Louisiana Floods 20160817

There is a pit in me of what flood waters, storms dislodge in a human journey, the turn in the maze of it all that I still grapple from Katrina.  Seeing Livingston and Tangipahoa Parish amongst the recent deluge bears a gravity of that path, people shaking the soggy mold zombie coat sheetrock and refrigerator stench-clan diner’s club, smear-ink tear photographs.  The humanness is an old known mask that we in a more Southern longitude of Louisiana put on for so many hours.  Many lived for at least a few turns of the Earth round the sun in the I-12 alcoves of what is now the puddled quagmire expiring as refuge.  Many are recycling that trauma.  My heart reverberates a chord of empathetic pang for what it means to try to calm a throttled family, unmoored in physical capacity, praying for normalcy as the row boat tosses in a black tide.

I think of Louisiana how many people in the affected areas probably did not have flood insurance.  I think how different disaster pornography and disaster fatigue has worn down the infrastructure of our country and how we as Americans are able to fund our state after Jindal’s Norquist agenda.  The economic calamity afoot is an undertow in a state that is scrounging to keep basic health, public safety, and educational services in place.  This is bad.  This very bad.  There will be people who suffer across our Louisiana community far outside the waters of the Amite River rippling in our interconnection. 

The bootstrap nature of humans in backyard boats and pickup trucks pulling bodies out of waters launched from the interstate and bringing food and toiletries to afraid families are our better angels.  When we talk of helping people and others in need without judgment first or blame first we shall see the shimmer of our dawn for it will get dark in these discussions to come about we don’t have enough money.  Sure there we will be federal disaster assistance on some levels and there is an argument to be made the money to rebuild New Orleans after Katrina actually helped Louisiana buffer the national economic depression of 2008, but the oil industry is dying in Louisiana and our lack of educational priorities has been glaring.  The reckoning of playing tricks to balance Jindal’s budget came due with his pathetic presidential boyish jaunt into whatever rock he now abides. 

We must come together and be ready to fight for each other in those surfacing moments of blame when the money is not there.  We must pick people.  We must start to pick people first, empathy first.  Louisiana has not done that for many years now.  The mental health needs, the public assistance needs and sacrifices for people who can afford it are going to need to be on the table.  That is what a lot of this comes down to and maybe this un-named storm like Katrina will help open hearts to many issues that empathy in a Southern state in these United States will help us along that path to better.  My heart goes out in love to our Louisiana community.  Peace.