Homecoming Day – Part 4 of 4, A Dusk’s Dawn in Louisiana

[Jimbaux found it easier to run, replacing this pain with something numb.]

(This is the last of four parts of Jimbaux’s homecoming on 22 July 2011.  Part 1 took place in Chattanooga, Tennessee.  Part 2 took place across the state of Alabama.  Part 3 took place in southeastern Mississippi.)

It Was Fate?

As I drove through southern Mississippi along I-59, I was almost constantly smiling, as the sun peeked through clouds in the western sky, illuminating the trees before me.  I was back in the Deep South, but I was soon to put that behind me too, at least culturally, as I was about to leave the White Anglo-Saxon Protestant area for home.

I could only laugh as I listened to the Christian hate radio stations spewing all of their homophobia and hatred, talking about a “San Francisco military” that we would have with the repeal of Don’t Ask Don’t Tell policy, spew their xenophobia and up tightness about so many things.  Soon, I’d be back in an area that was well-populated with people of the same thought but in a much more muted and watered-down form.

Louisiana!

At 19:27 CDT, I entered the Pelican State after a six-month absence, my longest ever time away from a place from which part of me always thought I needed to escape.  Prior to this, the two months that I lived in Mexico was the longest I had been away from Louisiana.

The morning before, I had left DC, a place with which I had grown increasingly jaded even though I had long admired it (and even though I’m just as jaded by New Orleans, but in very different ways), a place where some feminists think that ‘equality’ means being able to do the same behaviors for which they so harshly criticize men, a place where all monetary profit is demonized as are corporations themselves, a place where even some of the white people think that all the sins of all white men who preceded them should all be on their shoulders, a place where people want to blame ‘polluters’ for doing the very things that they (the people) want them to do in the first place, a place where even the mildest kind of criticism of a homosexual person is considered homophobia or bigotry, an unforgiving place with many driven-but-unforgiving people, a place where the train-watching and railroad photography experience were terrible.

And, now, I was back in the humid home state.  I was back in a place where people’s opinions on environmental matters are bought by oil companies, a place that in many cases doesn’t treat women equally, a place, outside of New Orleans, that isn’t friendly for homosexuals, a place where the mere effort of recycling one’s used goods is frowned upon because one might as well hug a tree, a place not at all interested in energy conservation, a place where the other race gets blamed on all of the ills of society, a place where we (not I) overwhelmingly re-elected a habitual prostitute-banging hypocrite to the US Senate, a place where people think that Barack Obama is a mere incarnation of Satan himself, a place where the land is pancake flat and the skies are so terribly hot and stuphumid.

Yes, I was relieved to be home, despite both it and myself.

Return Of The Jimbaux

Remember that scene in Return of the Jedi when Lando Calrissian piloting the Millennium Falcon emerges from the Death Star just before it explodes and says, “Yeeeehaaaah!!!”?  That’s about how I felt entering New Orleans in a southwesterly direction as the sun was setting, even as there was great uncertainty about how long I’d be back in Louisiana or when I’d be back in DC.

A Race To A Very Appropriate Shot

The sun was setting fast, and I was hoping, as I drove southwestbound on I-10 through Slidell, to possibly get a sunset shot at a place that I really love.  Then, as I got on the I-10 bridge over Lake Ponchartrain, I saw that the bridge span on the Norfolk Southern bridge was down.  Sweet!  A train should be coming soon.   Maybe fate will work on my side this time in a very unenigmatic way!  Then, I heard the bridge tender tell Amtrak’s southbound Crescent that the bridge was “lined and locked” for his movement.  Sweet!  Fate will indeed favor me afterall, and I’ll be able to get a very cool shot as a great way of re-entering Louisiana with minimal effort.  Awesome!  Yes we can!

No We Can’t

As I was driving across the I-10 bridge, I saw a sign that said that the US 11 exit was closed.  No!  No!  No!  How in the hell am I going to get my shot now?

God Is Messing With Me

That has to be the explanation for my misfortune.  What else could be the reason I’d be deprived of a shot of such an appropriate train (the Crescent originates in New York but is really a Washington to New Orleans train) in such an appropriate location with such a golden sunset?  Surely, I am not worthy of a person, and this is the Almighty’s way of telling me that.  Wait!  Do I even believe in God?  I don’t know, and I’m not sure that it even matters.  I’m also not sure that I believe in fate, but every now and then, things like what happened today do make me think of it.

All Is Well That Ends Well

Even with the exit closed, some kind of way – and the details of how will have to remain classified – I managed to get into position to get the shot, fate be damned.  However, the train is not here, and I’m not sure that it will get here before the sun sets.  Oh, fate, do not do this to me!

In the meantime, I should at least be grateful that I was able to see, experience, and photograph something like this, right?

And here I was standing in the same spot where one day shy of exactly nine months ago, I shot some great pictures of the northbound Crescent with a friend, three months after I had last taken any train pictures at all.  Fate be damned!

The sun is sinking really fast now.  I’m liking these views of the sun setting over the track over the lake, but what I really want is a shot of the train with the sun setting behind it over the water.  I realized that it was a year ago this very weekend that fate forced me to finally face myself, finally face the demons inside of me, a very painful experience, but a needed one, after I had found it “so much easier to run, replacing this pain with something numb” as today’s song says.

How would fate treat me now, after it had trodden so deeply on my soul — after, as I now very clearly see, I allowed it to trodden so deeply on my soul?  The answer would be revealed at 19:59, less than a minute before it was too late:

Is anything real?  Is the picture that you see above anything more than some prearranged pixels on your computer screen?  What I cannot describe to you any more than I have already done is the feeling I had of being there, standing with my feet in flip-flops in the water of Lake Ponchartrain lapping at the shore as I experienced this scene, a train that had left DC the day before just like I had, the setting sun that I had chased all day, and all by myself too.

And, now, Jimbaux had returned, perhaps still something of a fugitive from the demons that still haunt him (to a much, much lesser degree), and perhaps even a fugitive from the law this evening, but, much more importantly, and much more reassuringly, no longer a fugitive from himself.

A forgiven man I am, forgiven by myself, the most important forgiver, not just for what I’ve done, but for who I am as well, no longer a fugitive from myself, and no longer pushing away well-intentioned people who try to be close to me.  The sharing I’ve done on this site in the last six months is something I could barely have imagined doing a year ago, so locked up was I.

And with that new, reassuring knowledge, there is the new and reassuring understanding that an uncertain future can also be a very bright future!

And as the sun sets here, it will rise tomorrow!

By the way, although the pictures that you see here are presented here no more than 800 pixels wide and with my copyright waterwarks, a much larger version might look great on your wall!  Just go to my print website, click on the “Louisiana Scenes” album, and scroll all the way to the bottom of the album.

Then, The Sun Is Gone

It’s time for one more picture on this glorious and soulful day, a day that started with saying goodbye to a friend in Chattanooga, taking pictures there, being confronted by someone who turned out to be far less fortunate that I obviously am, despite my self-flagellation, a pleasant drive across Alabama, fun times with the KCS in Mississippi, and Amtrak and the sun setting over Lake Ponchatrain back in the “City That Care Forgot.”

Doesn’t it take time, experience, and effort to realize wanting is more fun than having?  Haven’t we all learned that it’s more important to want what you have than to have what you want?  As I ended a day that began not long before a homeless woman asked for food (and received some) from me, and as my future remained uncertain, not knowing when I’ll be returning to DC or how long I’d be in Louisiana, I was indeed comforted with this peace.  I felt relieved to be back home, but I often feel relief on coming home after being away for awhile.  This time, I felt more than relief.  This time, even with an uncertain future and even with still facing some demons, I felt genuinely happy.

Thanks

I hope that you’ve enjoyed my homeward journey as much as I have.  Thanks for at least visiting.  Comments are welcome in the comments section.  You’re e-mail address will not be displayed, but the name you chose to use will be.  Also, remember the Facebook fan page.  Remember, too, that if you’d like to purchase poster-sized prints of the above pictures without my name or copyright watermarks written on them, just go to my print website, click on the “Louisiana Scenes” album, and scroll all the way to the bottom of the album.

With love and gratitude,

Jimbaux