LOVER

Evacuation Route

Let me tell you what I'm doing: Packing up my house, which is a slab, and does flood. Everything is going in contractor bags & plastic totes. My roommate, Gregory, is awesome - he's cut the grass, put plywood on the windows, etc. We have 3 cats and my new dog, Rosa, who is big. My car (!) is drivable, still no a/c. He's got a Golf & a girlfriend & a/c. He's taking the cats, I'm taking the dog & my friend Jacob who has no way out. We're caravaning with my bestest Jennifer & her boyfriend Christian up to Mississippi, McComb, to stay in another besty's mom's "cabin". It's a house but in the woods, pine trees. Still dangerous, esp considering the projected path, but at least we won't be here. We're packing to live there for 5 days, there's another storm, Hannah, on Gustav's heels. We're bringing saws, flashlights, shrimp boots, duct tape, ice, transistor radio, batteries, etc, to ride the storm out there. If things get really hairy we'll pack back up & just keep going, somewhere, I don't know where.

I'm so scared for my people, the poor, the pets. I shuttled some elders/infirm to the buses for evacuation for folks w/no cars. There's armies of buses in town now & it's a really ominous sight - folks w/crappy backpacks & plastic bags filled with shaving cream & a bottle of Gatorade. Where are all their pets? Sigh. The thing is is we know our levees are crap. The levees of the entire country are crap. Nothing's been done to fix them. This is what we're afraid of, the levee breaks. Double sigh.

At least tho this time I have a really strong support network as well as a place to stay that's close, so I can get back w/little to no fanfair. I've got a press pass so I can get back into town for clean-up & to take care of our properties/etc. We've got vats of wine and lots of fruit & fish (Greg just got back from Alaska), a propane stove, and all the pet food we need. It's tense.

And the anniversary well, you're talking about some real heavy shit there and my city's feeling it. Just feeling it. We know we choose to be here, to fight, to continue to say that the government needs to pay attention to the environment (the Gulf is 89 degrees, insane, global warming is real) and especially the Gulf South. Gasoline & one of the largest ports in the country. We're worth protecting. And if they don't protect us they won't be protecting anyone.

So there it is. I've gotta get back to work. I'm really aching, very sore & tired. I have to get up at 4 a.m. and get the hell outta dodge. Let's pray the traffic's not too insane and that my car holds up. Let's hope the money holds out & my nerves don't crack. I've been really calm, actually, cuz this isn't a big surprise to us, but yesterday I thought I was gonna punch someone in the face I was so - wound up. So I breathe, like you know, like we know, and keep my eye on the prize.

My Head Hurts

Here it is, 3 years later.  We've changed but the politics have not.  It's amazing how little has been done, really, to prevent the horrible destruction of the levee breaks of 2005 from happening again.  The levees are shit, they're still shit, they're not "fixed", and fixing them is just a "plan".  A plan to fuck us over, that's what.  Our leadership sucks, the country's leadership sucks, on every level, I'm sorry Barack Obama but what are you actually going to do for me?  I wish "affordable health care" were my goal, how simple that would be.  They'll go on & on about Iraq & gas prices & minimum wage but not one peep about us, about this, about the Louisiana coast, the oil rigs, the food, the resources, the life worth saving.  I'll bet you $5 McCain's gonna be damn sure to at least talk about us - it's a political goldmine waiting to be tapped and he & Jindal are gonna exploit the crap outta that.  At least they'll be addressing it.  Why didn't Obama have Ray Nagin speak? Sure, he's bonkers, but he's a crazy passionate speaker and would've given that damn convention a deeper spiritual purpose for sure.  Sigh.  Nope -

It's the same old same old song and dance and I just, well, I don't know how much longer I can afford this.  I've never taken well to authority figures telling me what I can and cannot do and I'm still a sucker for the underdog, and I admit this, and am fully aware it comes at a cost.   Still doesn't mean it's ok for the government to get away with murder, doesn't mean we should stop demanding what we deserve either. 

I can hardly think straight, my head being so clogged up with so much to say, so many feelings, and stress, and worry, grief, fear, anger.  I want to be calm and loving for my friends and animals, proactive, strong.  But no matter how I do I just can't shake this core feeling of helplessness, of vulnerability, that is the truth of life, not just here, everywhere, forever, amen.  My heart is heavy and lonesome.  There's nothing special about this. 

I Feel Absolutely Terrific About Feeling So Terrible

I'm gonna go out on a limb here, and only here, and admit I'm really pissed off.  Army Corps Engineers get to "reclaim" land long owned by individuals (for example, the site of the former amazing Sid-Mar's on the Lakefront) saying it was, "always public land".  The Danziger 7 get off on a vile technicality.  John McCain visits oil platforms in the Gulf and Bobby Jindal endorses him and Bush visits NOLA more than a week before the anniversary and none of them talk about the oil spill just a few weeks back.  None of them do anything real for real people really living in the real here.  Rebecca got stabbed to death in her apartment not 3 blocks from here.  Prospect 1 is coming to NOLA and I have never felt so certain that artists are nothing but narcissitic blow hards who are convinced of their merit when what?  What are they doing, really?  Some things continue to inspire me, like Tyree Guyton who I just got to interview, and random musical discoveries like Crystal Castles or emailing Rye Rye or crazy dub insurgent nights but why would I take on more, in this war torn zone?  People in other places are doing just fine, reading pap self help, doing shots of wheat grass and over-populating the planet.  I keep saying I want to take on more, I keep taking on more, but I don't write letters, I don't go to museums, I don't wander around.  My vet told me when facing putting my dog Annie to sleep, "Think of the 3 things that she always loved to do, that gave her life pleasure.  Can she still do them?"  The implication being if the answer's "no" it's time to put the dog down.  I know full well that this is the truth of a true messy human life in this town: dark hours: and I know full well that I am surrounded by beauty and I know full well that this mood is ok, is natural, it's grief, it wells up, it's the anniversary, it's unresolved anger, it's ungranted forgiveness, it's feeling plum tuckered, it's needing to detox, it's the fricking anniversary.  I know I know and I know the web is for jokes & blokes & superficial B-LOGGING about bullshit like cake or graffitti or slow cooking or robots or strippers or breast-feeding fill in the blank, anything obsessive and cute and amnesiac.  So sue me.  This is just the nature of the beast.