Southern hospitality

A house down the street caught fire on Saturday. Walking home with Jake from our build site, we both saw barbecue-magnitude smoke over the rooftops. After we identified the smell as insulation rather than hot dogs, we about-faced and hurried down to the scene. Smoke billowed from under the eaves.

I'm proud to report that NOLAFD had three trucks there within five minutes of my call, and that as a result the house sustained little external damage beyond smudging. I'm crushed, though, for poor Roy, whose numerous concerned neighbors said that he'd just had his utilities hooked up and was getting ready to move back in. Sometimes you just can't win for losing.

Next to me, a kid of 15 or 16 calmly remarked that a house down the street had been intentionally set alight the week before.

"You know why?" I asked.

"Couldn't say," he squinted, and turned away.

In a neighborhood where only one in twenty houses is occupied, though, I have to say how struck I was by the turnout and evident concern. Residents crowded the streetcorners and inquired after the owner, all asking who had his cell number and whether he'd been there that day. Thinking back to my own neighborhood in Baltimore, I find myself wondering how many people beyond our immediate neighbors would know how to get in touch with my family if anything went wrong. Hell -- I try to remember my neighbors' names.

That evening, volunteer conversation was crowded with speculation along those lines. How far does southern hospitality extend? Are its qualities different from those of northern hospitality? Jess suggested that the height of fraternal consideration in her New Jersey town would be to dust off someone else's car after a snowstorm. Last night, we met a guy on the ferry across the river who invited us into his home, served us drinks, and then went round for round with us at the local pub. The northerners in our little group were stunned at his unabashed generosity, while the southerners rolled their eyes and suggested that all that snow had damaged our brains.

Back on Saturday, all of lowernine.org hied over to the local community center, run by a man named, simply, Mack. [see inset] At least once a month, he and his organization host a crawfish boil, that most N'w'O'linean of traditions:

Ingredients:
1 utterly poised and jovial host
10-20 neighborhood families
10 bushels of crawdads
1 bushel of shrimp
1 mind-boggling pot each of turkey necks and corn on the cob
8 tables
2 cases beer (Budweiser, obviously)
Volunteers to taste

...and, after an hour or three of salting, cleansing, spicing, and boiling, food is served for all at communal tables. It's glorious, not least because eating crawfish requires a level of dedication and fine digit coordination not practiced by the casual lobster diner.

I talked with locals about the Lower Ninth and how far it's come since they were perched on their roofs two and a half years ago. The two women at my table positively glowed as they simultaneously thanked the Lord for their recent good fortune and fine neighbors and ribbed one of the Peace Corps volunteers for not knowing what a crawfish was.

Again I submit to you that this simply doesn't happen in the north. Perhaps it's peculiar to communities under great stress, to groups of individuals who haven't the individual resources or accomplishments to celebrate en famille. Or perhaps la famille becomes a more inclusive term as you leave the Mason-Dixon farther behind.

Or perhaps it's just New Orleans, where the jazz musicians smoke cigarettes on the sidewalk between sets with anyone who's got a light.