Louisiana has great food and good music.
I lived there for five years and ate my way (see my photo) through some of the best restaurants and home kitchens in that state.
My friend, John, introduced me to meat pies in Natchitoches. My other friend, Anna, gave me her mother's meat pie recipe.
John taught me the Louisiana trinity of Cajun cooking: onions, celery and bell pepper.
Another friend of ours tried to teach me "the French" as he called it, which meant Cajun French.
All I remember: "Ça boit et ça fume et ça couche au serein." (They drink and they smoke and they stay out all night.)
For a while, Louisiana seemed like heaven. Then I went to the office of motor vehicles to get a driver's license. That's when I wanted to come back home.
The air conditioner had broken that day I ventured to hand in my Mississippi license for a Louisiana one.
The July heat and humidity turned the lady behind the counter into a human gator. She snapped at everything that walked by.
"Take a number!"
"Sit."
I watched a grown man more than 6 feet tall hunker down like a puppy that had piddled on the rug. He sat over in the corner and didn't say a word until Ms. Gator called his number.
Most of the time I grin and try to visit with folk. It's the polite way and kind of breaks the ice. My mamma taught me to be nice.
I watched enough "Mayberry" to know that you can overcome anything with a sense of humor.
"License. Social Security card. Birth certificate," she growled.
I handed them over. Nary a word escaped these lips.
She peered hard at the documents. The heat and her stare made me sweat more.
Ms. Gator made me go sit back down and wait until she had time to run my background.
It took 30 minutes because she had to confer with her comrade in misery - Ms. Wolf, who bared her teeth at all the teenagers seeking legal permission to drive their daddies' cars.
Having reared a male of the species, seeing a teenage boy in the throes of puberty who has become legal to drive is a frightening thing. They get all puffed up and strut.
Not these teens. They bowed their heads and mumbled when Ms. Wolf spoke.
I received my Louisiana driver's license as soon as Ms. Gator decided I was not a terrorist or any other vermin come over from Mississippi to destroy the Louisiana way of life.
I let that license go the other day here in Greenwood.
Timing is everything. I went to get my piece of plastic about 45 minutes before the state shut down all the computers - 4:45 p.m.
The room was crowded with some teenagers in search of legal driving privileges. Instead of bowed and cowed, they traded friendly remarks with the ladies who gave the tests and took their pictures.
Only one man more than 6 feet tall came in while I was there. He got his license. Apparently, the lady at the desk knew him. They traded pleasantries and asked about one another's families.
My number was called. I had forgotten something needed to exchange one state's license for another. The lady who waited on me explained that I could go get it and come back before 4:45 p.m., and she'd get me legal.
I did. She did.
Public servants sometimes forget they serve us, the public. I guess they get all hot and irritated like Ms. Gator.
Not these ladies who take care of you at the driver's license office on U.S. 82.
They understand customers and communication and all those things that make dealing with a bureaucracy go smoothly.
Thanks, ladies.
Laissez les bon temps rouler.
