. Yet, in other areas, no sign that anything untoward took place. Very unsettling.
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