1/4/06

A Visit From St. Guilt

Tri-O's oddities, observations, and opinions
by Herb Kandel


As has been a tradition each year we spend Christmas with my wife's mother and sister's family who live near New Orleans. This year was no exception. Except for an acceptance, which was to realize that the city was no longer what it was. With no claim to news reportage the following are just the personal observations of the place called home for over 30 years.
Approaching the city via I-10 the usual evergreens we were used to seeing had given way to the burnt umber look as the browns of the barren and uprooted trees were strewn on either side of the interstate. The usual hectic traffic we so dreaded had now given way to uncluttered lanes. This was to prove a foreboding of what was to come. What appeared to be zigzag lines of toy soldiers “at ease” were full orange mesh trash bags that stretched for miles on the median and road shoulders.
After settling we took “the tour” around the Lakeview neighborhood which had been a middle income area interspersed with an occasional mansion-like home. Last year most of the homes bore decorative lights and trimmings, some gaudy and yet appealingly charming. Now each proclaimed, in bright day-glo spray paint, that it had been explored by FEMA representatives who left their hieroglyphics in each corner of the X mark.
Like rings left in a bathtub each house bore the lines left by the water heights, a few over 15 feet. These markings brought to mind that this was just the opposite of what happened in Exodus and the tenth plague, when the Angel of Death spared homes that were marked; but here the mark was left after the visitation as a “gotcha“ and not as the Old Testament true believer’s haven to be passed over.
There was a kind of surrounding hush all about, you could almost hear the quiet. Streets were bereft of activity. What few people we did see were trying to drag movable debris to the curbside pile, they wore facial masks to filter the dust and slightly acrid odor. My wife’s eyes felt the sting. The tree canopies were gone as were car ports, windows, porches, brick walls and roofs. An occasional car, mud caked and rusting lay beached and rested where the water surge floated it. One hung at a 45 degree angle with rear bumper hooked on the branch of a live oak tree.
From the street one could see to the back of houses and observe the skeleton-like stud frames. The scene was eerily reminiscent of the one in the movie ON THE BEACH when the submarine’s periscope eye pans ever so slowly on a lifeless San Francisco and traffic-less Golden Gate Bridge, all the people having died in a nuclear radiation holocaust. Here we were, midday, in the center of a once vibrant community and there is no one there. The bleakness of the gray day added to the pervasive despair. And from what was seen on TV of the lower Ninth Ward I'm sure it was 10 times worse than in Lakeview where at least the outside structures were still standing.
We drove though the Central Business District and viewed the One Shell Square high rise where my offices once were. A chain link fence circled the building and the commercial lobby area was still skirted with plywood board. The glimmering light that provided a respite from the dimness proved to be the French Quarter and Garden District which looked virtually the same as in memory. However, the contrast between these intact areas and the surrounding devastation seemed only to magnify the disparity. The overwhelming feeling of loss abounded along with a gnawing depression, then the twinge of guilt surfaced in realizing how fortunate our families have been in not having sustained such major losses, the accompanying suffering, and the life changing decisions to be made.
Despite this cloud of despondency and uncertainty there is a strong personal feeling that the city, with the help of wise leaders, foresighted city planners, talented engineering, generous government aid, and a strong will of the returned and displaced New Orleanians, should be able to resurrect and perhaps even surpass it's former self. A place where all it's citizens can afford and live in decent housing, be employed, enjoy the entertainment, and savor food that the city is renowned for; a place where new industry, services, schools, and medical facilities provide more high tech and professional employment at wages competitive with other major cities. Let's hope that the old regimes of politico hacks filling their pockets and having the leftovers trickle to the public are over and an enlightened leadership, not self serving administrators, oversee carefully and are accountable for all the expenditures. One can only hope.
May the shout of “Laissez les bons temps rouler !” resonate loudly again.