Po Boy Views
By
Phil LaMancusa
Katrina
Or
Twenty Years On
“Crying won’t help you, praying won’t do you no good;
when the levee breaks, Mama, you got to move…ooh” Led Zeppelin
It
was a tropical depression on August 25, 2005; located down by the Bahamas.
Tropical storms Arlene and Bret had already happened in June; there were 28
tropical and sub tropical storms and the National Hurricane Center named 27
storms that year; 15 of them reached hurricane status (sustained winds of 74
miles an hour or greater 4 of them reached category five: Emily, Katrina, Rita
and Wilma (Wikipedia). On August 29, 2005 after days of meandering Hurricane
Katrina hit the gulf coast and. F***ked. Us. Up. BTW Category 5 sustained wind
speeds are 157 miles an hour.
That
was a bad year, (I was here) weather-wise and weather has only gotten worse.
This year we suspect 13-18 named storms, 7-10 hurricanes and 3-5 major
hurricanes (CSU). Are we ready this year? Maybe. Maybe not. One thing is
certain; Federal assistances are probably not gonna be available because the
administration has cut funding for and NOAA and The National Weather Service, who
predict when and where the storms come from and where they’re going, and also
cuts were made to FEMA, who helps in catastrophic aftermaths
(site.extention.uga.edu). All in the name of government efficiency.
I’ve
seen on the news (have you watched?) it’s been a very active storm and natural
disaster season in this country so far this year; forest fires, tornadoes,
massive flooding, early summers and late winters affecting millions. As for funding
from FEMA for the gulf coast in general and New Orleans in specifics go, a US
House Committee hearing has floated some ideas last April to “Let the states
carry more of the disaster burden” (The Advocate). If any kind of supercalifragilisticexpialidocious
disaster occurs here and you think that the great state of Louisiana is gonna
carry a more of the response burden, thirty Helens agree, “that is a vain and
illogical assumption”.
With
each passing year, I see less and less ‘Katrina veterans’ as our younger
population gets younger; anyone younger the twenty will have no idea what it
was like to be trapped in this city while the world fell apart; not an inkling
to what it was like to be completely shut off from the world, without water,
without electricity, without supplies of any kind. To depend on the neighbors
that were left here who were also without and how the people that were left
formed a community into and unto itself.
Debbie
and I were here for the impact of the storm. We were here for six days after
that. We took in animals, shared food and clothing, came together with others
to commune and spread any information that was available. We heard gunshots, we
saw explosions, fires; we witnessed and experienced heartbreak and fear. We
drank warm beer. I was terrified most of that time.
By
August 31st, 80% of New Orleans was under water. We were literally
abandoned by our government for much of that time, unable even to flush our
toilets. We escaped just when General Russel Honore came to town and got the
response moving from what he said was “Stuck On Stupid!”
We
got out in a ‘borrowed’ Toyota with three adults and seven animals and headed
to Shreveport to a ‘safe house’ that had been set up for us. Our first stop
outside of the city was at a gas station/convenience store where Debbie spent
the longest time in the rest room washing her hands and flushing the toilet
just to hear running water; Kevin, the other passenger, wanted “anything with
ice, ice, ice, I need ice!”; I sat in the car wanting to drive as far and as
fast as I could away from New Orleans. We, let Kevin off in Dallas and drove
all the way to San Francisco stopping on the road at any motel that had a pool
and had beer and pizza available nearby.
We
had talked about moving to San Francisco a few times, noting how wearing it
could be to live here; we had abandoned everything we owned in New Orleans when
we fled, not knowing if anything would be left if we went back. There had been
talk about flooding the French Quarter (where we were living) and there had
been widespread looting. The governor had ordered looters ‘shot on sight’ and
there were law enforcement snipers on roofs; we were told later that there were
running gun battles in the streets in the aftermath. I could tell you stories.
I was there.
Why’d
we come back? Why would we come back? San Francisco welcomed us with open arms.
I’ll tell you why we returned. As we were driving into the city, road worn and bone
weary, they were doing a musical tribute to New Orleans on the radio. As we
were driving into San Francisco, fatigued and damaged, the radio played a song
for New Orleans. “Do you know what it
means, to miss New Orleans, and miss it each night and day. I know I’m not
wrong, the feelings getting stronger, the longer I stay away.”
We had to pull over because I could not see
through the tears, we both broke down; it was the first time that I allowed
myself to cry since the beginning of the debacle; even now I tear up when I
hear that song. We made a decision. We would not be forced out of our city; if
we left it would be in our own time, when WE decided. We were going to come
back because when your home team is low and defeated, you didn’t change teams.
We came back because we truly knew what it meant to miss New Orleans.
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