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...I wrote that was published back in 2003.
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I just don’t get it.
For two decades now, I’ve had the opportunity to understand, to dissect and participate, to observe and indulge, but to no avail. Still, I’m left with the same feeling of “the outsider,” the one unwoven into the local tapestry.
I don’t really care about Mardi Gras.
There, I said it.
This heretical viewpoint is not borne of enmity, though I see a lot of problems with the pre-Lenten cavalcade. But neither am I blind to its benefits and potential.
Since my relocation to the coast, half a lifetime ago, I’ve found the phenomenon curious at best. I don’t know quite what I expected , but it was certainly different than its reality.
Mardi Gras at times can seem to clarify some ancient problems with this town. Sure, the troubles are hardly endemic to the Azalea City, but Carnival unveils them unabashedly.
The extraordinarily strict racial lines running throughout are most obvious. Basically, Plessy v. Ferguson still rules Mobile Carnival, in spirit if no longer in code. When I attended my first ball, those of color were not allowed at the “white balls,” and vice versa I was told. And it was no accident that every face serving the lily-white throngs I stood among was black. No accident at all.
And it’s true there is correlation between the town’s high society movers and shakers and it’s Krewes and royalty. Yes, many of those whose lack of vision and parochial motives kept this town mired in its “greyness of being” for so long have strengthened and strutted those networks via the Carnival cabals.
Big deal; similar things happen elsewhere. What’s the U.S. Congress for goodness’ sake?
The financial strain the season puts on the city coffers is noteworthy. Annually, hundreds of thousands of dollars flow from municipal accounts to facilitate events. Mobile is hardly wealthy.
Don’t get me wrong. I understand Mardi Gras in my head. I am completely empathetic with the desire to blow off steam, to celebrate life and the oft-overlooked joy of simply being alive. But, I don’t find those pleasures while taking elbow shots from prospective Sally Jessy Springer audience members diving for an individually-wrapped snack pie.
Also piquant is how the subject of Carnival reveals the massive chip on Mobile’s shoulder about New Orleans. Okay, so Mobile was the first to celbrate Fat Tuesday in the New World; so what? We should at least be forthright enough to recognize that Louisiana was where it was first observed. After all, the Brothers Le Moyne christened Pointe de Mardi Gras, Louisiana three years before Mobile was even founded. So, the Pelican State was the first to observe; Mobile was the first to celebrate. End of story.
Who cares if the crescent City’s proceedings are more famous? Should a teacher be jealous if the student succeeds? We should be grateful for the public relations rampart they breached by making the world aware of our unique way of life on the Gulf Coast. They took the ball and ran with it. Good for them.
And you can never obscure the backhanded inference to the Big Easy when Mobilians defensively sputter about their version as “the FAMILY Mardi Gras.”
Here’s news: essentially, the very inception of Carnival is debauchery. Take a look at the name, folks, and exercise a little etymological acumen. Bone up on your history. Does “festival of flesh” sound like a good idea for the PTA fundraiser?
Or is it that, in Mobile, nothing quite says “family” like an eight-year-old holding Mama’s hair so the bent and retching elder splatters less regurgitated funnel cake on her favorite “Who Let The Dogs Out” cut-off tee shirt? There’s more than enough trailer park drama on Mobile streets come Fat Tuesday. We indeed have our fair share of vomitus and violence, of mullets and methamphetamine.
Secondly, there are certainly sections of New Orleans’ much lengthier parade routes more civil than the famous downtown tourist morass. I’ve sat on a Crescent City proch, facing one of the large Uptown boulevards, and watched a crowd of kids and parents and general “neighbors of a diverse sort” clamoring for throws from the passing floats. There was no trouble, no bared breasts or gunplay, nothing of the sort some here would prefer you associate with the younger sister’s celebration.
Each town has its own panoply of Mardi Gras experiences from which to choose. What point is a rivalry over something that’s supposed to be sheer celebration for its own sake?
Also, yes, it is troubling that so many who are so eager to throw so much money away on Mardi Gras membership are also among the first to complain when asked to help fund more long-lasting, generally beneficial civic sponsorship. How many of those masked riders whine when a property tax increase tantamount to a box of Moonpies a month is proposed? No one is questioning their discretionary rights, just revealing how it looks from the outside, what it reflects about the region and priorities.
Now, before you start another chorus of that locally popular tune from Xeno and the Phobics, “If You Don’t Like it, LEAVE,” please bear in mind that worn chestnut of pop psychology, “The opposite of ‘love’ isn’t ‘hate,’ it’s ‘indifference.’”
Within this yearly ritual, lies a chance to further our standing in the eyes of others, particularly, those with dollars to spend or generate. As long as we insist on using regressive tax structures, we might as well exploit it. Every “outsider” that we can draw into the fold with Mardi Gras, the more monetary influx we reap. The more inclusive we make it, the more everyone stands to gain.
The richness of our Creole culture can reap dividends, but only if we retain the ability to discern the difference between the “celebration” and “life” itself.
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