Parades Pop Up

Something to love about life in this part of the world is the ever-present possibility that you might, without warning, stumble into the middle of a parade. This happened on a Saturday a couple of months ago when, while bringing four over-stimulated ten-year-old boys home from a soccer game in Port Allen, I made a pit stop in downtown Baton Rouge. It was October 31 and the Louisiana Book Festival was in full swing. Having played two back-to-back games the boys were starving, so I reasoned that I could kill two birds with one stone—nourish bodies and minds, as it were—by leading them on a lap through the Book Festival’s food court and children’s literature areas. The fact that we weren’t able to park within several blocks of the State Capitol grounds should have been a sign that something else was afoot, but Book Fest draws a crowd, so we left the car on North Boulevard and made our way to the festival on foot, chalking the road closures up to anticipation of a big turnout. 

An hour later and halfway back to the car, poboys, books, and burgers on board, we were surprised to find our path blocked by ghouls, black cats, and vampires prancing down Main Street, merrily pelting bystanders with beads, trinkets, and showers of candy. Was it the Zombie Apocalypse? No! Merely the 10/31 Consortium’s annual Halloween parade. Finding themselves surrounded by costumed grownups in heavy makeup flinging confectionary, the boys were overjoyed. But they didn’t seem particularly surprised. Born-and-raised Louisiana lads, I suppose they’ve grown up expecting this sort of thing.

You might expect that the publisher of a cultural events guide would have seen it coming. It was Halloween after all. The 10/31 Consortium does a perfectly good job publicizing its parade, and judging by the crowd of parade-goers lining the route clutching buckets, plenty of other people had caught wind of it. But then, when you live in a place where people organize parades the way other folks change socks, who can keep up? There are parades celebrating Christmas, Thanksgiving, July Fourth, St. Patrick’s Day, Irish-Italian Day, MLK Day; parades for funerals; harvest parades for rice and pecans and shrimp and peaches; and one of my favorites: the Joan of Arc Parade—a medieval-themed walking affair throught the French Quarter on Twelfth Night that commemorates Joan’s birthday and her liberation of the city of Orleans from the besieging British. 

Then comes Mardi Gras, when you can scarcely swing a cat, black or otherwise, without hitting a parade. For this issue’s calendar we rounded up more than fifty taking place on Mardi Gras weekend alone. Which only scratches the surface. Scanning the listings, you can’t help but marvel at the spirit, each event embodying its community’s peculiar culture and flavor. From Slidell’s Krewe of Selene Parade (February 5: famous for its lighted wand throws) to Spanish Town’s gleeful vulgarity (February 6 and the explanation for this month’s cover; I’m keen to hear what you think), to Madisonville’s Krewe of Tchefuncte Boats-Only Parade and the Opelousas Mardi Gras Parade and Chicken Run (February 7); to super-krewe Orpheus’s mind-boggling light show (February 8). And on Fat Tuesday, the whole gamut is on show, from the Tee Mamou Iota Folklife Festival to New Roads’ Lions Club parade—the state’s second oldest Carnival celebration outside of New Orleans—to iconic Zulu and Rex and so many more. Large or small, cosmopolitan or homespun, Mardi Gras parades are united by a common glue: each is a collective agreement between riders and spectators to congregate, celebrate, and often lampoon the very characteristics that define its community’s sense of self. As a source of hometown pride and bonding, what could be healthier than that? 

Kind of cool when your kids can take this sort of thing for granted. You’ll find the parades on page 16, in case you don’t stumble on one by accident. 

Happy Mardi Gras. May beads, doubloons, and coconuts be the only things that rain on your parade.

—James Fox-Smith, publisher