Bumping into geniuses

Chance encounters are not fodder for indulgence

The cover of Robbie Robertson’s 1991 album, Storyville.

One evening in summer 1991, I was sitting in Jean Laffite’s Blacksmith Shop (bar) in New Orleans. I had already traveled half the country on my 1974 BMW R900 aping Kerouac but becoming more like a Wall of Voodoo character.

Of course I was chasing girls most of the time and missing the point. After numerous states, three months, several dish-washing jobs and a bad night on a fire ant mound, I had only a daily journal of events and nothing else. Countless chance encounters misread, misunderstood or just missed. Young men do that. They called it dissipation once.

Exhausted and not yet ready to return to the fetid hostel room I shared with three Greeks and a Bulgarian, I nursed a beer through a cold. The night was hot. The bar was hot. Everything seemed to stick to me. I was ready to get out of New Orleans.

But a few bar stools over sat a gorgeous Creole woman in a flowing white dress turning a glass of white wine and looking really pissed off. Normally, when a man sees a woman with “that look” he backs off like a hound does a snake: slow and careful. Not me. I’m stupid like that.

“Bad night?” I asked. It was. She said she had been stood up by a date. I thought that guy either had to be dead or gay to miss that date. I tried to cheer her up and she began to come around. I made like I was actually a real writer when I was just a lousy reporter, unemployed at that. Traveling is to journalists as waiting tables is to actors.

My mediocrity now properly hidden, she had her turn.

She was a graduate of Howard and had a law degree and she was there to sing. Her date was also her piano player. Now I understood why she was so angry. Highly cultured and refined, being stood-up by her musical partner was doubly insulting to her. She obviously needed to get that off her mind so she asked me to go with her to a club on Decatur Street.

The night was hot, so she said she we should drive; the cool air in the Mercedes felt like an ice storm. But her elegance, white dress and erudite voice in the German machine made me blush with smallness. I was just lucky to be there.

We arrived at the club and immediately knew something was wrong. Glaring lights beamed from the entrance, there were no sweaty people in line, no bouncer, no thrumming dance music. Plastic sheeting hung from the second floor to the ground and we heard power tools. Construction at 11 pm? “what the hell is going on?” she said.

Bored enough to find out, she parked. I led the way into the entrance and walked right into Robbie Robertson, gut to gut.

He had been picking his guitar, quietly pacing while behind him technicians and grips did their thing. I did NOT recognize him but I knew he had to be someone important. At that very moment, my elegant driver said from behind me, “Robbie Robertson!”

She knew Robbie Robertson on sight. I did not.

Robbie was a really cool and well mannered fellow. He made small talk and never stopped playing that guitar. After a bit, he excused himself to continue his work on what was likely some support photos or videos for his new album, Storyville. We did not ask for an autograph and I think it mattered to him that we didn't. I am proud of that.

My elegant date and I called it a night. She did give me her number, but I never called her. I didn't need to. I am proud of that, too. It was one of my first steps away from the libertine and toward liberty.

Chance encounters are beautiful moments of Providence, not indulgence. That is how I pray over them anyway.

Robbie Robertson passed away 9 August aged 80. Please watch the video below.