NOLA pics

One of these days, I'll figure out how to get these to post in the order I want them!





This is my goofy pal Erica. On her way to my apartment one Sunday afternoon to help me use the bathroom and make supper, she cut across campus via a different route on her bike and happened across some Indian students having a festival at the amphitheater. She stopped to listen to the music, and a little boy invited her in. Next thing she knew, she had pink powder on her face!

I doubt that she'll be returning to NOLA because all she has left to complete her masters in public health is her internship. That she'll be doing either in Mexico or Central America (most likely the former) because her interests lie with Latino communities. I'll miss her because she was the one person I could always count on for a laugh. She always knows how to cheer me up.

She's also the only person who has ever gotten me to dance in a club. She talked me into salsa dancing with her at the Blue Nile when we took out my next door neighbor before he moved to Chicago. Yeah, she's crazy like that -- and no, I hadn't been drinking!

Here is a great shot taken by my pal Natalie (you'll meet her in a minute) of one of the many mimosa trees by the Liberal Arts building on campus. There's a giant yard on the North side of the building that is nothing but mimosa and magnolia trees. It's beautiful when they're all in bloom (about April and May), and the energy of the trees is phenomenal. I shudder to think what happened to them in the hurricane.

This is my pal Melissa. She was a masters student in the bio department and had the desk next to mine. We shared an office for about four or five months before we finally became friends. Part of it was our conflicting schedules, part of it was me taking forever to warm up to new people -- we all KNOW how I am. We discovered we had a lot in common, especially our life philosophies. She is also the person who introduced me to sushi.

In this pic, Erica, Natalie, Natalie's man at that time, and I were having an end-of-the-semester barbecue. Melissa stopped by but couldn't attend because she was getting ready to move back to Pennsylvania. She'd had it with her thesis advisor and was taking a job with a pharmaceutical company back home. She's much happier, but I miss her terribly.

This is a crepe myrtle. These lovely trees come with blooms from white to lilac (seen here) to deep purple to pale pink to magenta. They remind me of lilacs though they don't have a scent. This particular specimen grows in front of the apartment building next door to mine (you can see the end of my building behind the pine tree on the left). Two lilac-colored crepe myrtles grow in front of my building, but they hadn't fully bloomed at the time of this photo because they faced the West.

And here is Natalie. She is the third of my best pals I've made in NOLA (Erica and 'Lissa being the other two). Natalie is the one I counted on to be brutally honest. When I had a major shot dealt to my self-esteem, Natalie was the first one I told. Like a good friend, she listened sympathetically, asking questions to be sure she understood what I was feeling but generally lending an ear. Then, also like a good friend, she said, "OK, you've taken a blow to your ego. What are you going to do about it?"

Natalie now lives in NYC attending Columbia for a double masters in public health and social work. Also, interestingly, now she's dating a boy from Kansas. I laughed when she told me that. I'm happy for her, but I miss her terribly as well.