Posted by Viewfinder (Bradenton, United States) on 24 October 2007 in Architecture and Portfolio.
So it's been two years, plus some six or seven weeks, since Hurricane Katrina destroyed a way of life for tens of thousands of people in metro New Orleans and the Mississippi Gulf Coast. That way of life has not returned to "normal" and probably never will, by the standards used to measure "normal" in those places of my heart.
Here is a haunting look back at part of one Katrina-damaged home. This is what the inside of my mother in law's formerly neat and tidy little suburban house looked like, after the 12 foot flood waters subsided, after her floating furniture settled to new and weird positions around the rooms, after the ceilings collapsed and toxic spots of black mold grew up the damp and mushy walls.
Scary, yes? What I can offer is an image of the look; what the image cannot contain is the horrible stench of decay and rot, and the feelings of hopelessness which Katrina left behind. Trick or treat...
Please pray for Bella.
Bella Update: 07/26/08. Saturday. Bella's good this morning; walk was fun/no squirrels, but we did a different block than usual. She likes variety. Breakfast -- meds soon, the post-walk routine. She slept better last night than the one before. Panting still, but it's hot. So, thank you God for another morning blessing today.
Bella and I are grateful for each of you, for caring and singing (love is all around...), and especially for praying. Please understand this miracle being prayed for, because although it is day by day, it also may take a bit of time for completion: Bella's battle for life, wellness, and a healed heart isn't a sprint but a long-distance run.
What we have right now are day by day blessings: I am prayerfully thankful that her good days may be God's bit by bit miracle, slowly unfolding.
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How sad it must be to walk into places like this, that were once homes. It gives me the chills. Thank You for sharing this LV.
24 Oct 2007 12:42am
@Organik: To say the least, it was daunting to enter this once-familiar and loving home and find it looking like this.
Wow. I really hope she was able to bounce back from that. I did a stint of community service in New Orleans after that, and I agree. Words cannot describe the destruction. Pictures come close though. Great shot.
24 Oct 2007 12:52am
@e.: My mother in law no longer lives in metropolitan New Orleans. In fact, few of our immediate family members live there anymore; this is a personal and family tragedy as both my family and my wife's family roots in New Orleans go more than five generations deep. And our family's story is not unique. To be forced out this way is akin to exile from a way of life that was so familiar and beloved, and can hardly be duplicated in any other American city or town.
dear VF,i only hear abt Katrina from news and nothing hits home as hard as one image like this,which brings more pain,sorrow to my heart. How will anyone ever come to terms with lost homes,jobs,even loved ones? How sad it must be for you to walk into a house like that too.
24 Oct 2007 12:53am
@tyan: Here's the rest of the story, tyan. Although at 78 years old, she can no longer live here or really expect to recoup her losses (insurance paid virtually nothing), my mother in law is a gracious, faithful person who is thankful that no one in her family was lost in the storm. She says these material losses are just "things" that don't matter. She's a pretty awesome lady, IMO. But now she has gone from being a home-owner to living in a tiny church-subsidized independent living apartment for senior adults in a little bitty town in So. Louisiana. I think this bothers us more than it does her. That too is amazing.
Thanks for giving us an insider's perspective of Katrina VF. We saw it all over the news, but as you say the images don't give full justice to the total horror that unfolded in New Orleans that day....the total destruction and devastation she inflicted on the people of New Orleans.Thanks for sharing this image and giving us an idea of just how much damage was done. Hopefully people have started to get their lives back together and have started to move forward from the tragedy that forever changed so many of their lives. Great Shot VF. Blessings to you!
24 Oct 2007 1:33am
@Mandy: Actually the flooding was more the after-shock of Katrina than the direct hit. Rain and storm-surge waters (including a 30 foot tidal surge that came across the wetlands from the Gulf) overwhelmed the levees and lingered and sat in lower lying parts of the metro area for weeks. My mother in law's home was under 10-12 feet of water in her (formerly) neat suburban neighborhood for at least 3 weeks.
Wow amazing... and we all hope that everybody eventually will get over that disaster..... great shot !
24 Oct 2007 2:03am
@ColNed Pictures: Life will go on, and touristy parts of metropolitian New Orleans are either ok or coming back; but it is the middle class neighborhoods and the poorer parts of town that have been hit hardest and helped least. Our home city may likely become either a developer/profiteer's vision (parody of itself), or else public attention will wane, and thus forgotten, it will gradually become whatever it becomes.
OMG! thanks for the insight! This is scary.....!
24 Oct 2007 4:09am
@Sriram: Yes, scary and heart-breaking.
A worthwhile reminder that there is still so much to do, and questionning why more hasn't been done yet....
24 Oct 2007 4:58am
@Wolfgang Prigge: I don't want to sound as if not much has been done, but the scale of the destruction and devastation is beyond anyone's modern experience. And there are those resident levels of governmental corruption and incompetence that must be dealt with -- starting with the local level, then to the state, and finally to the federal level. This, mixed with New Orleans' characteristic passionate yet ambivalent self, and a good dose of media hype makes for a knot of titanic proportions.
The best help (IMO) has come from the private sector, and faith-based communities. People, organizations, and church groups unselfishly volunteering their time and energy, and resources to help metro New Orleans recover have been a consistent bright spot in this whole thing. But it's so huge a task!
HOLY COW !!
24 Oct 2007 8:06am
@Me , Myself & Eye: Multiply your reaction by tens of thousands of homes and spread it over much of a metro area.
While close to a trillion dollars has been spent on war machine, there are millions, literally millions of people still stranded across this nation with out any sufficient help from those who call themselves elected representatives. Katrina was one manifestation of this ill treatment of the masses in the world's richest nation. While a trillion dollars could fix all of this an more, fix broken education system, feed the hungry, insure the uninsured, finance research to find cures and much more.
The democracy and representation is long dead my friend. People of power could care less about your mother-in-law, and the smell of her house in New Orleans; they are comfortably sitting in their luxury living rooms planing how to advance their interests and get themselves elected over and over and over again.
24 Oct 2007 8:51am
@Amir: Well that is your opinion. Now this is mine. America is far more than just the government. When the American people themselves grow as bloated and disinterested in the needs of others as you describe our government as being, then I'll concede the point. Until then, I do believe there is hope. But I also think you are partly right -- our system as it is -- democrat and republican alike, needs to be shaken up, and the American people, not foreign interests or powers, are the ones to do that shaking. This is our responsibility, and we need to see it as such and start voting and learning issues, and quit being swayed by mega-million dollar campaigns that are geared toward electing or re-electing the powerful. So that we can remember our system of government for what it is at its best, and begin behaving again like the responsible, informed, unselfish electorate that we once seemed we were.
Thank you though, for your opinion. I recognize America and Americans are not universally popular in this current world. But then, we never were, except in times of world crisis when our resources could be called upon to save or bolster nations and regimes in peril.
Heartbreaking. I do not know how one comes to terms with this, or will you ever. Nature's wrath.. so hard.
@rainsocks: It's a tough adjustment for the people who have been forced to leave their city and homes.
Absolutely heartbreaking - its always the personal stories like yours which break through the emotional overload we get from watching events like this on the TV news.
24 Oct 2007 9:45am
@Ian Bramham: Yes, beneath the numbing statistics and information overload, there are individual people like my mother in law; and their stories are quite often truly inspiring and deeply heart-rending.
It is a hearbreaker Vf...there are so many things wrong in our world, so many things to fix, and so many hearts to heal. I hope your mom-in-law's grace continues to carry her through.
24 Oct 2007 11:05am
@Lorraine: "T'was grace that brought me safe thus far, and grace will lead me home..."
Wow! I even can't imagine how was this room before. It's so sad and heartbreaking, not only this but every where that human beings are suffereing from natural disasters, war and poverty. Thanks alot for sharing VF.
24 Oct 2007 11:14am
@Reza: Stuff like this can put a lot into perspective. I hope that from this I am learning to become more compassionate for the plight of others.
Graphically captures the enormous impact of one heartbreak in a situation where many thousands of lives were dislocated.
24 Oct 2007 12:12pm
@Brian: Yes, the power of even one image can do this.
Thank a lot my dear Viewfinder for sharing your point of view. I am sorry if is any way, my comment offended you. I certainly respect other point of views. Thanks for sharing the shot and I will try to stay out of dirty politics.
Looking forward to see your future images.
24 Oct 2007 1:43pm
@Amir: Amir, you are very gracious and I certainly welcome you to my site at all times.
What I have appreciated about Am3 is the good relations we've all managed across national boundaries and differing national interests. I believe it is these kinds of friendships that will ultimately make for world peace and understanding, perhaps far ahead of any official acts of "diplomacy" if our people and your people and other people simply refuse to hate or embrace unacceptable levels of international political hostility. Maybe this is idealistic, maybe this is unlikely. But who would have thought an Iranian and an American could meet in the middle over something as simple as photography? Blessings to you, my friend.
Very sad.
24 Oct 2007 1:53pm
@Laurie: It is. But New Orleans has a resident joy within its collective soul, that may yet overcome even the worst adversity, in time.
Wow VF, this really touches me. Your loved ones are the fine example of the ability of human's to persevere and adapt in times of adversity. Such stong wills to survive and overcome. I truly admire your family!
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My 14 year old was so moved by Katrina that she started a fundraiser at her school here to help those affected by this. She raised money and had people donate supplies. To my surprise one morning the local radio station called me and I was interviewed by the local DJ's. then news at 5pm showed up at her school to interview her. She thought is was no big deal because everyone needed to remember that while we had homes to live in there were those that didn't. " So instead of itnerviewing me would you like to help these people?"
24 Oct 2007 2:02pm
@Lost Valley View: Thank you LVV, and your daughter is wonderful to take the lead in such a way. Please thank her for me and thousands of New Orleanians who have been crushed by this storm. Each and every expression of caring like hers and yours comes as a great blessing and comfort.
Oh, dear VF, I am speechless looking at this. It is heartbreaking indeed, and Ian has observed very rightly that it’s such personal stories that really bring home to us the scale and enormity of such catastrophe in the lives of human beings just like us, beyond all the media overload that can sometimes really numb our senses. I remember such a different New Orleans from our visit there awhile before Katrina. The sense of life, vibrancy and real character that struck us so much about the people and this place they called home. Your picture reminds me once again of the fragility of the beautiful yet hurting world we live in, how people’s lives can be so quickly torn asunder by sudden overwhelming events. And yet, reading your further sharing of your beloved mother-in-law’s fortitude, in the face of all this, reminds me too that there is an amazing perseverance, character, hope that is forged only in such suffering, and I truly salute with all my heart all those who have been through such fires of suffering and have emerged with such unassailable character through grace. Much much salutations to your dear mom-in-law, VF, and much blessings always to you and yours too.
24 Oct 2007 3:15pm
@Rebecca: Thank you for these caring thoughts Rebecca; and for the compassion that is in your heart for all who have suffered like this in New Orleans and around the world.
Its a terrible thing indeed to lose what your life and work has built, and that in an instance, it all disappears.
I think the sad thing is that we are expecting that there will be more catastrophic weather events in the coming years of this century, and if the predictions by scientists are correct, the damage that will occur will be due to global events started many years before. Today I tried the 'Carbon Footprint' test on the UK WWF website, and was disheartened by my own families wasteful use of resourses (According to the WWF, if we all lived like me, we would need the equivalent of 1.65 planets for us to survive), but the UK average was 3 planets and the average US citizen around 5 planets.
Anyway, my sympathies to your mother in law, I hope she is coping well with the changes to her life
24 Oct 2007 3:29pm
@Richard_Irwin: The amazing thing about my mother in law is that while she has lost most of what she had, she is very much a survivor and is quite happy in her reduced circumstances. I am so reminded by her example of something St. Paul wrote in Philippians 4:11-13 -- "I have learned to be content whatever the circumstances. I know what it is to be in need, and I know what it is to have plenty. I have learned the secret of being content in any and every situation, whether well fed or hungry, whether living in plenty or in want. I can do everything through him who gives me strength."
Yes, it is truly a sad, sad commentary on the lack of caring for the citizens of this country, shown by this administration. So busy, busy with their own agenda, that the people who they're supposed to represent no longer - exist in there eyes, except to get them what they want. Who are they, politicians. Barely any effectively good ones - as choices. This is the scarey truth of our country.... Thank You for the ever reminding, it seems we forget if not reminded.. What I want to know are - where are the revolutionaries?
24 Oct 2007 4:13pm
@FC: Few New Orleanians lay the whole blame at the feet of the federal government. But what hurts is to see the degrees of incompetence and callusness at each level of government, starting with the local and state officials supposedly elected to directly represent your best interests. Federal posturing and indifference only makes it all that much worse.
Oh! this is a heart breaking image VF, your poor mother in law! God Bless her! and the people of New Orleans, who have suffered so much and seem to have received so little help in a great time of need.
24 Oct 2007 4:36pm
@MaryB: Hidden blessings -- New Orleans may not survive as it has been, but in some unexpected ways its diaspora and tragedy may cause "it" (the culture and soul of New Orleans) to spread far more widely than it otherwise would have in its untouched parochial pre-Katrina condition.
What a loss for America indeed. Great capture.
24 Oct 2007 5:02pm
@HorseRotorVator: New Orleans and the LA/MS Gulf Coast is America's opportunity to demonstrate the same unselfish spirit that led to the Marshall Plan post WWII and the amazing rebuilding of Japan. What is lacking now is vision and leadership to help bring that about.
Such a sad reminder.
24 Oct 2007 6:57pm
@Stunner: Yes, sad. But also a great opportunity is before us as a nation.
phew VF !!--one photograph raising so many issues--good on you pal.. As most of us have not been involved in such a tragedy,we don't realise the heart brake and suffering experienced by you and your family,and thousands of others..so we can only sympathise from afar..sadly though,the support is in words only.. Nice to know you sir.. Billy
25 Oct 2007 4:49am
@bronzebilly u.k.: Thank you Billy. Tragedy is something that simply raises its head at different times and in different ways. The tragedy of the Blitz which England endured is something I can only marvel over; how your nation withstood that horror continues to inspire any who understand history's tale. And that is but one example. Katrina is another. As I said at your place on Thurs, I'd like to shake your hand if I could. So consider that done, at least in a cyber sense, mon ami.
OH MY. That's all I can say - how devastating - you've captured it (for better or worse or posterity) OH MY>
25 Oct 2007 11:59am
@Betsy Barron : www.thebetsy.com: Thank you Betsy. Sometimes "OH MY" is the most articulate and intelligent thing a person can say in the face of such an awesome scale of destruction; this photo is not one of exceptional awefulness, it's mostly typical of the aftermath of the storm's flooding, repeated by the thousands of homes across the eastern city and metro area. Yes, it is an "OH MY" event, and remains so for countless people still displaced from their ravaged homes.
Awww - This is an image of heartbreak. i cannot begin to express how i feel when i see this image - i send much strength and love to you and your family. i know this is in the past but i also know the memories last forever.
25 Oct 2007 12:00pm
@Rabbit: Thank you, friend Rabbit. Your gift of much strength and love is most welcome and received. For my wife and I, who were already living away from NOLA before the storm, it's a weird feeling to know our roots are ripped up and our place is so horribly changed. There is almost a sense of guilt that we feel for not being hit by the same material losses as our loved ones back home. Since Katrina, we've been back numerous times, but sadly, while the progress being made in the neighborhoods is progress, it is blessedly slow and tragically piecemeal. I think restoration is a lifetime's work that will not be finished before we go on to glory.
This is the power and beauty of photography...the ability to convey so much information and emotion..to stimulate the heart and mind......condolences for the disruption to your's and your relation's lives. There is an inherent brutality as well as unsurpassed beauty in nature. One must pause and realize that 'fairness' is a manmade construct.Misery and joy are handmaidens to life and courage it takes to weather her storms. Thanks for posting this penetrating and painful photo....eddie/http:thecliffwalk.com
25 Oct 2007 11:28pm
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