The history of this list is an important one to me. I got the idea from my good friend Carolyn D., a professor and former colleague at the Women’s Studies Department at the University of South Florida. To make life in Tampa bearable, Carolyn worked on a collection of cool things about the city. Carolyn, you have to understand, has lived *all over* the world. So, of course, Tampa would be boring to her. Especially since she has never lived in Baton Rouge. So I have borrowed her idea of making this list and it has become an ongoing conversation with several of my friends here who share a similar frustration with this “booming metropolis” in which we live.
When I was young I lived in two wonderful college towns: Austin, TX, and Madison, WI. These towns are meccas to young people. They are both state capitals and also home to major universities. They both offer food, cultural events, live music, politics, used book stores, alternative communities, and so on. I expected this from Baton Rouge since it too is a college town and state capital. I was disappointed. Since I have been here, the city has grown enormously, with many major restaurants and big box store chains moving in. There’s even a Whole Foods here now. Still (as of 2012), there is no art house movie theater, no decent used book store, very little in the way of alternative lifestyles. Most of the “activism” in the community takes the form of “social service” or “community service.” To be fair, many people think Baton Rouge is a great town because it’s definitely the place for partying, football, and church. Some people even party at the church of football. I’m not into that, though.
The Rules:
* The list cannot include restaurants because otherwise it would be page after page of eateries. I have included two exceptions and I explain why under each entry.
* The list cannot include people. There are too many good people here to include. The people I listed two extraordinary “service providers” and I’m including them as professionals, not acquaintances/colleagues/friends. I should change this rule and remove people from the list because the town is filled with wonderful folk.
It has taken me many years to compile this list. The entries are in reverse chronological order. They get cooler as they go.
14. The Red Stick Roller Derby
Women
‘s Roller Derby is on the rise nationally and Baton Rouge has its own team. A colleague from work plays on the team, which is how I learned about it. Roller Derby is wondrous. It’s brash, frilly, ballsy, rough and tumble, girl fun. There are boys’ teams too, but this is really all about the girls. Drew Barrymore’s 2009 movie, Whip It, has contributed to popularizing the sport. RSRD does flat track skating, not banked track like in the film. Also, in the sport violence is not acceptable; instead, sportsmanship is valued. Still, there’s a good bit of rough-housing going on. I have a hard time actually following what’s going on. There’s so much to keep track of, it’s too fast, and there are too many arms and elbows in the way. But I’m getting the hang of it. The local team has just earned an apprenticeship with the Women’s Flat Track Derby Association.
September 18, 2010
13. Ninja Snowballs and other gourmet food trucks
Gourmet food trucks have been a trend in urban areas for a while now, but some folks have decided to bring the trend here. There is growing support for gourmet food trucks now. The two I like best are Ninja Snowballs and Taco de Paco (owned by the same folks). Now, a snowball is something uniquely Louisiana. People ask me what a snowball is and I tell them and they say, “Oh, you mean an icie, like an Italian ice?” No. “Oh, you mean like a snow cone?” No. Snowballs are made of shaved ice, with the ice so thin that it resembles snow. It’s not crunchy like snow cones are. Italian Ices are heavier than snowballs. There’s no comparison. Snowballs, like snow cones, come in a variety of flavors, many of which are bizarre and fun: Wedding cake, king cake, orchid, tiger’s blood. Even more fun, you can add condensed milk to your snowball to make it insulin-shock-level sweet. The marketing for Ninja Snowballs is really catchy and cute. The only way you know how to find the truck is if you fan/like them on Facebook or follow them on Twitter(ninjasnowballs), thus capturing the Ninja spirit.
September 18, 2010
12. The YWCA Dialogue on Race
After participating in this program for a long time, I think I need to give it a separate entry! With Robbie Madden’s retirement, a task force of Dialogue alum have gathered to ensure the program stays strong. Though the Dialogues frustrate me to no end, I still learn and grow from them. Gripe as I might about this and that, I do see that the Dialogues make a difference in the community. I’ve met many people who have changed their thinking as a result of participating and these people leave the Dialogues and spread the message of anti-racism through their circles of influence. This can only be good.
September 18, 2010
And the list goes on.
At some point, I have to accept that this is where I live. There must be some lesson here that I’m supposed to learn and I’m being stubborn about getting it. In the mean time, things have been changing in BR and so I intend to add to the list. Now several things have popped up lately that could be added but that I haven’t done, so I will save them until I’ve experienced them. The music and art scene is growing slowly but surely and the downtown area is being developed. I’m encountering more and more politically progressive people. Changes are slow, but they are happening.
September 18, 2010
11. The Chimes
Technically, since I left the Kaleidoscope on the list, the Chimes is actually number ten. The Chimes is a local restaurant that sits right off the LSU campus. It is the spot where everyone goes to celebrate defending dissertations, exams, etc. The food is excellent. They have a “’round the world” selection of beer (not that I drink) and you get a t-shirt and your name on a plaque on the wall if you drink 60 beers from 20 different countries. They have a little card for you to keep track.
The Chimes is my second restaurant on the list and it deserves a place here because it’s the quintessential LSU and Baton Rouge experience. Of all the restaurants here, I’d say this is the one to visit if you want local, college-town flavor. Beyond the amazing food, the good times I’ve had at the Chimes and its symbolic value in my life at LSU justifies its place on this list as more than a restaurant.
June 7, 2009
10. The Red Shoes
The Red Shoes is a women’s center for personal and spiritual growth. The name comes from Clarissa Pinkola Estes’s interpretation of Hans Christian Andersen‘s tale in her book, Women Who Run with the Wolves. They offer many programs that focus on spiritual, issues, Jungian-slanted seminars, birthing circles, breathing programs, film or book discussions, art classes, and the like. One of the Dialogues on Race was hosted there. They are involved in One Baton Rouge, which is a community group focusing on diversity (including sexual orientation). A former student of mine was a staffer there for some time.
June 7, 2009
9. Dr. Roslyn Tabor, MD
I have been seeing Dr. Tabor since I moved here in 1999. She is an excellent doctor. I chose her because she was one of the few women on my insurance provider list. I intentionally sought out a woman doctor, of course. I made the right choice. When I visited her most recently, I told her that she’s the only doctor I’ve had any sort of long term relationship with, and that I didn’t like doctors, but that she made me feel very comfortable, all of which is true. She was especially helpful when we were trying to get Willow into school without a record of immunizations.
June 7, 2009
8. Blon Salon
Blon Salon is owned by Beverly Thornton. She’s an excellent hair stylist and I’ve been seeing her for several years now. I met her through a classmate of Willow’s when they were in junior high school. I’ve never had a hair stylist that I’ve liked before. With Bev, I can just go in and say “do what you want,” and she does. Her philosophy is to work with the hair instead of against it, so with most of my haircuts I don’t have to do much work with them. She’s also politically liberal, so we can agree on politics while she cuts my hair. Can’t go wrong with that! Unfortunately she does not have a website.
June 7, 2009
7. KLSU Radio
They play very cool music. Good alternative music. Lots of chicks who aren’t Britney Spears or Avril Lavigne, which is a major plus in my book.
January 30, 2003
6. The HopKins Black Box at LSU
I cannot even begin to say how cool that space is. Or, really, how cool the performance faculty have made it. Here is what the Black Box website says to describe it:
The HopKins Black Box opened in 1992 and is the nerve center and heartbeat of Performance Studies at LSU. The events held within this dynamic space range from informal, workshop-style presentations and performance experiments, to performance hours that feature solo and group performances, to fully staged scripts that, in most cases, the director has adapted for the stage from written, oral, and/or other cultural texts. On the average, 40-50 students appear in public performances on our stage each semester. Additionally, because most of the Performance Studies classes involve a performance component, the space is both our theatre and our classroom laboratory.
The coolest thing I ever saw in the Black Box was Ruth’s Moby Dick show. My memory of it is visceral. I cannot describe it. I don’t have a vocabulary to talk about it. I mean, I could wax deconstructive about it fairly easily, but it would be an academic exercise in the truest sense and it wouldn’t come near to capturing how that performance made me feel. So it’s probably better just to move on to the next thing on the list :) (Sorry, Ruth, if you ever read this.)
January 30, 2003
5. The YWCA
I was introduced to the UU Church by Robbie Madden, who is my idol here. Robbie reminds me of my grandmother. She is a grass roots activist and community leader. She gets so much accomplished and she really knows how to “work” things. She’s very good at cultivating networks of folk who will help her when she needs it. She amazes me. Robbie works for the YWCA, which is a surprisingly radical organization. Their approach to women’s issues is very broad and includes eradicating racism. They have a pretty sophisticated view of the way that women’s issues are entangled with poverty and race. The YWCA has hosted anti-racism programs for years now. I have been involved in the Dialogue on Race as a participant and facilitator. I was re-reading Sara Evans’ book Born for Liberty and ran across the background of the YWCA as part of the women’s reform movements. Very interesting history.
August 29, 2001
4. The Unitarian Church of Baton Rouge
I used to attend the UU Church and work with their senior youth. I don’t go anymore, but I like knowing it’s there. They do good work for social justice in the community. I like this church because of the huge round window at the front of the sanctuary. The window was inspired by a poem by Edwin Markham:
They drew a circle and shut me out,
A heretic, a rebel, a thing to flout.
But love and I had the wit to win,
We drew a circle and took them in.
Church is extremely central to the culture of Baton Rouge, so non-church-goers have a difficult time finding community here. The Unitarian Church is a loving and welcoming place and they always have something going on — far much more than I can actually partake in. For a while, they hosted a “mother/daughter book group” for middle school aged girls and their mothers (or guardians — That’s Me!!). Willow and I attended some of those meetings. The group selected 12 books, one for each participant. Interestingly enough, the books were all about strong girls, often magical, witchy, goddess-worshipping types. It must be a tween thing. This is the origin of the Books for Tween Grrls list.
August 29, 2001
3. Kaleidoscope Children’s Art Gallery
This place is one of the most creative ideas I’ve ever seen. I sent my niece, Willow, to a children’s art camp this summer at the Kaleidoscope studio. Their approach is fantastic! The instructors taught about famous artists like Van Gogh and Pollock and then the kids would make their own version, copying the style of the artist they learned about. They used all sorts of creative techniques and produced artwork that looks much better than anything I could ever do myself. The Gallery had an art exhibit featuring a piece of art by every camper. The owner is so talented and creative! She has painted picture frames in bright colors and designs right onto the walls of the entire studio. Then she just tapes up the various pieces of artwork into frames to display them. She also made note cards out of miniature copies of each kid’s art. Once a month they have “Ladies’ Night,” which is an art class for adults (women, presumably). Sometimes they have mother-daughter nights too. This place definitely makes Baton Rouge bearable.
This place has closed down, but I’m keeping it on my list, damnit.
March 27, 2002
2. Flowers and February (and March, too)
My friend Loretta P. says that flowers and the flower season of February to March should count as TWO separate cool things about Baton Rouge. I told her that was cheating. I used to live in the Garden District, which was buil
t circa 1920s and which is filled with beautiful bungalow style houses. The streets are lined with oaks and azaleas and crepe myrtle and when the flowers bloom and the weather is bearable, well, Baton Rouge is a beautiful place.
But I still say trying to turn this delightful aspect of life in Baton Rouge into two entries instead of one is cheating. And, yes, Loretta, that means you have to work harder to make your list. So, the picture of pink flowers above is Azaleas and the tree thing to the left is a crepe myrtle. These pictures, incidentally, were stolen from the LSU AgCenter‘s website.
August 29, 2001
1. La Madelaine
This is a delightful “French” restaurant on the corner of Jefferson and Corporate–”French” in the postmodern, hyperreal sense, meaning there’s nothing really authentically French about it. It has that old-time provincial feeling to it and good bread and coffee. Even though it’s a chain out of Dallas, it’s considered to be a “Best Bet” by New Orleans restaurant guides, particularly for breakfast, and the Baton Rouge version is my favorite restaurant here. There are three special things I like about La Mad’s.
First, they have a beautiful little garden in front that changes every time I go to the restaurant. So, if you squint your eyes and cover your ears, and focus your gaze on the flowers while blocking out the strip-mall parking lot sounds, fumes, and images, you might actually feel like you’re in France. Or New Orleans. Apparently the people who live in Atlanta, GA, agree with me, because they voted La Mad’s as the best bakery in Atlanta for their Creative Loafing. See? I told you it was a chain.
Second, many people dine at La Mad’s who look like the sort of people I want to get to know. In other words, women, with short hair, very cool earrings, who look like they might be Democrats, or the might like to read books and talk about them, or *gasp* they might even be pro-choice. A Marxist in the house? Dare I hope?
Third, every time I have dined alone at La Mad’s, I end up in the most curious conversations with single, elderly women, who all want to know what I’m eating, how it tastes, and how it compares to what they are eating. Not to mention whether or not I’m enjoying the pleasant weather and the Azaleas. It never fails. I promise. It is the most charming thing. Especially since I -know- these women eat here every day and have had the precise thing I’m eating, which makes their questions about more than food, obviously. It’s very -Southern- and one of the few things I -like- about the South. Now if one of them would only ask me how I like the latest issue of Ms. Magazine, I’d be set for life.
So, La Mad’s is on my list not so much because it’s a restaurant but because of the curious and surreal experiences I’ve had there.
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