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We all experience loss –
loss of a job, of friends, of personal possessions, even the loss of
a home. People often develop serious mental problems just trying to
cope with one of these losses. I believe it’s only by God’s
grace that Mark and I have managed to cope so far with all of
these losses.
On Sunday, August 28th we packed up
our car and the car of our friend Alfred and slowly made our way
west toward Dallas. We had never evacuated for a storm before, but
I just had this nagging feeling that we needed to go this time. We
brought only our dogs, my pet-sitting client’s dogs and a backpack
for each of us containing two changes of clothes and basic
toiletries. Our plan was to visit Mom, spend a few days in Dallas
and head home on Wednesday to pick up the fallen limbs in the yard
before returning to work on Thursday.
On Monday night, as we stayed up late to watch
the news coverage of the storm, we were breathing a sigh of relief
because it wasn’t a direct hit and the storm had turned to the east
and missed New Orleans. I slept late Tuesday morning and when I got
up every TV station was talking about the broken levee and the
flooding of New Orleans. Because of where the first broken levee
was we knew our house would be OK. The second breakage was more of
a threat. We knew we’d lose the car that we left in the driveway
and that water would be dangerously close to coming in the house in
spite of the fact that it’s three feet off the ground. When the
London Street Canal levee broke we knew it was over. That break was
less than a mile from our house.
We continued to watch the coverage for the
next several days and witnessed the suffering of so many. I became
literally obsessed and slept just a few hours a night, as if I were
on some kind of guard duty and had to see everything that had
happened. Mark eventually refused to watch at all. These people
were suffering and dying in the August heat with little or no
water. Nobody could get supplies to them, yet TV cameras were there
to show the world all this suffering and loss of dignity! What was wrong with
this picture? I was so angry.
We found our house in an aerial photo and our
worst fears were confirmed. Our address registered eight foot flood
depths. We had lost everything in the blink of an eye. Actually,
we had no idea how far our loss would stretch. We weren’t figuring
in our friends which were scattered across the country, our
beautiful city we love so dearly, or the friends that would die in
the filthy, poisoned water.
I got on the phone and started calling
everyone I knew. Cell phones with the 504 area code weren’t
working. We couldn’t get calls to go through. We discovered that
text messaging would work. At that point we didn’t need to hear
anyone’s voice; we just needed to know they were OK, so we were
“texting” like crazy with three or four phones at a time. It had
been almost a week and there were still people out there we hadn’t
reached. Some people we never reached. We heard through others
they were OK, but we’ve lost the means to contact them now that
everyone has moved and changed phone numbers.
Mark was very realistic about everything and
called a contact in the bicycle business to see if he knew of any
temporary jobs in the area. He was fortunate to land a sales
position at Richardson Bike Mart. The people there were very kind
and generous; the owner even offered his house to us for a month
while he was out of the country! I was not very realistic at that
point. I refused to accept what had happened and knew I would wake
up any minute, jump in the shower, and wash that horrible nightmare
out of my mind. After a few weeks I slowly began to acknowledge
that we would be here for a while and I started looking for a job.
I had one within the week, and I’ve been very happy there for nine
months now.
We lost all of our possessions. Very little
could be salvaged. The “stuff” isn’t important, but it’s painful to
lose photos and our wedding video. It’s the little things that
we’ll miss. The little love notes we used to write to each other
when we were dating, all my journals going back 20 years, pictures
of our fathers, both of whom are deceased.
We were the fortunate victims. We were
well-insured and the pay-off was fast and hassle-free. We
discovered that our home’s foundation and framework, as well as 75%
of the roof is OK. We were able to buy the things we needed like
new cars and furniture and because we both found such wonderful jobs
we were able to save enough of our insurance money for the
rebuilding. We’ll go home again some day.
Home is a word I used to throw about casually
in conversation. It didn’t mean any more than any other word. Oh,
how I’ve learned that home is not a casual word at all. I say it
gently now, and carefully. I don’t want to risk injuring it as it
comes out of my mouth. I didn’t realize until I lost it that New
Orleans is and always will be home to me. I went back over the
journal that I started after the storm and here are a few excerpts
to give you an idea of how much I love that place.
Friday, 12/02/05
“Mark isn’t sure if he ever wants to go back.
I promised him that I would never nag him about it, but he needed to
know that every day of my life I would wake up wanting to be in New
Orleans. I long for my friends and my church and that crazy,
wonderful community that will always be home to me. It’s such a
vital pillar of my identity. I was never lonely there, even when I
was alone. I miss everything that is New Orleans so much.”
Sunday, 12/04/05
“I found the love of my life in New Orleans. I
don’t mean Mark, I mean love in my life. So many different
kinds of love, I found my whole life there – I found ME. There’s no
reason to be anyone but yourself there because New Orleans will
embrace you and hold you tight to her breast and give you all her
love if you just do the same for her. I want so much to have that
incredible feeling of home again in my heart.”
Friday, 12/16/05
“I can’t find myself here. It’s bad enough not
having friends, but I don’t even have me now. I’m back in New
Orleans, covered in flood muck and lost. I’m in the piles of debris
on Pontchartrain Blvd. I’m in the empty houses in Gentilly. I’m in
the boat that washed up in someone’s front yard in Lakeview. I want
my old life back. I want my friends and my daily dog walks. I want
a salad from Venezia and a mango ice at Broccato’s. I want to sit
on the patio at PJ’s and hear about Rudy’s love life. I want to
walk through the French Quarter on a misty spring morning. I just
want to go home.”
Mardi Gras, 02/28/06
“Being with friends has a whole new meaning
now. I always took it for granted that they would always be there,
that I would always be there. Will this sadness ever leave my
heart? It’s so heavy, but I’m afraid to let it go because it’s my
link to home.”
Saturday, 06/10/06
“Gave a talk at the UMM meeting today. My
Katrina story. I didn’t want to tell parts of it because they
couldn’t possibly understand. How do you describe “home” to a group
of people so that they understand how deeply it can embed itself in
your heart and soul? They could never understand MY New Orleans
because it’s not a place – it’s a state of mind, a state of heart.
New Orleans is physically as much a part of me as my own hands or
feet. I am who I am because of that crazy, beautiful city. Her
blood flows through my veins. My heart beats in time to hers.”
Perhaps those excerpts give you an idea of
what it feels like to lose your entire identity. They’re
emotionally raw, but I don’t know how else to emphasize the loss
other than to bare my soul and share them with you. Writing those
words has helped me cope over the past ten months.
We had our first white Christmas in New
Orleans on December 25, 2004, and it was such a magical thing. My
dearest friend, Susan Cowsill, whose brother, Barry, died in the
floods, wrote a song titled “Crescent City Snow” following Katrina.
There are a couple of lines in her song that especially echo my own
feelings.
“Our precious hearts are all shattered,
scattered across the land. But I know that I am going back to a
place where I know who I am.”
“Hold all our memories in one hand, so tightly
we won’t let them go. And in the other hand we pray that the wind
and the panic and the rain will all turn to a soft and quiet,
gentle, peaceful snow.”
You can hear the whole song at
http://www.bluecornmusic.com/site/artists/susan_cowsill. She
was in Dallas in mid-December doing a concert and when she sang this
song there wasn’t a dry New Orleans eye in the place. Most of the
Dallas eyes were a little misty too!
I’ve shared this with you so that you can
understand how deeply this disaster has wounded so many people. I’m
not looking for sympathy. I got plenty of that when I needed it.
What I need now is for everyone to understand how precious home can
be. Regardless of where it is, always be thankful for it. Make
sure that all your friends and family know how much you love them.
There may come a time when it’s too late to do that. Never take for
granted what you have in your life. It could be gone in a second.
Start and end each day with gratitude and always remember it’s not
the “things”, but the relationships in our lives that make it all
worthwhile. |
