Katrina Report – We’re Safe

Today is our first day back to work and I wanted to drop a note to let all my friends here know that I and my family are safe. Thanks to you all for your emails, calls, and notes of concern and love. Baton Rouge here is about 100 miles northwest of New Orleans so although we had some significant power outages and some felled trees, we fared well and are not decimated as are our friends, families, and neighbors to our southeast. Clean up was minimal (for me) and we were without power for only about 12 daylight hours on storm Monday. Worst damage here to us was a few shingles off the roof and some small branches of debris.

Most importantly, my son, Wade, and daughter, Jill, (and an elderly aunt and two cousins staying with a third cousin here in town) arrived safely in convoy from New Orleans among the mass evacuees on Saturday. It took them about eight hours for a usual 1.5 hour trip on the back roads with me giving them directions via cell phone since they had to go where they were directed in the major arteries leading out of New Orleans. It was one of those “can’t get there from here” for a while as they were routed northeast despite having family (us) northwest. I had told them to pack all that was irreplaceable since I did not expect they would have anything to return to (I had first-hand post-storm experience with both Camille and Andrew – I’d seen the results of Cat 5 and hoped I would never again). They arrived with one dog, one cat, and what personal treasures they have. Although they lived in second story places in the business district which was holding its own with respect to water until the levees gave, they have accepted as best they can that nothing remains there for them. Even if their places were miraculously saved, the remaining homeless and/or looters would finish the job Katrina started. My third child, Jake, moved back to Birmingham from New Orleans for a job about two months ago and he is ok. That’s the good news. The bad news is that all of his household goods were in storage until he got settled in – stored in…New Orleans. So…all three have pretty much lost everything they owned…no renters’ insurance of course…young people could never see the purpose…until now.

Oh well…just stuff. All replaceable.

Wade and Jill are pretty much in shock. The news and video are truly devastating to us all, but especially to them. Jill cannot watch or hear the news any longer it depresses her so – she loved her city of New Orleans. Wade is just the opposite and cannot turn from it. I took him motorcycle riding yesterday because as stoic as he was trying to be (and he does have a tendency to hold things in) I could see it was having an effect on him. The break did him (and me) good. Both have pretty much declared they will not go back (it will be months before they could). They feel there will be no reason. They are both pretty much unemployed as of now – both looking at the want ads yesterday for interim jobs. Jill speaks of going to San Francisco (she has a cousin there) and Wade talks of going back to Birmingham.

When my kids hurt, I hurt. My distress is there for them. They will ultimately need…stuff. But as unfortunate as it is, it is part of life. They are alive and will recover from this. In the meantime, it is us…the family…that provides a bridge. So…until….???…the four of us will live together in a place planned for two (and an overnight visitor) with two dogs (including one very large and destructive eight month old chocolate lab puppy who has already destroyed every screen in the house and any glass items within his considerable reach – beautiful dog, clumsy and good-natured as he is), two cats, and another hyper sissy dog (my wife’s). And you know what? I thank God for all this.

As a community, we have some challenges as well. We are the closest metropolitan area to the devastated region and we are the state Capital. We become a refugee camp. Our population doubles or triples and our infrastructure is not prepared for that. Our already inadequate road systems are jammed. Our resources are stretched thin in all areas. All rental properties (business and housing) have been taken. Gas (when found) is being hoarded. Food is available, but limited. Bread has recently been a valuable commodity, mostly because power outages accompanied with the population explosion dictates sandwiches as the meals of choice. I know of no home here that is not accommodating refugee friends and families. A Pepperidge Farm truck arrived at an Albertson’s market I was in yesterday, and the crowd that gathered at the truck for its bread resembled the fall of Saigon in my eyes. One lady next to me said she had twenty people staying in her home and she needed to feed them. All restaurants (and hotels) are full…all the time. There will be no jobs to be had until we disperse some of this population.

And…crime will increase…it already has. I look out the window from where I type this and two blocks away is the Civic Center – the one you have seen on national coverage – our refugee center (along with LSU). I see homeless and unsavory characters wandering our downtown streets. The prisons in New Orleans and surrounding storm areas were released we hear. Women have been advised not to travel anywhere alone. I am old enough to have seen devastation – storms, wars, etc. – in my experiences it is in such times that my Americans step up to the plate and we work together to take care of one another. I have seen that more often than I ever cared to. What I see now is much too much…inhumanity. I recognize and have seen desperation and the acts of desperate people. I recognize the penchant for the media to hone in on the negativity. I recognize and know there are thousands of good people doing good things and are exhausted for doing it but will continue – there are heroes out there doing wonderful things. But…there is still too much inhumanity. There is lawlessness and looters (as there always are), but there seems to be more of them. There is greed and self-serving beyond compare. There are opportunists (and I include white collar robber barons here too…that will out). Five minutes ago I came across one of our state maintenance workers transporting a generator. It had been removed from an area of less need. He said they were trying to get it to New Orleans. A truckload of generators that had made it there had been robbed at gunpoint. The truck was robbed right from the site where they were intended to be put in use and where the existing generators from that site had been stolen. That site? A hospital. Charity hospital. These are not my Americans. It is this that shakes my personal core values. It is this most of all for which I weep.

We will pull together…the rest of us…here. Help is on its way and we will do what we need to do to put this all back together somehow. We are the lucky ones. We have lost our gem…our beloved New Orleans…but it will be rebuilt – the souls the city (and the entire Gulf Coast) has and will give up serve as the true benchmark for this tragedy. And I fear in this regard we are seeing the tip of the iceberg. Now comes…pestilence.

Let me express my most sincere gratitude to all of you who have personally offered to help me and my family with whatever you can, but we are fine and have beentruly blessed. As many of you have asked me, I recommend if you are able, and care to, that you donate (as in all such catastrophes): blood (as my family did yesterday), and/or monetary donations to the Red Cross or Salvation Army. The need is great as I am sure you are aware.

Again, thanks to all of you…my OD family.

*****

EDIT: We just got notification from our public address system that we are not to leave the building until further notice and our adjacent high-rise parking garage has been locked. We are in lock down.

So it begins…