CHAPTER FORTY -- IN NEW ORLEANS, THE STREETS ARE PAVED IN JAZZ

(Did You Sleep With the Models?)

I wrote my very first travel article, which I titled "New Orleans: Bye Bye Blues," for the December 1983 issue of Mandate. I was under the journalistic influence then of Jan Morris (1926-2020), as I have been ever since. Morris is widely considered not only the best travel writer of the twentieth century, but one of the best writers in any genre. More specifically, a bravura stylist whose writings sparkle with wit and sophistication: an enormous vocabulary tooled for precision, startling metaphors, crisp depictions of people and places, and a sunny disposition that lights up the page and that must have brightened many a dark, thorny patch in her ninety-four years.