i am wondering how to get where i am going. i would like to think that something leads to something else.
maybe that’s our folly as humans: we can’t allow ourselves to admit that this is all choas decorated to look like order.

i’d like to see myself in this place (violet/new orleans) as a maintainer and as a resource to those who work selflessly in supporting the communities here (i.e. keep-hope.org). i would also like to absorb the spirit and wisdom of this place and learn from my neighbors. it was not entirely a conscious choice to come south, but it is a conscious choice to stay.

i’d like to grow with this soul i’ve come to fall in love with via memories and through letters. in life, i’ve come to worry that desire for a person–desire that takes you over rivers and mountains to see them–only leads to an anxiety over the separation of person/place. what i mean is that i find myself in this not-so-new home of new orleans with a new appreciation of “place”, yet falling for a person in a different location seems to fracture my connection with that home-place. in the instance of new orleans/violet, i have continually been at odds with it’s state of “home,” even though it has rightly become one. now that i have fallen in love with someone in another place and begin daydreaming of moving to that place (even a place i thought i would never live), i suddenly start reinforcing my beliefs of why new orleans/violet shouldn’t be my home. what i’ve failed to admit is that it already is.

really, i think it is important for me to wholly admit this is home, and then to visit with this love and ponder together the prospect of making a new home. all the little details i worry so much about–material possesions: tools, vehicles, stuff…ownership, responsibility, accountability–these things will work themselves out once a reason for home is established, where ever that may be. here. or there.

It seemed so fast to think of it now breaks my heart. But in the long days of home the world went on forever. Every day was a thousand years. Electric lines hummed over quiet roads; trees whispered secrets and spoke of signs and wonders. The light of afternoon filtered through my fingers laced before my eyes to reveal the sweetness of the world below and of the world above my head. My hidden heart made words and symbols and created a sense of place that made the days stretch into a memory that long may as well be a lifetime. And the silence of the day would bear down and then the sun would sink low and my heart would be cast up into the language of evening; into the mystery of home.

out of all things, all places, i wonder where am i?
i made a mistake: i told my friends i’m leaving. i was excited, not thinking like my usual self. really, i needed to keep my thoughts to myself, take a trip, soak up my secret desire to go someplace far away between mountains and sea. i am alone, dreaming of this face. i am wondering where am i? where am i? i am here, with you.

i day dream often. i don’t take enough time to look into the river. i sleep in. i work on too many projects at once. i live carefully yet recklessly. i wander. i have trouble relating to most people. i am scared of being alone. i can’t find enough time to be alone, sometimes.
i miss home. it is right here. right there.

(first paragraph from jaci)

Friday, April 11 @ 8 pm
New Orleans, LA
Co-presented with WWOZ

Tapping into the city’s vibrant radio scene and joining forces with New Orleans’ Jazz and Heritage Station, WWOZ, the Third Coast Festival presents an evening of lively, sound-rich and NOLA-relevant radio stories—you’ll hear about jazz (duh), ghosts, mousetrap sadists…

After a couple hours of hot radio, Delfeayo Marsalis’ New Orleans Jazz Show will continue the evening’s sonic celebration, taking the stage at 10 pm.

Where: Donna’s Bar and Grill - 800 N. Rampart St, French Quarter

Tickets: Admission is free all night!

[ PDF flyer! ]

VIOLET, LA. 05 may 2006 - i wrote this on a scrap piece of paper in march in the back of a car heading south to the beach on the gulf coast. i found it again folded up in my wallet, and i’ll copy it down here as a record of my emotions, another piece of the timeline doing relief work here in louisiana.

when i arrived in new orleans, the sinking, horrible feeling came conciously and on the surface. now that feeling is rooting itself deeper in my subconscious. i don’t think much about the devastation now, but i am much more sad. it’s a drowning feeling coming sporadically and often causing near immobilization. i can’t feel much of anything but emptiness and despair, almost as if i’m coming to empathize with the people who survived the storm and today tell their story to those who listen…

she stepped out of her house onto the front step. the hurricane winds had calmed and she thought to herself how mild a storm that was. a few trees down, some telephone poles knocked over. something they could handle. looking out from her front step, she felt rain fall on her forehead and watched the dark sky above. she looked to her left. off in the distance, a wall of water came surging down the street, and unstoppable force of nature coming to tear down houses and drown anything in it’s path. i can’t fathom the feeling of impending death, the fear. but i’ve heard a dozen stories yet of those who felt the fear and immediatly fought back, holding onto the possibility of life, however small that chance may have been. climbing furniture as the water rose within minutes. punching through ceilings to climb onto roof tops. sitting on chimneys waiting for help and maybe rescue. swimming on driftwood to hold themselves up. having guns pointed to their faces by cops and property owners hunting for “looters.”

in february, i heard these stories with a strong interest and felt sympathetic. i could almost say i had a hunger for the oral history being told by so many survivors and those who came to help. but now, at the end of march, i’m sick to my stomach and depressed. i hear these stories and have to put my head down or look away, off into another world where i try to imagine the fear of facing either death or devastation. death means letting go; surviving means dealing with the aftermath and attempting to cope. my spirits are lifted by the survivers, those coming home, the relief volunteers, all the people working in solidarity together. but right now i’m tired and lonely, working hard amongst destructive, corrupt, oppressive systems, trying to figure out a better way.

i am home on a friday night. it’s cold outside, 39 degrees. the temperature might hit freezing tonight. niobo went home to violet to put the seedlings inside the house to save them from the cold.

if this part of the south were ever “home,” it is now. if you know me you know i have little roots and identifying the place where i am from is a long answer. thinking about new orleans as home will stress me out. wondering where i belong can cause me anxiety. but i am learning patience and how to be in the present, to be here now. and not question tomorrow.

just a little over a year ago i left this place. i didn’t decide to leave, i seemed to follow the decision made by others. we were volunteers. and outsiders. and we were supposedly burnt out. or at least ready to complete this voyage in our unchartered adventure. none of us had planned this: one week into one year; one month into a new love. still, i believe that in the depths of my gut back in february of last year i wanted to stay. but memories are always foggy and there are so many details i am forgetting to mention…. all in all, my time ended in violet for good, and chicago–for lack of any other home–was where i could find myself again. or this is what i presumed.

but i’m getting off topic. no, wait, i don’t really have a topic here. new orleans? chicago? home? hope?

if you read this journal back a few months, you know i have family here now. and if you check hope you know it’s still around, tribal as ever (don’t let the professional look fool you). and this life is about joy and tolerance and believing in each other so we can be strong for those who lose strength sometimes. or all the time.

a single new orleans day is an entire lifetime. we don’t let it slip away, no matter who, no matter how. live…

i wake.
standing in the kitchen, steam rising from a mason jar half full of tea, i think. the house is empty. it is christmas day. 54 degrees. this weather would be warm for chicago, but it is really cold for new orleans.

the saints lost their game two days ago and every new orleanian i know was in a somber mood, but today offers cheer. hope, maybe. it is yet another reason to gather and cram large families into small houses, tall pots steaming of greens and jambalaya. boxes and boxes of wrapped gifts piled high in the corner.

when i speak of new orleans right now, i speak of violet, too. the difference can be a sensitive subject depending on the topic. the weather: well it’s all the same in the gulf, from houston to florida. wet. wet-cold, wet-hot. i think most folks ten miles down river in violet would consider themselves “new orleans” in most situations. but then it’s true that many people have moved away or stayed away from the streets of new orleans because of just that: the streets. before the storm, violet could be rough, but new orleans was always rougher. violet is country, really. quiet. that’s what people like about it. but then the storm winds blew in. and the water rose up and up and up. people in violet tell of a “wall of water” that came through the marshland to the north-east, over the dirt levees, and on top of the houses. 25,000 homes: destroyed.

when the lights camera action lit up the crecent city, only half devastated, violet was lost in the shadows. a whole parish wiped out and the only attention violet got a woman serving rice and beans and hot dogs in a red cross truck. then the difference between “new orleans” and violet meant much more because what the city got, violet didn’t.

in february 2006, i drove down the road. i needed a place to sleep and common ground was all filled up. someone named isabelle and suncere had set up cots in a empty church they cleaned out. the steeple lay in the dirt next to the building. piles of wood were organized in the parking lot. a white tent was set up housing canned food and clothing. i turned off the ignition to my truck and the door opened up. “hey, we security. you guys volunteer?” he was already taking our bags out of the truck. he spoke with a thick vietnemese accent a carried a huge mag light, the kind with like fifteen D batteries. in the dark, he sounded really tough, but as he walked away his silouette from a outdoor light revealed a scrawny little body in boxer shorts and a winter coat. phong was his name, i learned.

this was HOPE, the first relief operation this far down the road that i know of. a little crew came down with a pickup truck one day and found a few residents living in tents behind their houses, gutting their own muddy, moldy houses day by day. by the time i arrived a month later, HOPE had wheelbarrows, shovels, boots, gloves, tyvek suits, respirators, and duct tape. volunteers were going out daily to clean out houses and residents were showing up equally as fast to sign up and take food and supplies. families lived in tents, vehicles, trailers. coordination couldn’t happen fast enough. there was so much to do.

(to be continued…)

this is the first street elise and i drove down when we arrived in new orleans on february 2006. this photo doesn’t speak much to most people, but it’s reminds me of the place i arrived to then, and how far we’ve all come since.

i live in new orleans now, in the upper ninth ward. i drive to st. bernard parish every day to work, fixing plumbing on houses being rebuilt by a new non-profit giving grants to homeowners to rebuild. i enjoy my work and am fulfilled by the purpose. i can’t really imagine doing anything else right now.

i have a family, we eat together every night and watch out for each other’s needs. it works. there’s a little baby, almost four weeks old now, birthed in our bathroom. there is love that ties us together. something about family…

Pledge of Resistance in Defense of the Right to Housing in New Orleans and the Gulf Coast
Tuesday, November 6, 2007
www.peopleshurricane.org

A major human rights crisis exists in New Orleans and the Gulf Coast. It is a crisis that denies the basic rights to life, equality under the law, and social equity to Black, Indigenous, migrant, and working class communities in the region. While this crisis was in existence long before Hurricane Katrina, the policies and actions of the US government and finance capital (i.e. banking, credit, insurance, and development industries) following the Hurricane have seriously exacerbated the crisis.  

One of the clearest examples of this crisis is the denial of the right to housing in New Orleans, particularly in the public housing sector. Since the Hurricane, the US government through the Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD) has denied the vast majority of the residents of public housing the right to return to their homes. Unlike the vast majority of the housing stock in New Orleans, the majority of the public housing units received little to no flood or wind damage from the Hurricane. Yet, as of October 2007 only one-fourth of the public housing units have been reopened and reoccupied. The Bush government refuses to reopen the public housing units in New Orleans because it appears intent on destroying the public housing system, demolishing the existing structures, and turning over the properties to private real-estate developers to make profits.  

Based on the discriminatory Federal Court ruling issued on Monday, September 10th, all of the major public housing units in New Orleans are now subject to immediate demolition (the latest report from Monday, November 5th is that HUD will attempt to start the demolition on Monday, November 19th. However, this is being challenged by various legal advocates and will be delayed until at least Wednesday, November 28th pending a Federal court hearing). The first site on the schedule for demolition is the Lafitte housing project. Lafitte therefore, is the line in the sand that must be drawn by all peoples in support of the human right to housing.  

Pledge:

• I believe in the fundamental human right to housing.

• I will not be a witness to the denial of this right to the peoples of New Orleans and the Gulf Coast.

• I therefore pledge myself to resist the denial of this right by all civil and humanitarian means available, including civil disobedience.

• I pledge to stand ready to take action against this imminent threat and to put myself on the line, either directly in New Orleans or in strategic locales throughout the US, in support of the demands and leadership of the peoples of New Orleans and their organizations in the struggle for housing and human rights.  

Have you ever received training in civil disobedience? 

We ask that all those interested in coming to New Orleans to contact us before making the journey. We need to ensure that everyone coming is registered, properly orientated and trained in order to partake in this act of resistance in the manner determined by the local leaders and residents.
Please contact us via email at action@peopleshurricane.org 

it’s storming today and i’m going to try to take photographs. the water is choppy and rough. the water is choppy. it has the texture of crumpled paper.

i imagined i saw rachel’s brother on the train. i got up from my seat and sat across from him; he was sitting in one of the seats next to the doors. i said, “you know the sears tower is the tallest building in the world?”
    he said, “really?” kind of sarcastically.
    i looked out the window behind him and continued, “on a really clear day, you can see it from miles and miles away.” i kept staring out the window. “sometimes i wish i was traveling and doing nothing but seeing. but i know that once i’m out there i’ll wish i was in the city riding the train and looking out the window.”
    he didn’t say anything. he hadn’t said a thing the whole time. i finally looked at him. and he just stared back, emotionless. it’s hard to believe that people who display no emotion are feeling nothing inside at that same moment.
    we sat there for a moment, i don’t know how long. i got up and walked away.

there are times on the train when you look up and notice you are at your stop and it only felt like minutes. forty-five minutes is a long time to travel, to ride home. but recently i haven’t noticed. i don’t even recognize half of the stops to rachel’s house. i never took notice.