Surviving New Orleans

Bad travel luck, Part 1 of 987 (plus or minus) OR why I'm brave to leave the house

My maternal grandfather was quite proud of the fact that his ancestor arrived here on the Mayflower. In fact, he received a publication called The Mayflower Quarterly, The General Society of Mayflower Descendants. That’s always the tell. If someone’s getting a magazine about something, they’re into it. I didn’t have much curiosity about this snippet of family history until my sister started doing some genealogy research. The past she discovered had my full interest. Tell me everything and leave nothing out. She learned that our forefather was John Howland, an indentured servant (sad trombone sound #1) who, during that historic voyage, fell overboard and had to be rescued (sad trombone sound #2). Grandpa never mentioned those fun facts.

I mention all that because it lays the groundwork for understanding the type of bad travel luck that has been bedeviling my family for many, many generations. It might help prepare you for what’s to come as we flash forward 365 years, when we, the descendants of John Howland, got back on a boat.

My grandparents enjoyed paddlewheel steamboat cruises up and down the Mississippi. When I was a senior in high school, they invited the family to join them on one of their trips. We were all still reeling from the sudden and unexpected death of my sweet uncle the year before. He had been in his early 30s and we were all still stunned and heartbroken. I think my grandparents wanted us all to have an opportunity to enjoy each other’s company and hopefully have a fun distraction. My dad had work obligations, so our entourage consisted of me, my mom, my sister, my grandparents, my uncle, and my late uncle’s wife.

The cruise departed from New Orleans, so we all flew there together a few days early to do some site seeing before boarding. Other than the takeoff making my young sister nervous enough to accidentally swallow her gum, the flight was uneventful. Looking back, I do have questions, because some of the family flew first class and some of us were in coach, but I have no idea what the financial arrangements were, other than I didn’t pay a thing, so let me find my gratitude button and press it.

Our hotel was huge and U-shaped, abutting the river. This created a nice courtyard with the water as the fourth side. My grandparents had booked a block of adjacent rooms, but when my sister and I got to our room, we couldn’t help but notice the man asleep in the bed. We were assigned a new room, on the opposite side of the hotel from everyone else. As a teenager, I was happy for a little breathing room.

We had a full day of walking around, shopping, snacking on beignets, having dinner at a nice restaurant, and spending the evening at a jazz club. Through it all, I could tell my grandfather was feeling like he was responsible for us all, and it was stressing him out. I remember I was wearing a shirt with buttons, and he made me button up my previously open collar before we headed to Bourbon Street, the assumption being I would be swarmed by degenerates otherwise, and he would have to fight them off.

That night when we went back to our hotel rooms, my sister and I immediately snuck back out. Well, snuck is too strong a word. We went back out. No one said we couldn’t leave our room, it was just implied we wouldn’t. All we did was go to the hotel atrium, where we rode the glass elevators up and down. They had great nighttime views of the city and as someone who was about to go off to architecture school in a few months, glass elevators were pretty cool. To our horror, we ran into my grandmother. Misbehaving is one thing, but misbehaving in such a wholesome manner and still getting caught was just humiliating. She never ratted us out though and wasn’t upset with us at all.

The next day we went to the famous restaurant, Arnaud’s. It was fine dining and one of the fanciest places I’d ever been. If you’re my age or older, you may recall the Folgers commercial filmed there, where they tricked people into drinking instant coffee, told them on hidden camera, and the patrons who must have known what was up tried not to look mad. When I went to the ladies’ room there was a woman in there who handed me a fresh, cloth towel after I’d washed my hands. It wasn’t just that I hadn’t encountered that before; I’d never even heard of such a thing. There was a big tip jar and clearly I was expected to put some money in, but I’d walked in empty-handed. What I should have done was say “Sorry, I didn’t know, I’ll be right back.” Instead, not wanting to look as naïve as I obviously was, I waited for her to turn around to serve someone else, grabbed the tip jar and shook it a little so it sounded like I dropped coins in. She turned around and thanked me! Shaken, I explained what had happened back at the table. I don’t know if I’d ever seen my grandfather laugh harder, but he was genuinely impressed with my solution.

As I mentioned, my hotel room was a long walk all the way around the U-shaped corridor from the rest of the family, but we all had ground-floor rooms with doors that opened directly onto the courtyard which made for a perfect shortcut back and forth. We visited back and forth that way quite a lot. Oddly, all of us had trouble with the doors sticking, but if you put your shoulder into it, you could get it open.

The next day, when we checked out of our hotel, we got the typical “How was your stay?” One of my family members mentioned that their courtyard door was very hard to open. The front desk clerk replied “Oh, unfortunately, those doors don’t open at all. We were having water leakage, so we had them all permanently sealed shut.” As a teenager, I learned a lot watching 5 adults have a full conversation with facial expressions only. A soundless “Should we tell them we just broke several of those puppies wide open?” “No. No, we should not.” Sorry, Hilton New Orleans Riverside. This was in 1985 so I’m assuming any sort of statute of limitations has expired.

Then, the real adventure began, and we boarded the 176-passenger Delta Queen riverboat for a multi-day cruise with several planned shore excursions. It was an honest-to-goodness steam-powered paddlewheel, constructed in 1926. It was charming and historical and interesting and, at the time I believe I described it as a small boat that got smaller every day.

While in many ways the Mississippi was mighty and majestic, it turns out it was also significantly gross; muddy, brown water with all sorts of debris floating in it, and it didn’t always smell great. That river water was used for non-potable functions onboard, including filling the toilet tanks. At first, I thought something scandalous had happened to and in our toilet, before I realized what was going on and I was just seeing dirty river water. My poor kid sister didn’t happen to look before use, and she came out looking very concerned. "I think I'm sick!" My mom and aunt shared a cabin, and they had a worse problem. Their toilet had a bad flapper valve, so it flushed every few hours on its own, day and night. They suffered that through the entire trip because rather than fixing it, the maintenance crew asserted there was nothing to be done because the cause was actually that the room was haunted by the deceased wife of a previous captain.

We’d been on the cruise for a bit, and although we were basically having a nice trip, there was an overarching sadness about my late uncle, and I could tell my grandfather was still feeling anxious about keeping us all corralled. I guess that’s why he had the heart attack. He received some medical attention on board, but he clearly needed to get to a hospital, and quickly. Here’s where river cruises beat ocean voyages, the boat just…pulled over. We went to the nearest dock on the side of the river and an ambulance met us there. They whisked Grandpa away, and Grandma and my uncle went with him. They told the rest of us to “stay and enjoy the trip.” We were instructed where to look in my grandparent’s room to find the cash and plane tickets home, and off they went. Reread that if you need to, but I’ll recap. My grandfather had a coronary, half the family rushed to the hospital with him, and the rest of us stood on the deck of the boat as it pulled away, watching the ambulance lights fade as we got further and further apart, wondering if we’d ever see him again. But “Have fun!”

The crew and other passengers routinely asked us how he was doing for the remainder of the trip, and I felt guilty every time, wondering what they thought of us for staying. At least we were able to report he was stable and improving. In fact, spoiler alert, he made a full recovery.

Knowing he was improving helped us try to enjoy the trip, but it was challenging, maybe even a little stressful. Can stress cause a gallbladder attack? Or did my aunt have one for another reason? Things were not going well. At least she was able to recuperate on board.

The highlight of the cruise for me was when we passed our sister ship, the Mississippi Queen. It was announced in advance that we’d cross paths at some point that afternoon and people got quite excited. I didn’t think too much of it, but watching things go by is sort of what you do on a river cruise. We wound up converging shortly before dinner, when lots of people changed into formal wear. From what I saw, I can for sure report that’s what was happening on the Mississippi Queen. That ship had balconies with privacy screens between them, so I guess people were used to the idea that they could be out there and no one could see them. When several of them stepped out to their balconies to watch our boat go by, they happened to be in mid-clothing change. And we could see them. Balcony after balcony of people in underpants. Some of them waved, like it was the most natural thing in the world. It was quite strange.

Eventually, the cruise returned to New Orleans, and we had another day there before flying home. We decided to take a sightseeing trolley. My aunt wound up the designated holder of all the cash and airplane tickets home, and I knew she had it all in her purse. As we stood in line to board the streetcar, a man rudely budged in line in front of me. He had a trench coat draped over his arm, but that wasn’t suspicious as the forecast was calling for rain. But then I realized he was using the coat to conceal his hands and he was unzipping my aunt’s purse and was reaching into it. His hand was in her purse! Back then, if you didn’t have your hard copy of the plane ticket, you weren’t boarding the flight.

Adrenaline took over. No one was more surprised than I was to see me grab the man’s arm, twist it out of my aunt’s bag and – remember I said it was supposed to rain? – wail on him repeatedly with my tote umbrella. He tried to run away but I held onto him for dear life while yelling at my aunt “Check your purse! Check your purse!” Once she verified everything was still there, I let go, he ran away, and…we got on the trolley and took the tour. I guess we were in Remain Calm And Carry On mode by then. It was surreal. None of that was conscious action on my part, it was pure instinct. I guess my grandfather didn’t need to be so worried about me after all.

I’ve told this anecdote many, many times over the years, but until I wrote it all down, I never realized I have some questions. What was my grandmother doing in the hotel lobby that night? Why didn’t any of us go back and tip the bathroom attendant? Why didn’t we leave our return plane tickets safely in the hotel room? Will I ever fly first class? And of course, was staying on the boat clinically insane?

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This is a picture of me on the trip. It has nothing to do with the story, but when you find a picture of your waist looking like that, by God, you post it.