"Stop Work" (On The Fifth Anniversary of Katrina)

“Stop Work: Vieux Carre, The Garden, The Bywater, and The Lower Ninth, New Orleans, Louisiana

   

    The beignets this morning were airy and sweet. The ceiling at St. Louis Cathedral placed me in awe. (A little Holy Water on the forehead didn’t hurt either.) An hour ago, a pretty red-headed woman smiled at me as she walked past in the Quarter. (Thank you, honey. I needed that.) A streetcar rattling by on St. Charles made me smile. The off-and-on rain hasn’t dampened my spirits in the least.

    

    The coffee in that Garden district cafe wasn’t as good at the coffee at The Cup in Tucson, but it did its job. A barista there gave me directions to the Lower Ninth Ward. Her co-worker, who poured me my cup, lives in the Baywater district.

    “Best place to live in the city, the Baywater, not like around here in the Garden,” he said, poking her.

    “It always smells there in the Baywater. It stinks,” she said, playfully jabbing him back. They both chuckled. Not a big laugh. Just a chuckle. Gaffaws will most likely come after work.   

    The blues on WWOZ Radio has me tapping my steering wheel with my fingers, as I drive to the Lower Ninth. I drive north on Elysian Fields and then take a right on St. Claude. I cross streets with names like Music, Piety, and Desire. I drive over the old bridge and suddenly I’m in the Lower Ninth. I take some side streets with less poetic names. I see new houses, bright and shiny, and old homes, much worse for wear. And I see a lot of vacant land. But something else is missing. Not just houses. Something else. What is it? Ah. It’s people. There’s not enough people here or through out the entire city for that matter. The hum of humans is much softer than it was two decades ago, when I last visited here.

     (In 2008, the population of New Orleans was lower than in 1910. 2008: 336,644 souls; 1910: 339,075.)

    I see a flood stained house. I think of taking its picture. I look around and see a few people down the street, sitting on their stoops, taking in the morning. I get ready to get out of my car, with the 5D Mark II, but stop. I then place the camera back on the front seat. I don’t even get out of the car.
    It would be pornography to take photographs of this. I don’t want to be like those tourists, back home, who shoot Navajo government housing up on the Rez, because ‘Look, Martha, at how these people live!’ The Lower Ninth is where these folk live. This is their home. Would I want someone to come by my apartment, get out of their car, and take pictures of my prayer flags? ‘Chuck, look at the Liberals and their pretty colors!’ Don’t think so.
    I put the car in gear, turn around and head back toward the center of town. WWOZ plays a soulful blues by someone I don’t know. It begins to rain again.

    I feel like crying but I’m just too sad.

    Was that the radio or me?