My Katrina story begins similarly to every other New Orleaninan. We were contemplating whether or not to actually evacuate the city because it had the makings of every other big Hurricane that was supposed to hit the city. The mayor and the weather people would come on TV speaking as if the entire world was about to end and ultimately nothing would happen. We would get scared, evacuate, and have to sit in traffic on the way to Baton Rouge for about 4-5 hours. Ultimately, we made the decision to evacuate the city. My brother, my mom, and my mother’s boyfriend all willed ourselves into our Toyota 4 Runner. I packed no more than clothes for 3 days thinking that it would be a short stay. As we began the slow stop and go trip, I couldn’t help being excited at the fact that most likely we weren’t going to have school the next day. The trip to Baton Rouge took 5 hours to complete. We had planned to bring my brother back to Baton Rouge that weekend anyway so I decided to opt to stay there instead of staying on the road and going to Houston, Texas(which ended up taking them 14 Hours). As my mother and her boyfriend pulled away, I waved goodbye to my mother thinking that I would see her in a few days. The sad truth was I wouldn’t hear my mother’s voice again for 2 weeks, I wouldn’t see her for 2 and a half months. I went to sleep knowing that the next day would be an adventure.

The next morning (the day Katrina hit) I woke up to a thunderous explosion. My great aunt’s tree had collapsed onto the nearby road. The stop lights were swinging in the wind, eventually crashing through her neighbor’s window. The electricity for the whole area had been shut down. Still feeling smug, it looked to be no more than the effects of a tropical storm. Since my great aunt , like most all elderly people needed to have her pills and electricity, we went over to my aunt’s house where my father was staying. The house was full of New Orleaninans who had evacuated. The musician Kermit Ruffin( a long time friend of my aunt) was there. As we finally got the TV and the cable working we watched in horror as we saw helicopter over views of the city. My smug demeanor almost instantly disappeared. Confusion in the house quickly became horror and hysteria. Most of the women in the house screamed and I could do little but sit there knowing that my life would never be the same. For the next 10 hours my eyes were glued to the terrible sites on the television. From the situation at the Superdome, to the pictures of Mississippi that looked as if a tornado had touched down, it took all of my power to keep from crying. Rumors began to spread that there were bodies floating in the street, people were being shoot dead for looting. Senior citizens were been euthanized left and right. I began thinking that the only house I had ever lived in had been completely destroyed. It tore me up on the inside. I kept thinking about my friends who said they had stayed in the city. What was going to happen to them? I thought about my mother who was only two years away from retiring in the New Orleans public school system. I had almost no clothes. No bed to sleep in. No real food to eat. The mood in the house ironically had changed at nightfall. Kermit Ruffin started playing his trumpet and there was loud music and it almost sounded like a party. Angry and confused I tried to shut it out of my mind and go to sleep.
My father went back to the city of New Orleans about a week and a half later because he needed to set up the District Attorney’s Office. Many of the prisoners were living in the train station. This left me alone with my brother, and my 83 year old great aunt. My great aunt ,being old fashioned, put me right back in school about 3 weeks after Katrina. I was the first person at Southern University’s Laboratory school from New Orleans. I was truly miserable and went through everyday praying to God that he would reverse what had happened to my city. I spent almost everyday looking out of the window of the living room of my great aunt’s house, longing to be back in New Orleans. I had never missed being home that much. I began to rapidly lose weight. I had no desire of eating much. About a month into school, I finally received some good news. My mother was coming for a short while to take care of me because I was at wits end. I started feeling slightly better about my situation. As everyday passed I began to hate Baton Rouge more and more.
The first time I traveled back to New Orleans was around Thanksgiving of that year. Mostly everything in the city was closed. There were blue roof tops as far as the eye could see. Everything that was previously green was now dead. Once I reached my house, which is located in New Orleans East, I couldn’t hold back my tears. There was mold in the house, glass on the floor, and everything in my room was a darkish brown color. I thought that I may never get to live there ever again. As we went back to Baton Rouge I realized that the saying “You don’t know what you’ve gone till its gone” couldn’t be more true.
However, I had received great news that my high school St. Augustine was coming together with St. Mary’s, Redeemer Seton, and Xavier Prep to form the MAX. When I reached New Orleans in January, I began living with my father on the West bank. I had a new appreciation for life, my things, and my city. If Katrina gave me anything it was a huge serving of Humble Pie. The storm washed away my smug demeanor. I truly believe it made me a better person. Don’t get me wrong I still would have loved to have it reversed. But I thank God that I’m alive and typing this blog right now.

This entry was posted on Friday, August 31st, 2007 at 1:54 pm and is filed under Week 01: Background. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.