Living on New Orleans Time

In Living on New Orleans Time, Richard Caire uses his photos of seemingly ordinary moments in New Orleans past and captures pieces of the city's history. He preserves places that “ain't dere no mo'” (I'm a central Louisiana girl, not a New Orleans native, but I can appreciate that sometimes places ain't dere no mo'!) so that people can remember them - fondly, wistfully, however they want to. His descriptions of the places and things in the photographs range from the serious to the chuckle-inducing and everywhere in between, and they're peppered with a range of pop culture references that I could appreciate. Monty Python, Talking Heads, the Platonic solids (okay, that last one isn't pop culture). There are bits of sound advice and wisdom acquired over years woven in there, too. Mr. Caire has either done a lot of research for his book or lived a varied and fascinating life. I suspect it's the latter.

If you love New Orleans, are from New Orleans, have any kind of passing interest in New Orleans, you'll want to pick up this book. Mr. Caire memorializes the mundane, the weird, the abandoned and forgotten that even I find myself longing to visit New Orleans that was. The book makes me want to pay more attention, to find the beauty in the small things.