Posted Tuesday, October 24, 2006

I've been home for a few days now and I'm starting to remember my routine. I didn't expect the readjustment process to take so long. I miss NOLA and I miss singing and laughing with Neo, Erin, Evan, Fai, Jessica, Rachel, Ryan, Adam, and Anna. We all decided that we would remain friends when we returned to Grinnell- as we engage in half-ass conversations with people who can't even begin to understand what we saw, what we did, and who we met, it's been great to know there are nine others that are feeling just as out of place. Last night we had a Red Beans & Rice dinner with about 20 of the NOLA Alt Breakers. Kathleen thinks I'm obsessed with the stuff. Becca and Maggie's recipe was spicy and delicious and I burned everyone CDs of all the inappropriate songs we sang rolling in our white Chevy Impala. I bought a vanilla air freshener for the car at a gas station mid-week to mask the dead animal smell we tracked in from the refrigerators we pulled from the homes we gutted. When she returned it on Saturday morning, Rachel decided to leave it in to make up for all the water bottles, masks, and contaminated work gloves we left in the back seat. I loved that car. Holla.

We worked on four houses throughout the week, all of which were in different neighborhoods that sustained varying degrees of wind and water damage. Several of the homes we were assigned had already been touched by local volunteers (the homeowners of the homes that we gutted did not have the financial means to hire a professional crew. The cost of gutting is typcially $3,000-$4,000 depending on the size of the home.) The home we worked on on Monday was significantly less taxing than the homes we tackled the remainder of the week.

Tuesday we were assigned a duplex full of contents including a handful of storage containers filled to the brim with "Katrina Gumbo"- a combination of water from the storm, roaches, personal items, and sewage. The homeowners had yet to return to their property so we were especially concerned with preserving the photos and dishware we found buried under piles of crap and structural debris. The difference between the organization we worked under and a professional gutting company is that our primary concern is the homeowner. Professional teams don't get payed to sort through a stranger's belongings. We found two refrigerators in the duplex. Fortunately, they were both upright. I took one out with a hand truck; Ryan took the other. Thirty minutes later, scavengers with a large pick up truck came by and drove away with both of the units. According to our crew leaders, it's not uncommon for people to come by and sort through and repossess the items pulled from the homes of their neighbors. One can bring in $200-$300 worth of scrap metal on a good day of hunting. We returned to this home several times but we were never able to completely finish the process. Unfortunately, half of the duplex was deemed structurally unsound after the ceiling over the master bedroom buckled in a rainstorm.

We were sent to the home of a retired school teacher on Wednesday; her property is yards away from the "Mr. Go Levee" in the Lower Ninth Ward. When the water finally settled in September, 2005, it did so at just over eight feet. At this home, the fridge was not upright; the smell of an overturned fridge is was like nothing I've ever smelled before. Adam threw up in his mask last summer when the volunteer crew he worked with mistakedly opened the fridge door. 13 month old milk, cheese, meat, and eggs oozes out in green liquid form. When we entered, the ceilings were on the floor. Under the ceilings was a solid two feet of debris and contents mixed with cracked sheet rock and plaster. The work was hard and we were only permitted to stay until noon because our crew chief didn't trust the roof. Anna, who worked for two months last summer with the organization, said this home had some of the worst structural damage she had ever seen.

The remainder of our week was spent at Ms. Holmes house in the Lakewood neighborhood. Since April, she has lived in a FEMA trailer next to her home and for the last six months, she has been sifting through the debris in her house without a mask in search of salvageable items. In a day and a half, we were able to finish her home and during lunch on Friday, she told us her evacuation story over a roast beef Po Boy. Our garbage pile after just two days was 15 feet across, four feet high, and almost thirty feet long. Ms. Holmes plans to rebuild. We found termite damage and black mold in almost every room (plus an ungodly number of red cockroaches) but still, the neighborhood is all she has known of the city. We watched as Adam walked her through her home at the end of our final workday; she cried throughout the entire walk through. Ms. Holmes will begin another phase of reconstruction when she has the money to hire a contractor. She's been stuck in the same rut for over a year and we helped to pull her out.

The city looks like a war zone. There's not much more I can say about its physical state. It will take five to 10 years for the city to truly function again. Fifty percent of its residents have yet to return.

New Orleans is an incredible place, though. We visited the French Quarter several times- Cafe Du Monde/beignets twice- and listened to a mediocre talk about Displaced Populations at Tulane University. On Thursday night, we attended a community meal the Episcopal church prepares for its gutting volunteers. They bring in a jazz band every week to entertain patrons- this week's was pulled straight from Frenchman Street (we visited a few jazz clubs on Frenchman our first night in town.) After the dinner, we stopped in front of the Real World New Olrean's Mansion on St. Charles. Robbs hooked us up with the address. Ryan and I were beside ourselves. He basically wept as I took his picture in front of the Belfort. Bourbon Street was insane- so many middle aged white women and men doing incredibly embarrassing things. I saw one pair of breasts and two penises. One of the greatest parts of the trip for me was just driving around the city. Adam and Anna made sure we saw it all; the areas hit hardest and the ones barely touched physically by TFW (Initially, search teams were instructed to spray the acronym, which stands for Toxic Flood Water, on the sides of homes flooded with the most hazardous waste.)

I'm looking forward to returning next year, probably next summer. I would like to get a group of friends from home to come down with me. I can think of a handful that would be into it and then there's Kari who would be an excellent waterbottle filler.

On a lighter note: Spanish kicked my ass and Professor Purcell can't seem to get past my "grandiose prose." I still maintain that my diction and sentence structure make for a more interesting read. I have a five pager due tomorrow and a few papers due next week. I would also like a new winter vest. I think I'm going to order my Land's End winter gear this afternoon. It's only getting colder here. I bowled a 569 series last night. Two games I scored above 200. Lynn still calls me Margo because he says it saves him time. The pre-shot cheer is already included in the name- Mar(gie)-Go. He's belligerent.

Carroll's Pumpkin farm this week. WHAT AM I GOING TO BE FOR HALLOWEEEEEEEN?!