I spent my undergrad years at Tulane in New Orleans, and I am currently deciding whether to attend Loyola (NO) for law school. After reading Georgia 10's profile in the Chicago Reader today, I emailed her. Depaul is the other choice on my law school list, and I was pleasantly surprised to see that she is currently enrolled there.
For the past two years, my mantra has been "Get Back to New Orleans." Post-Katrina, that drumbeat has changed, and I've had a hard time figuring out why. After all, if there was ever anything that deserved my support, love, and dedication, it is New Orleans. It is home.
After reading Georgia10's post, though, I think I understand my reticence to commit to three (and probably many more) years of New Orleans. As a former (and possibly future) NOLA resident, I say with absolute confidence that if another hurricane hits indirectly (inevitable) within the next five years, that we will be abandoned, lost, and dead.
If I go back, it will be because the city is so beautiful, so unique, and so imperfect in every way. If I go back, it will be knowing full well that inevitability, politics, and nature are going to destroy that which I know and love.
If I go back, I will go knowing that this will happen in front of my very eyes. I'm not sure that I have any more tears to give, but I know I will try ... if I can. I know this: we will drink hurricanes as the impending storms swirl, listen to the brassy instruments of local jazz as the winds build, and gather with friends to eat crawfish before NOLA becomes THEIR new home. We will celebrate in the face of disaster, and then we will cry for decades, stunned by the apathy and neglect of our public officials and American society as a whole.
This is truly the tragedy of our times.