In the 1995 movie Smoke, Harvey Keitel’s character, Auggie Wren, takes a photograph of the same street corner at the same time every day for 18 years. A Christmas newsletter is like one of Auggie Wren’s photographs—people’s periodic attempt to take a snapshot of their lives at a fixed point in time. One snapshot in isolation is unremarkable. But the parade of snapshots shows the incremental changes that, over the years, add up to dramatic changes. It also shows the constancy of some things—and in an ever-changing world, constancy can be a blessing. With that intro, here is a snapshot of Ray & Suzanne Ward’s world, taken in December 2008.
Ray is a lawyer at Adams and Reese LLP in New Orleans, where he has practiced since June 2002. He concentrates on appellate practice, representing clients on appeals before state and federal appellate courts. In his spare time, he has written a few articles for publication by DRI (Defense Research Institute) and has taught three continuing-legal-education classes on appellate practice. For fun, he maintains two blogs: The (New) Legal Writer, devoted to legal writing; and Minor Wisdom, where the motto is Yogi Berra’s famous quotation, “You can observe a lot just by watching.”
Suzanne works as a manager for the State of Louisiana, Department of Social Services, Office of Disability Determinations. In February, she competed in the the New Orleans Mardi Gras Half Marathon (13.1 miles). In her spare time, she pursues certification as a yoga instructor. She teaches a yoga class at Touro Infirmary, and hopes to do more of the same when she retires from civil service in the next year or so.
We live in an old Victorian camelback house on Magazine Street in New Orleans. We don’t know exactly how old it is, but the earliest real-estate transaction we know of involving our lot occurred on October 20, 1900. So we’re pretty sure that the house is at least 100 years old. We’ve lived here since Election Day 1992. Like any old house, it always has something in need of fixing (at the moment, the kitchen floor and the lock on the front door). We love it. It’s a block and a half from Audubon Park and within easy walking distance of a great grocery store, dozens of shops and restaurants, a neighborhood bar (a bit pricey, but just 1½ blocks from the front door), and perhaps the last neighborhood theater in Louisiana. And it’s situated right between both our workplaces. Commuting time for both of us is about 20 minutes each way.
Both of us remain active in Holy Name of Jesus Parish. Suzanne is a eucharistic minister, and both of us serve as lectors and as members of the RCIA (Rite of Christian Initiation of Adults) team. This year, Suzanne became a member of the parish council. On May 4, we were awarded the Order of St. Louis Medallion for service to our church.
We still have the same four cats we started the year with. In order of seniority, they are:
Some notable events this past year include the following:
Suzanne was supposed to get a new car for Christmas 2007. We’ve been an all-Saturn family since 1994, and she wanted a small car. But there were no IONs to be had, because Saturn discontinued them right about the time we started shopping. So we decided to wait for Saturn’s new small car, the Astra, which is actually an Opel in disguise. It took longer than expected for the Astras to arrive in New Orleans, so she didn’t get her Christmas present until February. But we did end up being the first kids on our block (or for that matter, in the whole city) to drive one of these puppies.
- Not many people know that we have a mixed marriage. Ray is a Jazz Fest person; Suzanne isn’t. For the second year in a row, Ray got himself a WWOZ Brass Pass, allowing daily entry. Much of the time, it rained. And when the rain stopped, the Fair Grounds were a muddy mess. Ray had a ball. He filed daily reports on Minor Wisdom, to the delight of a dozen or so readers. In case you’re interested, here they are: Apr. 25; Apr. 26; Apr. 27; May 1; May 2; May 3.
- As some people know but fewer and fewer remember, Ray used to be a pretty good distance runner. But that was 20+ years and 35 lbs. ago. Nevertheless, there is one race every year that Ray still shows up for: the Tchoupitoulas Barathon. Participants must run from bar to bar, drinking a beer at each bar. Six bars, six beers, six miles (more or less, depending on shortcuts). Ray participated in the first Barathon in 1983 and has only missed one since (1990, which conflicted with his law-school baccalaureate mass). Photos from this year’s event are here.
- One advantage (?) of living on the gulf coast is that you can count on the occasional hurricane to break up the day-to-day tedium. New Orleans did not take a direct hit this year, but Gustav passed close enough to trigger a city-wide evacuation. We stayed put. We followed the storm closely on the National Hurricane Center’s web site; we also followed all the computer models. We just didn’t see anything to justify Mayor Nagin’s hysteria. We figured we would be better off here than on the road—especially with four cats. As it turned out, the storm did exactly what it was predicted to do, passing close enough to cause Category-1 winds in New Orleans. We felt very safe throughout, as the neighborhood was crawling with National Guard and NOPD. We did lose electricity for most of that week, but as luck would have it, the power outage coincided exactly with the Republican National Convention, so we missed all of the TV coverage. Though we had no air conditioning, this old house was designed for those conditions, ventilating itself naturally by convection.
- Like most people, we lost some loved ones this past year. Two deserve special mention. One is Patricia diGeorge, Suzanne’s stepmother, who died after living a long and full life. The other is Ashley Morris, a famous and fiery New Orleans blogger and a dear friend of hundreds, including us. To learn a little bit about him, read Ray Shea’s eulogy.
Best wishes to everyone for a happy holiday season and a wonderful 2009.
6227 Magazine Street
New Orleans, LA 70118-5849
raymond.ward@gmail.com
