I hope it’s obvious to anyone reading this, I didn’t come here for Mardi Gras. Its been a very long time since I’ve been to a mass, and I’m not great at backtracking 40 days from Easter when planning my breaking point “I need to move now” moments.
So while I know everyone has been very friendly with this question, the answer is definitely no, I’m not here for Mardi Gras.
But that doesn’t mean Mardi Gras isn’t here for meeeeee.
Just kidding. But also kinda not.
I went for a very long very early morning walk the week before my mom got here because I was *emotional*. Some people were made for solitude, I clearly am not one. Related but if you have tips please share them.
So, I was out on a walk. I found a park in the city (technically google found it and technically it is City Park but it sounds way cuter to say a park in the city), and I drove to it and was immediately overwhelmed. There are multiple museums inside of the park. There’s lots of other stuff too, but I’ll probably never know because I only have a week and a half left here and that park is bigger than any park I’ve ever seen. Yes including Central Park.
I was having a rough morning so I made myself a deal, if we went and shot a whole roll of film in the park, I could come home and nap without an alarm. That’s my bargaining power folks, treating myself like a toddler.
When I got there I was surprised and scared to see how big it was. I figured if I gave myself an hour of wandering, it could amount to three hours of nap time. So I wandered. At first, the park is not a park, it’s a parking lot. I didn’t realize that. I just thought it was kinda industrial. But the further I got in, the less I felt like I needed a nap.
It’s hard to want to nap when you’re surrounded by the prettiest trees you’ve ever seen in your life. When there’s old stone bridges crossing lakes and waterways with swans swimming underneath. When there’s an old man going absolutely mental on a very rude couple ignoring every sign requesting you to wear a mask. A place like that is a good place. I got my coffee and gave the “respect you sir” nod to the man, he told me to have a beautiful day. I walked across a tiny bridge to an island where I could sit with my coffee and stared down a duck for a good 15 minutes. I thought it was the most magical place I had been yet.
That is, until I started walking on the other side of the park. There isn’t anything wrong with the other side of the park. It’s a little fancier, a little more paved, a few less yelling adults. It was alright. I was enjoying the stroll but was hungry and realizing it was probably time to hunt down my car. And of course that is the point where I got very lost.
Normally for me, getting lost is a panic situation. I sweat, I cry, I call Jackie. In that order. This time, as soon as I entered the sweating phase of the panic, I turned the corner to see an entire street of parade floats.
Just sitting there.
No one around, at all.
What in the sweet holy heck.
Turns out, they were staging a drive through Mardi Gras, which makes sense. All of the Krewes had set out their floats the night before for people to start driving through the next day. But in that moment, that morning, it was just me. And I got to stand very very small next to a very very large parade man playing the trombone and an alligator spanning 3 tractors.
I don’t think I’ll ever end up lucky enough again to accidentally stumble on a full abandoned parade, my life is not that weird or that creepy.
But I will say, I don’t think I’m going to keep denying myself the option by choosing nap first then walk. Very rarely do I actually listen to my inner “get your ass out of bed”, but I’m happy I did that day.
You never know when there’s going to be a whole parade waiting for you.
Ash tells a story 