When I was growing up, there were open canals everywhere. During big afternoon thunderstorms, they would fill with drain water, sometimes at an alarming rate, washing their ecosystems of larvae, snakes, road debris and trash all the way down to other canals or ditches that presumably dumped them into Lake Pontchartrain. The city was founded on the Mississippi- which is, in its own way, a huge drainage ditch for a lot of the United States. And being a city under water anyway, riding through puddles, seeing cars occasionally floating down the road, those were all things hardly worth noticing. My first "canal" was the one down the center of Mirabeau Avenue. At that time, Mirabeau was a divided street. And a very exciting one. People sped down Mirabeau racing between City Park and Elysian Fields. It was forbidden to cross the street alone. I had no reason to cross completely. The lure was the often swamp- like canal, and its wealth of squiggly water creatures, snakes, dragonflies, water beetles, dead rats, and trash items thrown from passing cars. I cannot remember the actual sights, but I can feel the oppressive summer humidity that came from it. The weedy grasses that grew on the sides of the canal were cut once every two weeks or so by a huge piece of equipment that left the dead grass to compact and decay leading to even more heat being generated. Going to explore was a hot, itchy, sweaty, fascinating and scary thing all at one time. I didn't dare go with my brother or his friends- they would have pushed me into the water. I knew that much. But I could go by myself if I figured no one would miss me for a while. It was a short dash across the street and then a furtive climb down to the gummy mess. My brother had terrorized me with stories of how quick sand would eat you alive with no hope of escape. And I was never too sure what or where the quick sand was, but if it was anywhere real, then it was probably in that muck down in the canal.
My brother was particularly fascinated by Bayou St John. He and a friend found a wooden crate which they put a cardboard box into. When my mother saw them, they explained they had made a boat and were going to put it into Bayou St John. My mother forbade them to do so. And then, an hour later, they had disappeared. No amount of calling or searching produced a sign of either child OR the box. Frantic calls were made to the police and a search was begun. Neighbors walked the streets calling for him. Police searched the banks of all the canals and ditches. Six hours later, driven by hunger probably, my brother and his friend showed up dirty on the front porch. After extensive questioning, they revealed that they thought it was pretty funny to see people running around looking for them. They DID go to Bayou St John, and the "boat" sank before they could get in it. So they wandered about and then hid in a vacant and overgrown lot for hours watching people running around yelling their names. My brother was spanked, thrown in a bathtub, not given dinner and put in his room. All to my delight. Who doesn't like being the kid who looks pretty faultless?
The next canal was the one running on West Esplanade in Metairie. By the time we could hit this canal, we were fully independent with very little parental supervision. We could ride our bikes there, hop off and hide our bikes in the weeds, and use our BB and pellet guns to shoot cans and whatever else was worth shooting. We could catch bugs of interest and put them in jars. We had a game where we would pull weeds that looked like spears out of their casings and throw them at one another. We could be about as free as kids could be. But it didn't last long because subdivisions were rapidly encroaching on the area we used as a playground. This was the best time because we were boys and girls together- before puberty came to change how we saw one another. We were all just friends. We did stuff together, got in trouble together and were all punished together. It was worth it.
Slowly but surely, a lot of those ditches and canals have been covered over. Massive projects laid huge pipes and covered them up.
But I am sorry for the kids who never got to do those things. Sure, we could have died, gotten life threatening infections, been run over, shot our eyes out, whatever the fear was. But we loved it.
