09.25.05

Fleeing the Homeland

Posted in The Latest at 9:26 am by Jules

Disaster changes the human topography. Fancy and cosmopolitan as we pretend to be, we’re all still nomads trying to cover the basic needs of food and shelter. The improbable happens all the time. When I watched all the poverty stricken New Orleans people being transported hither and yon I was a bit excited for them. I hope some of them go to places that enable them to truly transform and change, that they break the cycles that are incomprehensible to me. It’s a bit like fleeing the potato blight for a new country- hopefully one filled with opportunity.

I’m somewhat Marie Antoinette in my views of poverty as there’s never been anything that I could not accomplish if I truly put my mind to it. I have a girlfriend in Chicago that’s been a inner city teacher for years. We were talking about her students once and she asked me things that opened my myopic eyes a wee bit. Things like: how can you do your homework when you’re too cold? How can you stay awake in class when you’ve been kept up by gunfire? These scenarios are circles of hell away from anything I’ve ever known or will encounter. I still don’t understand how you can’t just do better. I tell my children that everyone makes at least one bad choice a day and that trouble starts when you keep making that some choice over and over. But, I digress…

My parents are fine, which is a good thing. My dad, step-mom, stepsister and the related octogenarians are still here. My father has been referring to himself and them as Ritagees. My birthplace, Orange, received the worst of Rita. Terse phone calls from police officer friends indicate that all home structures are still standing. My mom’s house has a fallen tree on it AGAIN, but the horses are fine. I keep thinking that there aren’t any more trees capable of falling on my mother’s house.. and viola. In all likelihood a twister went by my mom’s as there are no leaves on any of the rose bushes, 50 ft of the wood fence is gone and the other fallen trees are in clusters. Note to self, don’t live anywhere prone to hurricanes/tornadoes and described as the Big Thicket.

It’s surprising and heart stopping to think of the sheer numbers of aunts, uncles, and cousins that I have in Southeast Texas, but, never once did I stop and wonder if anyone was safe. I knew that the old people would be moved and no one was fool enough to tie themselves to the roof ala Gary Sinise’s character in Forest Gump. I know that some are facing certain financial ruin when they return, but they are physically unharmed. Now, let’s eat some cake.

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