Another month full of seeing relatives from all parts of the family. My son Rob and his wife Jami with their three children, Sierra, Walden, and Emerson came from Indiana to stay with us for a week. The week after they left my Uncle T-Al Bascle, on my mother's side, died at age 80 in Bourg, Louisiana. A day later my dad's cousin, June Walker Loycano, died at age 77 in Harvey. Both of these funerals occurred during the peak of the Carnival season, all of which made for long days and jam-packed schedules for both me and Del.
Sierra, seven, loved to make up stories and during one long drive she told her stories non-stop to her baby brother, Emerson. Walden, six, loved to drive the 38 Roadster pedal car. The first of any of the grandkids who could pedal it backwards and forward and steer it like Dale Earnhardt, Jr. He used the back wheel like a wheelchair user would to get the car moving so the pedals would work easily. Emerson, two, is our newest and most rambunctious grandchild. Only 19 months old, he dragged a bar stool across the kitchen, climbed up on it, stretched out the length of his tiny body to be just able to reach the faucet, turned on the cold water, put his head under the nozzle and drank from it. All this he did without hesitation — as if he had been doing it all his life — and he is only 19 months old! I added his footprint to my cooking apron, the last print of our 17 grandchildren to be placed on the apron. I ran out of white paint, so we had to use the red paint for his footprint. The only place available on the apron was a spot that is right over my heart --- I call that red footprint "my red badge of courage" — which I earned by surviving 5 days with Emerson roaming through Timberlane.
This month holds Valentine's Day. Del's dad usually sent her a stuffed animal on this day, so I decided to buy a couple of white monkeys with their arms around each other for Del for Valentine's Day. These two reminded me of our first stuffed animals together – the brown monkeys with the linked arms which we got during 1977 and which we still cherish.
When I put these two on Del’s desk, I noticed a curious plastic tab coming out of the back which said, “Pull to Activate” which I did and when I pressed the button on the male’s left arm, he began to sing, “I’ve got you to hold my hand” with his head bobbing in time to the music. Then the female voice sang, “I’ve got you to understand” and so it went till the last eponymous line, which they both bobbed in sync and sang, “I’ve got you, Babe”. It was Sonny and Cher singing inside the white apes. Del had a smile from ear to ear and kept cachinnating in spontaneous laughter. The animated set was well worth the price of two Valentine Greeting cards I paid for it. With the $5 Bonus Card discount, it was about $11 for the two apes. Amazing that they could design, build, and sell it at a profit for so little money. It may be built in China, but it’s American ingenuity that created the possibility for its existence and reaching Del’s desk at this time. See still shot nearby.
After writing in my Reminiscences review about how artists paint angels, I decided to acquire an angel painting from Maureen Bayhi, my artist daughter. It is entitled "Angel and Vase". I have attached a photo of it as it appears in the Timberlane Bathroom Art Gallery.
Did I mention Carnival was in full swing? The weather was dreary, cold and rainy for most of the parades and Mardi Gras, but we still managed to catch Endymion, Babylong, Adonis, and Rex parades and I have some photos to show at various places on this page. I always identify photos in this Digest using the ALT command, which means you can read my description by resting your cursor on the photo (with most browsers).
On the morning of the Galatoire's luncheon, I had to drive 90 minutes each way to Uncle T-Al's funeral. I left at 6:30 in the morning, visited with Aunt Clarice, Myra, and Phil before going to the church in Bourg where I met and talked to many of my Babin relatives before I had to leave about 10 to get to Galatoire's in the French Quarter for our Carnival Krewe's luncheon. After the luncheon, I drove home for a nap and to change into my white tie and tails for the four parties which followed. It was a full day which only ended at midnight when we opted out of the last party and headed home. Another marvelous Mardi Gras Ball, compete with a St. Charles Avenue streetcar ride by the Krewe, New Leviathon Oriental Foxtrot orchestra music, great friends, food and dancing the night away in a large old mansion on the Avenue. The King of the Ball was King Arthur, whose identity was secret, but that he enjoyed his reign was no secret. Hail Arthur!
I visited the large Krewe of Endymion's parade at its staging point and got to talk some friends from the nuclear power plant where I used to work. It was a beautiful day for my walk through City Park. The next parade we stumbled into was a West Bank parade called Adonis. Del and I were heading to her Mom's to help change some high overhead light bulbs for her, and the parade showed up between us and her house. So we did what New Orleanians do when interrupted by a parade: we growsed a bit for not planning more carefully, and then got out and caught some beads.
The big day for Carnival is Mardi Gras or Fat Tuesday and we usually do downtown on that day. The rain was omnious. All forecasts called for 80% chance of rain. We burnt some incense to the gods and headed out anyway, hoping for the best. And we got the best we could expect given the forecast. Chilly, misty weather, 250% relative humidity it seemed, but absolutely no rain the whole day. With the thin crowds due to the weather, we were actually able to walk the length of Bourbon Street. We had lunch at La Madeline's, hot soup and quiche, and then headed back to Canal Street for the Rex parade. We waited in the Casino until the parade started and walked out. Unfortunately we missed the Fighting Tiger Band of LSU which led off the Rex parade, but caught lots of beads and doubloons as the Krewe unloaded their cache of throws just prior to the end of the parade a few blocks ahead. The floats were spectacular this year, a throwback to designs from the beginning of the 20th Century. The theme was The Winged World and the winged creatures of mythology paraded before our eyes in living color.
The final parade of the year was the one on the Canal Street Ferry as we were carried across the Mississippi River to our West Bank destination. We were ferried through the dense fog coming to the Mardi Gras at 9 AM and we were ferried back across the great river in the dense fog when we headed home. Another Mardi Gras downtown New Orleans was over for us. But Mardi Gras itself continued well into the night over the television channels.
I watched and was enthralled by the three hour spectacle of the Rex and Comus Balls climaxing in the meeting of their two courts. It marks the end of Carnival. The end of flesh-eating by humans before the fasting and abstinence of Lent, as the name carni-val tells us. Carnival is all that, and even more.
There is no King of Rex, no King of Comus — what may seem to be a petty formality to some is the vesture of a deep truth about Carnival, about the origin and future destination of humankind and the cosmos. Rex symbolizes the essence of King-ness — the name means King — thus Rex is the King of Kings. To use the title King Rex or King of Rex is to be redundant and to gloss over the great mystery of Rex. Comus is not a king, but rather is a god. To use the title King Comus or King of Comus is to be erroneous and to gloss over the great mystery of Comus.
The Courts of Rex and Comus meet to signal the end of the Carnival season, the end of all flesh-eating for this cycle of the Earth’s progress around the Sun. There is also a deep meaning, a deep mystery revealed in the ritualized meeting of the two courts — the ritual signals the end of all flesh, the end of flesh-based human beings, the end of the Earth as a material body. To understand this mystery, one needs to view the regal vestures worn by Rex and Comus and their queens.
Rex and his queen wear white vestures with gold embellishments; Comus and his queen wear white vestures with silver embellishments. The gold of Rex symbolizes the golden rays of the Sun and the silver of Comus symbolizes the silver rays of the Moon. On the last night before the end of Carnival, Rex and Comus each has a Ball in which each Krewe meets and pays homage to its respective leader and his queen. These two Balls take place in one large hall which is separated by a huge curtain, and, at the climax of the evening, the end of Carnival itself is symbolized by the meeting of the Golden Court of Rex and the Silver Court of Comus. This ritual has been enacted at the end of each Carnival season in New Orleans for over a hundred years.
On the next morning, Catholics all over New Orleans have ashes applied to their foreheads while these words are said, “Ashes to ashes, dust to dust.” This is a ritualized enactment of the great mystery of the end of all flesh that occurs to each of us at the end of our individual lifetime on Earth, when we leave our flesh behind on the Earth to return to ashes and dust while our spirit returns to the spiritual world.
What is enacted in the ritual of the meeting of Rex and Comus is, rightly understood, the dissolution of the basis for all flesh, the Earth itself. One needs to understand that Earth first appeared as a planetary body able to support flesh-based human bodies when it separated from the Moon, that silvery orb which orbits the Earth. Before that separation, the Earth and the Moon were one, and together as a Silver globe they orbited the Golden globe of the Sun, from which the Silver globe had previously separated. Thus it will come to pass that the Earth will one day be re-attached to the Moon and the Silver globe will orbit the Golden globe of the Sun once more in that time when “sun and stars will rise and set no more.” Then the Silver Moon will combine with the Golden Sun and the end of all flesh, literally and figuratively, will occur.
This great mystery is beautifully enacted by the courts of Rex and Comus to mark the end of Carnival season each year. It is a mystery revealed in a slow-motion procession of two regal courts, one adorned in Silver and one in Gold, which orbit each other on the floor of a huge ballroom, and in the end finally merge into one body.
This is what the people of New Orleans have put on each year on the stage of the world for all to see for over a hundred years: what our ultimate destiny as human beings is. That is what kept me riveted to the screen as the spectacle of the meeting of the two Krewes of Rex and Comus took place. [If anyone would like to learn more about Rex and Comus or even to acquire a copy of the three hour video presentation, a Google search of [ WYES Comus ] will provide the links for further investigation.]
P. S. Just for comparison purposes, here’s how the meeting of Rex and Comus was mundanely described in the TV Focus of the Times-Picayune:
12 (WYES) Live coverage of the meeting of the Rex and Comus courts from 7:30 to 10:30 PM. The annual attendance at the season’s glitzy finale will be preceded by a day of Carnival specials and followed by a rebroadcast of the event.
And, last but not least, just before going to press with the March Digest, we drove up to Alexandria for the christening of our 8-year-old grandson, Thomas Gralapp, at Our Lady of Prompt Succor Catholic Church. Congratulations Thomas! Afterwards we drove across the Cajun Mason-Dixon line from Rapides Parish into Avoyelles Parish for some great boiled crawfish with the parents, godparents, grandparents and Thomas's friends.
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The best source at the best price is to order your copies on-line is from the publisher Random House/Xlibris's website above.
“Frida” was the best friend, fellow artist, and constant companion of Diego Rivera, renown artist of Mexico. Occasionally she marries him. Her career as an artist begins when during a streetcar wreck, she is impaled by a steel shaft through her back and vagina. With broken legs, pelvic bones and ribs, she lived constantly in pain, and her art work glows with pain and anguish she experiences. This movie glows with the images of her artwork, which is artfully woven into the texture of the movie — especially transitions between scenes — some segues are so well done that the borders between art and reality are indiscernible. Amazing movie, amazing performances by three brilliant actors playing Diego Rivera, Frida Kahlo, and Leon Trotsky. Art history in its finest hour and a half.
“Igby Goes Down” — Warning: this movie may be too intense for adults. Teenage Igby's older brother keeps giving him a copy of Rilke’s 
“Private Benjamin” in which Goldie Hawn marries a man who is more interested in money than in his bride and gracefully dies in the act of consummating the marriage. She then volunteers for the Army and survives boot camp and goes to work for NATO. Meets a Frenchman who is more interested in other women than in his bride-to-be and she leaves him at the altar. Seems the Army made a woman out of her. A delightful movie to revisit. 
