Dancing in the Park

Bopping in Beach Chairs.

The '80s were alive and well at La Freniere Park Thursday night. Mostly the '80s. A little of the '90s and some contemporary. But mostly the '80s.

It was the Mojoeaux Band playing in the park's spring Thursday concert series. They're a local party band, and they're pretty good. They had the audience, which I'd guess around 500 to 800 people – mostly around my age, so that was a little funny watching them try to rock, bopping in their beach chairs. There was also a host of little kids – 2 or so to 10 – who knew just what to do when the music pounded. Get up and move! Tori and I and a handful of other adults joined them and were on our feet most of the night.

The band name, of course, is pure NOLA. Pronounced mojo, but since this is Cajun country we spell it with a lot of imported extra verbs. We have signs that say "Geaux Saints" and Tostitos ads that say "We Kneaux How to Party."

We'd been meaning to get to the concert series for a month, but it was always something. A school activity. Then I got sick and that ate up three Thursday nights – I don't want to dwell on it since I wrote about it recently. I'm mostly better now, Even have my voice back, just still feel a little wrung out.

So anyway, Thursday was also the last day of school, so we celebrated by walking down to the park. We strolled through the bird sanctuary than around the pond. It was peaceful, quiet, even with the band starting up not far away. We were fascinated by the maneuvers of a Roseate spoonbill circling around, his beak in the muddy water, to pull up his dinner.

Then we entered the area where the concert was, and things got very lively. We had a couple of excellent tacos each while the band played a blend of '80s favorites – Journey's "Don't Stop Believin'," Whitney Houston's "I Want to Dance with Somebody," bunch of other songs that made me go, "Oh, yeah! That song!" and a few more contemporary songs. They'd be a fun band to have at a wedding or something.

Soon as we finished eating Tori was on her feet and, unlike me, she can dance and she got into it. We haven’t' had a lot of fun lately, so this was a great chance to let go, and she did. She even got me on my feet, sort of bopping in my middle-aged white guy way.

Mojeaux rocks out.

Max and his friend met us there. Max enjoyed dancing and moving to the beat, especially when Mojeaux rapped ("Gangsters Paradise") but his friend seemed unwilling to let the beat infect her, she seemed self-conscious. She'll get over that pretty quickly if she hangs around our family for any length of time.

Anyway, we had a great time last night. Just a lot of fun, and fun is something that's been in short supply the last month, The Louisiana Philharmonic orchestra will play in the park tonight, and we plan to go give it a try. Sounds fun!