Hurricane Katrina
from Virginia Beach

As I mentioned earlier in this series, I had planned on going to New Orleans from Virginia Beach at the end of September, 2005. My arrangement for staying in Virginia Beach for the remainder of my time there included helping with a home remodeling project. Actually, I worked alone and it was a series of projects. I was still able to go to the Association for Research and Enlightenment one or two days a week.

I would begin working in the morning. I appreciated the quiet and being able to organize the work on my own. I'd done this kind of thing before. There was no stereo and I did not have an iPod at the time. There were hundreds of CDs laying around in portfolio binders, but nothing to play them on. But there was cable with cable "muzak" that could be played through a television. As the day went on, I turned on this cable music. It was ok, you pick a genre and it played with no commercials. After a while, though, all the songs would sound alike. Change the genre.

When late afternoon came, I would take a break. I would switch the television to cable and watch a few of the DIY home improvement shows, or occasionally, something on the Food Network. This was all new to me, as I hadn't watched TV in a long time. This would be the routine for the time being.

Then, on August 29, all the channels were showing the same thing: the impact of Hurricane Katrina on the Gulf Coast of Mississippi and Louisiana. And the flooding of New Orleans. I had lived there before. I had some good times there. I drove through New Orleans in 2004. I got off the interstate highway, drove through the French Quarter. I did not get out of my vehicle, but I cried a little.

For three days I watched the devastation of the area of New Orleans on television. Something like this was what the librarian at the A.R.E. library must have had in mind when she mentioned the eleven "named" storms she'd heard about in July.

After the three days of Hurricane Katrina television, I went to the internet to find out what was happening. I had not been online all that summer. But I had an old laptop with me and Cat5 cable, and managed to get online. Since I had planned to go to New Orleans, it must be that I was intended to go there to help.