New Orleans: Part 1 (PDQ)

Growing up in New Orleans is one of those things that is hard to explain. It is mostly like living in America, just with more parties. People in New Orleans have a very specific view on life: it is meant to be lived. From all walks of life, citizens of New Orleans conduct daily business and personal interactions with a certain joie de vivre that always seems to say, "Life is not about work -- life is about living."

I was born in Mid City, one of the neighborhoods that received about 8 feet of water during Hurricane Katrina. Mardi Gras parades passed in front of my house. My mother is Cajun, and, like most New Orleanians, we ate red beans and rice every Monday (a tradition which went back to when Monday was wash day).

I heard stories of Hurricane Betsy throughout my formative years. Older neighbors told stories of their roofs being torn off with them inside, flood waters rising to the second story, bringing an axe with them as the crawled into their atics in order to be able to hack their way out in case the water got too high.

In a very "youthful" way, I think we always dismissed these stories as the hyperbole of grandparents. I lived through 7 large storms while in New Orleans, including the downsized version of Hurricane Andrew, and knew of uprooted trees, flooded cars, etc., but the largescale tragedy seemed like an inflation of the past.

So as I spoke to my mother the Tuesday after Katrina, while she and my father were trapped in Memorial Hospital with 2000 other people, it was as if all those stories were coming true. Mom cried a bit on the phone as she told me that the lights were flickering, and that the water had already reached halfway up the first story of the hospital.

To be continued....