So, we went to a convent to join a very busy group packing boxes of donated items for shipment to the shelters - took awhile to become a part of the machine, but I managed to stop bumbling and start carrying boxes. Later, my wife Jane and I headed to Reliant park. First we went inside the Astrodome. Lots of people, but, contrary to reports, the air was fresh, and most people were in decent moods. The news is saying that there are more than 30k evacuees in the park, and that's not hard to believe.
What still blows my mind, but is now easier to believe, is that New Orleans is basically gone. My conscious memory begins there, exploring as a small child around New Orleans East -- eating the honeysuckle flowers that grew close to the waterways. Later, fishing with my grandfather in the Industrial Canal and Lake Ponchartrain. It's still not completely coming together for me - maybe I'll go back there after some time passes.
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But the Astrodome is not where we needed to be - Jane is a licensed clinical social worker (LCSW) with a lot of counseling experience (especially with children), so we walked over to the makeshift medical facility in the Reliant Arena (not to be confused with the nonsensically huge Reliant Stadium next door, which is currently not housing anyone). We signed up as 'crisis counselors' at the Counseling Services area, and took seats with a bunch of idle counseling professionals. I was soon appointed a runner/messenger, because, despite being a counselor in the legal sense of the word, and a serviceable coder, my skillsets weren't in huge demand at that point. My job was to go around and inform doctors of the deep counseling bench, which I did. The doctors were all in cheery moods, but most looked pretty tired. Jane waited with another LCSW for some time while a doctor talked to a patient who had expressed a need to speak with mental health professionals. When the doctor emerged from the draped examination 'room', the patient had already changed his mind, though. |
Jane and another LCSW friend of ours decided to head for the George R. Brown Convention Center (GRB) to see whether their services would be more in demand there. I helped a patient find the pharmacy, and then headed out, since I was more in the way than anything. Now walking alone, I had some time to look around. This is one of many crowded bulletin boards devoted to reuniting folks. I also saw an impeccably wired bank of Dell computers with nice flat-screen monitors which were all in use by the medical personnel. What struck me on the *long* walk back to the car was the lack of tension, the apparently good moods of most evacuees I saw (shock? you'd sure think so), and the general orderliness of the campus, despite the suddenness of the whole thing. Not a trace of the panic or peril that has crept into the local BBS discussions.
As I approached my car, a small group of volunteers wearing peach colored wristbands (which I didn't have) warned me that the National Guard would eject me if I was caught without a peach wristband. I made it to the car and out of the area without incident, though.
update: Jane just called from the GRB -- very orderly there, but some people are talking to her about what they went through. She's going to be there for a while. She told me a portion of one story that I won't repeat, and I'll probably never forget.
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