Thank you for taking the time to visit with us yesterday. The fact that you did goes a long way with me and I am honored that you keep in touch with us here as I know this was not your first diary.
I was very busy yesterday and, frankly, hadn't really thought about writing except that two things happened. First there was a fantastic diary! Please check out thereisnospoon's profound diary.
The second event, which seems small perhaps, but huge to me was a video of Laura Bush that I ran across that was linked on a New Orleans blog.
Senator Edwards, please to read on.
I proudly live in New Orleans, on what has become known as "the slivah by the rivah". I, too, fled Katrina. My husband and I were fortunate enough to be able to return to the city with our house, somewhat intact, and our jobs, somewhat secure. Yesterday, in another diary, someone mentioned that many middle and upper class people had also felt the impact of Katrina. I suppose you'd put me and my husband into that group as we are both professionals with decent incomes. I had to rebuild my job from the ground up as I am self-employed, but I'm doing just fine now. When you read what I do, you'll understand why.
When we returned, because there was no oversite on the rebuilding, my husband and I were bilked out of almost $100,000 in savings by a dishonest contractor. Most of this money was from the death of my father-in-law in April 2005. (Yes we had a signed contract. Yes we checked references. Yes, we should have invested in something that would have paid for the repairs without having to dig into our savings). But when something you love dies, you aren't always in your right mind. We have a criminal case pending. Our house is still not completely repaired but we are living in it none-the-less. We had to move back into it in August (you know about August down south) while it was still missing an outside wall in one room.
Laws are one thing, but Katrina's psychological impact was not well thought out - just like what our government did when they decided to invade Iraq. I don't know why this was because I am a psychotherapist as are many of my friends and we all realized what would be happening to people, including ourselves. We New Orleanians are still grieving; not a good time to have to make important financial decisions. What happened to us has happened to almost every person in New Orleans who is rebuilding their home. Because we were anxious to move home; because our house was damaged to the extent that further wear and tear without repair would damage it much further; because living in rented housing and paying a mortgage put an unGodly financial strain on most of us; because we had a tree in the back of our house; because it was still raining in 9 out of our 11 rooms, we couldn't wait the 1 to 2 years we were told it would take before local contractors could get to our house. We did what many others have done, we hired an out of town contractor who wanted 2/3s down at the beginning of the job. Due to the incredible demand for contractors, this was not an unusual request. The only contractors not asking for these outrageous terms were local and they were the first to be hired and hard to get.
Our attorney did the same thing but, as he said, he was just lucky his contractor was honest. He also admits that he's been a little bit crazy, too. As Chris Rose has said, (paraphrased)"It's not unusual to see a grown man break down in tears in public. We just shrug and think, oh yeah, that." The Asst. D.A. said that we did what just about what everybody did. We stopped beating ourselves up for being so stupid.
We went through 11 contractors before we hired these guys. They came through an excellent, local referral and their references checked out.
Words cannot express the sorrow we are living with daily. Not only is our city gone, our culture dispersed, our friends relocated, our economy in a shambles, our levees unsafe, and a city in mourning, but we have yet to see, a clear plan for our safety and our wetlands. If we are to feel safe and as the two are completely dependent upon one another, we have to know that this will be taken care or. Our city cannot rebuild successfully without a plan for the levees and the wetlands in place and immplemented.
I mentioned the sorrow. Most of us, including my husband and myself, have moved on. The sorrow is there but the stronger feeling is determination and committment. There is also alot of hostility toward our elected officials - local and federal. We have gone ahead and gotten the bank loans necessary to finish our house, putting us deeply in debt. But this is our committment to the city we love and are willing to do it. Perhaps, if we were 10 years older, we would have to do what many others have already done; packed up our belongings and started over in a new place.
In my family and in most others, when a loved one dies, our friends and family gather 'round us. They cook for us. They straighten up for us. They hold us. They listen to us. They run errands for us and they understand when our tears begin to fall and they do not shame us for this. They do this to help us heal and because they believe we will. They believe in us.
But we have been told, time and time again, that we are underserving. Our leaders have been attacked for not knowing how to handle a completely overwhelming natural disaster. Yes, we knew it might happen. No, no one could have been prepared for this having never experienced this before. You have no idea the number of people who try to reach us in strange ways to tell us how screwed up we are. The rage over the misperceptions from others is sometimes overwhelming.
A little over a month ago, I went into therapy. I was the last of my colleagues to do so. It was time as I noticed depressive thoughts seeping through the sadness. I have counseled many New Orleanians since the storm. I have helped people stay. I have helped people go. I have helped people keep their marriages together. I have helped people let go. I have helped parents to understand why their children's personalities have changed and why their grades are falling. I went into therapy so that I might continue to be strong for my family and the people from New Orleans that need me. Fortunately I haven't lost any of my patients to suicide but, about a month ago, I heard about 4 of them, people I knew, in one week.
Senator Edwards, John if I might call you that, while I was holed up in Austin, waiting to return to New Orleans, we heard all kinds of maybes. Some of them really got me excited. It was rumored that the city was setting up a central spot in the Convention Center where contractors, plumbers, roofers, electricians, and on and on would be listed for us to hire. We were told that their credentials, licensing, insurance, references would all be checked out and that we would be relatively safe hiring them. We weren't.
In addition, the rents in my neighborhood and any other one for that matter, that didn't flood, skyrocketed. If there ever was a time when the government could have stepped in, that was it. Instead, New Orleans turned into the wild, wild west and we fell pray to every Tom, Dick or Harry with housing, a wrench, or time on their hands.
One of the good things is that crime in my neighborhood is down 47% since Katrina. But Central City is literally a battleground for drug dealers both from New Orleans and those from other cities who seek to take over the drug trade in New Orleans.
Several months ago, a Times-Picayune photographer, drove his car down Magazine Street (a popular shopping district) and purposely crashed into several cars, daring, even begging the police who stopped him to shoot him. Chris Rose, a columnist for the Times-Picayune, who wrote "One Dead in the Attic" and who won a Pulitzer for his columns about Katrina, admitted that he is on anti-depressants after not being able to get out of bed, having suicidal thoughts, and being unable to report to work or make deadlines.
With this said, John, I am asking one, simple question. What are the Democrats going to do for New Orleans? After all, Katrina won you guys Congress.