I have a thing about cemeteries and communing with the dead. It’s been a thing since my very first experience of death - my Great Grandfather, when I was freshly 9 years old.
Pretty much everywhere I go - I must visit a cemetery. There is always someone there that I must “meet”.
New Orleans was no different. I had an unrelenting obsession with going to Saint Louis Cemetery #1.
Yes it is where Madame Laveau is entombed.
Yes it is where the future final resting place of Nicholas Cage...
Yes it is home to many of the cities large society tombs...
Yes it is home to Madame LaLaurie (all the American Horror Story - Coven fans should remember that name)
Yes to all of those things, and more.
This is also the home of Homer Plessy of the infamous Supreme Court case Plessy vs Ferguson. Homer and I aren't that much different - we both share a great grandparent that is a person of color... and both of us look very much white. Seeing his tomb and also hearing the tour guide give the local history of the case, brought up so many feelings deep with in me. (remember when I said I would find answers to questions I didn't even know I had?) These are things that I will continue to work through for the rest of my life.
And when I am really honest with myself... I think I would have done the same exact thing as Homer, had I been me in 1892.
I always thought it was Madame Laveau that I was meant to "meet" in NOLA... turns out it was Mr. Plessy... and all the many miles I walked around the city to finally get to him put a patina over my heart that will never be able to be removed.
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