Because I sit in the Thursday chair here at the Opinion Factory, every year I speak on Thanksgiving, but never on Mardi Gras. Further depressing my chances is the fact that I live in Vermont, the land Mardi Gras forgot. But Mardi Gras is a premonition of spring and whether or not you believe me, I can feel spring swelling beneath the snow and so this week I say to hell with calendars and latitudes.
I started thinking about Mardi Gras a few weeks ago when my parish priest mentioned our church is holding a Mardi Gras celebration. I just smiled and nodded at the time, because I don’t like to be impolite to priests but I think either A – my priest doesn’t really understand what Mardi Gras is all about or B – we’re about to break some new ground for the church. Either way, I think I should go to this event, just to check it out.
I’ve never been to the real Mardi Gras, the one in New Orleans, nor do I expect I will ever go, but I do have some second-hand Mardi Gras memories. Mardi Gras is a series of parades, staged by groups called krewes. Each parade has a theme, with elaborate floats and costumes for the marchers. Regardless of theme, one feature all the parades have is distribution of largesse, in the form of plastic beads, medallions and amulets. The spectators at parades come from all over the world for the chance to become highly intoxicated, beg for plastic gewgaws and vomit in public.
The parade marchers often require spectators to perform some act before largesse is distributed. A frequent requirement is the removal of an article of clothing. These requirements often involve women and usually involve shirts. This last point of business has become notorious in the recent decade or so and it is this which leads to my fears for my parish priest and also to my second-hand Mardi Gras memories. That’s memories.
A few years ago, I knew a few women in New Orleans who had had just about enough of the tawdry displays at Mardi Gras. They made up placards bearing the legend “Beads for Brains, Not for Boobs” and waded into the throng of spectators along the route of a particularly bawdy parade. Mardi Gras is a time reserved to endorse all kinds of freedom of expression, so my friends were received with tolerance, but their campaign fell on deaf ears.
While I think their cause was a noble one, I have to take issue with their geometry. “Beads for Brains” is a lopsided equation. If you can stagger down Bourbon Street, knee-walking drunk and still decline Latin nouns, you don’t need a string of green plastic beads as your reward. “Beads for Boobs,” on the other hand, has a certain symmetry, and I think we tamper with that at our peril.
By the same token, my church ought probably not be sponsoring any Mardi Gras parties. After all, Mardi Gras was invented as a last fling before six weeks of Lent. Mardi Gras’s excess was designed to be a mirror image of Lent’s austerity. They’re two sides of the same coin and that coin is of a very old currency: spring, rebirth and renewal. I welcome them both.
Rites of Spring
Because I sit in the Thursday chair here at the Opinion Factory, every year I speak on Thanksgiving, but never on Mardi Gras. Further depressing my chances is the fact that I live in Vermont, the land Mardi Gras forgot. But Mardi Gras is a premonition of spring and whether or not you believe me, I can feel spring swelling beneath the snow and so this week I say to hell with calendars and latitudes.
I started thinking about Mardi Gras a few weeks ago when my parish priest mentioned our church is holding a Mardi Gras celebration. I just smiled and nodded at the time, because I don’t like to be impolite to priests but I think either A – my priest doesn’t really understand what Mardi Gras is all about or B – we’re about to break some new ground for the church. Either way, I think I should go to this event, just to check it out.
I’ve never been to the real Mardi Gras, the one in New Orleans, nor do I expect I will ever go, but I do have some second-hand Mardi Gras memories. Mardi Gras is a series of parades, staged by groups called krewes. Each parade has a theme, with elaborate floats and costumes for the marchers. Regardless of theme, one feature all the parades have is distribution of largesse, in the form of plastic beads, medallions and amulets. The spectators at parades come from all over the world for the chance to become highly intoxicated, beg for plastic gewgaws and vomit in public.
The parade marchers often require spectators to perform some act before largesse is distributed. A frequent requirement is the removal of an article of clothing. These requirements often involve women and usually involve shirts. This last point of business has become notorious in the recent decade or so and it is this which leads to my fears for my parish priest and also to my second-hand Mardi Gras memories. That’s memories.
A few years ago, I knew a few women in New Orleans who had had just about enough of the tawdry displays at Mardi Gras. They made up placards bearing the legend “Beads for Brains, Not for Boobs” and waded into the throng of spectators along the route of a particularly bawdy parade. Mardi Gras is a time reserved to endorse all kinds of freedom of expression, so my friends were received with tolerance, but their campaign fell on deaf ears.
While I think their cause was a noble one, I have to take issue with their geometry. “Beads for Brains” is a lopsided equation. If you can stagger down Bourbon Street, knee-walking drunk and still decline Latin nouns, you don’t need a string of green plastic beads as your reward. “Beads for Boobs,” on the other hand, has a certain symmetry, and I think we tamper with that at our peril.
By the same token, my church ought probably not be sponsoring any Mardi Gras parties. After all, Mardi Gras was invented as a last fling before six weeks of Lent. Mardi Gras’s excess was designed to be a mirror image of Lent’s austerity. They’re two sides of the same coin and that coin is of a very old currency: spring, rebirth and renewal. I welcome them both.