Walking in the rain today to go vote (earlier this morning, an Arab-American at a gas station Uptown told me it "always" rains on the Katrina weekend), I passed an open garage door on Euterpe Street and happened to glance inside. Stacked neatly against the wall inside the garage was a large double stack of sandbags.
I'm thinking that there aren't a lot of places where you'd see that -- or where else it might even be conceivable as a good idea.
Saturday, August 28, 2010
Friday, August 27, 2010
Hiatus over (Finally!)
Dear Readers (whoever you are, wherever you are),
I am sorry to have been away for so long. Part of the reason is that Big Man and I were away for 2 long trips this summer (we put over 8,000 miles on our van!), and since this Blog is oriented to tales of life in New Orleans, reporting on our travels didn't seem appropriate. The other part of the reason is that once you get out of the habit of blogging, it's hard to get back into it. (Approach-avoidance, don't you know.) There always seems to be something more pressing to get to first. But with the Katrina Anniversary hard on my heels, I knew I had to get back, and so here I am.
A few observations gleaned from our travels:
Everywhere we went this summer, west and east, during the 100 days of the BP oil spill, as soon as we said we were from New Orleans, people everywhere -- UU and non-UU, service personnel, hotel workers, guests at a B&B near Mount Rushmore, my sister's friends in Minneapolis -- they all acted like somebody had died, and we were the bereaved. "We're so sorry," they would say, sometimes laying a hand sympathetically on our arm or shoulder. Or they would ask us solicitously, "Are you folks OK?" We appreciated their concern, really we did, but it got old. I mean, if you're on vacation, you're trying to get away from everything that's worrying you or making you sad. And what were we supposed to say, "No, we're so NOT OK -- we're bloody sick and tired of being public victims, the nation's designated downtrodden."
And it was especially grating to have folks ask if we could smell the oil, for pete's sake, from our house or from our church or from the French Quarter. No, and we couldn't see it, either. Why do so many people around the country seem to think New Orleans is located right on the Gulf of Mexico? (Although, God forbid, if we keep on losing wetlands, we will eventually be on the damn coast1) I also hated the questions about whether I supported the deep-water drilling moratorium (I don't) and whether I am seeing any effects inside my congregation (I am, believe me, I am), and whether I would feel safe eating Louisiana seafood (geez, like I think either Louisiana or the Feds would allow us to sell our seafood if it wasn't safe -- what good would that do?). Let me just testify -- like almost every other non-allergic, non-vegetarian New Orleanian I know, I am eating Louisiana seafood literally like there was no tomorrow.
Another thing we noticed was how differently people from "away" (those not from New Orleans) think about food. Even relative foodies elsewhere don't think about food the way we do. Few people in other places think it's proper to discuss or reminisce about other meals while you are in the midst of a meal. Folks looked askance at us when we mentioned our ambition to eat as many cheap Maine lobsters as we could on one week's time (gee, not like we were trying to eat 'em all at one sitting!). Being particular about food was seen as strange or quaint, or maybe snobbish. Hot sauce was exotic. That we avoided chain restaurants and fast food while on the road was seen by many people as unnecessarily adding time and miles and expense to our trip (maybe so, but we sure ate better!). Our obsession with good food is one of those thing about New Orleans that I do already know, but these 2 trips really brought it to mind.
Anyway, it was good to get home, heat and humidity notwithstanding.
I am sorry to have been away for so long. Part of the reason is that Big Man and I were away for 2 long trips this summer (we put over 8,000 miles on our van!), and since this Blog is oriented to tales of life in New Orleans, reporting on our travels didn't seem appropriate. The other part of the reason is that once you get out of the habit of blogging, it's hard to get back into it. (Approach-avoidance, don't you know.) There always seems to be something more pressing to get to first. But with the Katrina Anniversary hard on my heels, I knew I had to get back, and so here I am.
A few observations gleaned from our travels:
Everywhere we went this summer, west and east, during the 100 days of the BP oil spill, as soon as we said we were from New Orleans, people everywhere -- UU and non-UU, service personnel, hotel workers, guests at a B&B near Mount Rushmore, my sister's friends in Minneapolis -- they all acted like somebody had died, and we were the bereaved. "We're so sorry," they would say, sometimes laying a hand sympathetically on our arm or shoulder. Or they would ask us solicitously, "Are you folks OK?" We appreciated their concern, really we did, but it got old. I mean, if you're on vacation, you're trying to get away from everything that's worrying you or making you sad. And what were we supposed to say, "No, we're so NOT OK -- we're bloody sick and tired of being public victims, the nation's designated downtrodden."
And it was especially grating to have folks ask if we could smell the oil, for pete's sake, from our house or from our church or from the French Quarter. No, and we couldn't see it, either. Why do so many people around the country seem to think New Orleans is located right on the Gulf of Mexico? (Although, God forbid, if we keep on losing wetlands, we will eventually be on the damn coast1) I also hated the questions about whether I supported the deep-water drilling moratorium (I don't) and whether I am seeing any effects inside my congregation (I am, believe me, I am), and whether I would feel safe eating Louisiana seafood (geez, like I think either Louisiana or the Feds would allow us to sell our seafood if it wasn't safe -- what good would that do?). Let me just testify -- like almost every other non-allergic, non-vegetarian New Orleanian I know, I am eating Louisiana seafood literally like there was no tomorrow.
Another thing we noticed was how differently people from "away" (those not from New Orleans) think about food. Even relative foodies elsewhere don't think about food the way we do. Few people in other places think it's proper to discuss or reminisce about other meals while you are in the midst of a meal. Folks looked askance at us when we mentioned our ambition to eat as many cheap Maine lobsters as we could on one week's time (gee, not like we were trying to eat 'em all at one sitting!). Being particular about food was seen as strange or quaint, or maybe snobbish. Hot sauce was exotic. That we avoided chain restaurants and fast food while on the road was seen by many people as unnecessarily adding time and miles and expense to our trip (maybe so, but we sure ate better!). Our obsession with good food is one of those thing about New Orleans that I do already know, but these 2 trips really brought it to mind.
Anyway, it was good to get home, heat and humidity notwithstanding.
Thursday, June 10, 2010
Bless You, Boys -- Again
It's the off-week for the Saints summer training camp, and instead of the usual diversions coaches dream up to help the team cohere and stay together while not actually practicing (like team bowling, for example), Coach Peyton and team owners the Benson Family have come up with something quite different.
For the past few days, the Saints have gotten onto buses (one hopes air-conditioned!) and driven hours to the end of Plaquemines Parish and, the next day, down to Grand Isle, to meet with the folks most closely affected by the Gulf Oil Spill. They gather in a local community center with fishermen, oystermen, shrimpers, and oil workers and their families, and other folks like shop owners and catering workers and restaurant owners and their families, and listen to their stories. They shake hands with hundreds of people with work-hardened hands, get countless hugs from maw-maws, and ruffle the haircuts of hundreds of kids. It's like being politicians, only they're not running for anything.
And for good measure, they carry in the sacred Lombardi Trophy and everyone there gets a chance to touch it, to lay hands on it. (I picture Sean Peyton polishing the smudgy hand prints off the thing with a chamois on the bus on the way back home.) And everyone takes advantage of this, pressing forward with their hands out-stretched like supplicants to a shrine, like the Lombardi has a magic power to heal and restore.
All of this would have been enough and I would bless them for it and be grateful they're the kind of team they are, but they didn't stop there. The Saints are offering for raffle one of the "extra" Superbowl rings they will receive as 2009 Superbowl Champs (apparently, each winning team gets a few extra, to gift any way they want -- who knew??), with ALL proceeds going to Gulf Relief. The lucky fan who wins will get his or her ring at the season-opener game against Minnesota in September. The minimum order is 5 tickets for $10, but the more tickets you buy, the more they are discounted (like, 100 tickets are $75).
Of course, Big Man and I bought tickets right away, as did I'm sure, nearly every member of Who Dat Nation who could possibly squeeze together $10 or more. When I went online last night to check on it, I Googled "Saints Superbowl ring raffle" and discovered that there were close to 650,000 Google pages devoted to this topic. The Saints announced that they were hoping to raise $1 million from the raffle -- but I'll be sure surprised if they don't get more than that.
Once again, the Saints under Sean Peyton are showing that they are more than just a professional football team and that they "get it" about their role in the city's and area's recovery. All I can say is, Bless you, Boys, bless you.
For the past few days, the Saints have gotten onto buses (one hopes air-conditioned!) and driven hours to the end of Plaquemines Parish and, the next day, down to Grand Isle, to meet with the folks most closely affected by the Gulf Oil Spill. They gather in a local community center with fishermen, oystermen, shrimpers, and oil workers and their families, and other folks like shop owners and catering workers and restaurant owners and their families, and listen to their stories. They shake hands with hundreds of people with work-hardened hands, get countless hugs from maw-maws, and ruffle the haircuts of hundreds of kids. It's like being politicians, only they're not running for anything.
And for good measure, they carry in the sacred Lombardi Trophy and everyone there gets a chance to touch it, to lay hands on it. (I picture Sean Peyton polishing the smudgy hand prints off the thing with a chamois on the bus on the way back home.) And everyone takes advantage of this, pressing forward with their hands out-stretched like supplicants to a shrine, like the Lombardi has a magic power to heal and restore.
All of this would have been enough and I would bless them for it and be grateful they're the kind of team they are, but they didn't stop there. The Saints are offering for raffle one of the "extra" Superbowl rings they will receive as 2009 Superbowl Champs (apparently, each winning team gets a few extra, to gift any way they want -- who knew??), with ALL proceeds going to Gulf Relief. The lucky fan who wins will get his or her ring at the season-opener game against Minnesota in September. The minimum order is 5 tickets for $10, but the more tickets you buy, the more they are discounted (like, 100 tickets are $75).
Of course, Big Man and I bought tickets right away, as did I'm sure, nearly every member of Who Dat Nation who could possibly squeeze together $10 or more. When I went online last night to check on it, I Googled "Saints Superbowl ring raffle" and discovered that there were close to 650,000 Google pages devoted to this topic. The Saints announced that they were hoping to raise $1 million from the raffle -- but I'll be sure surprised if they don't get more than that.
Once again, the Saints under Sean Peyton are showing that they are more than just a professional football team and that they "get it" about their role in the city's and area's recovery. All I can say is, Bless you, Boys, bless you.
Tuesday, June 8, 2010
The Kind of People We Are
Months and months ago, possibly even last year, someone came up with the great idea to hold the first-ever New Orleans Oyster Festival on the first weekend of June, this year June 5-6, next to the House of Blues on the edge of the French Quarter. Of course, back then, no one could have dreamed that we would be facing the loss of America's best oyster beds, which have been giving folks the best-tasting oysters in this country since like the 1870s.
Perhaps in some more logical or sensible place, the Oyster Festival would have been canceled. But not here. The show must go on, and if we are to lose our precious and delicious oysters, then at least we'll go out swinging, with a big bang of a celebration. So the festival went on as scheduled. That's the kind of people we are. Hit us with a hurricane and a federal levee failure, and we will still hold our Mardi Gras and the critics be damned. Pour poison into our Gulf and threaten our oysterbeds for the next generation, we will throw an Oyster Festival to end all oyster festivals. Depressed and low down as I have been over this thing, I knew we had to go.
The ways to cook and eat oysters were uncountable, but I will list a few of the highlights that appealed to Big Man and me: oyster and shrimp (also endangered by the spill) eggrolls, oysters en brochette, oyster and spinach salad, oyster and eggplant casserole, fried oyster po boys, raw oysters (of course!), chargrilled oysters, buffalo oysters with bleu cheese sauce, oyster dressing (just like yo' Mama used to make), oysters with pepper jelly sauce, oyster gumbo, oyster soup, oyster sauce over crawfish cakes -- you get the picture, I'm sure. And I have to give a shout-out to the incredible Red Velvet Torte for dessert -- a large square of red velvet cake completely dipped in hard dark chocolate and then topped with fresh whipped cream. OMG f'sure.
There was a contest for the fastest oyster shucker, and another contest for the person who could eat the most raw oysters in the shortest period of time. (I've been known to eat *quite a lot* of raw oysters at one, er, standing, but I would hate to shovel them down fast. I like to savor my oysters, and enjoy a little sauce with 'em. I believe the winner vacuumed up something like 8 dozen in 5 minutes or some other ridiculous figure. Better him than me.
There were bands playing, of course -- what's a New Orleans festival of anything without music?? And the heat was mitigated by drizzles and gentle rains, hardly needing an umbrella to fend off, but really making it pleasant on that blacktop. (The festival ground was a parking lot so it could have been brutal.)
There was an Oyster Heritage Tent set up, where local craftsmen were making lovely artistic oyster knives, in case you shuck at home, and showed beautiful variations of ceramic oyster plates. Save the Gulf had a display, as did several other organizations, and there was a scroll to sign and send greetings to Louisiana's oystermen and their families. P & J, in business since 1875, had a display as well. Big Man and I signed the scroll ("We love y'all and would do anything we can to help.")
There were also posters of the event (what's a New Orleans festival without an artist-designed limited edition poster?), which had a large fleur de lis (of course) fashioned out of raw oysters (naturally) labeled hopefully as The First Annual New Orleans Oyster Festival. May that be so, may that truly be so!
Perhaps in some more logical or sensible place, the Oyster Festival would have been canceled. But not here. The show must go on, and if we are to lose our precious and delicious oysters, then at least we'll go out swinging, with a big bang of a celebration. So the festival went on as scheduled. That's the kind of people we are. Hit us with a hurricane and a federal levee failure, and we will still hold our Mardi Gras and the critics be damned. Pour poison into our Gulf and threaten our oysterbeds for the next generation, we will throw an Oyster Festival to end all oyster festivals. Depressed and low down as I have been over this thing, I knew we had to go.
The ways to cook and eat oysters were uncountable, but I will list a few of the highlights that appealed to Big Man and me: oyster and shrimp (also endangered by the spill) eggrolls, oysters en brochette, oyster and spinach salad, oyster and eggplant casserole, fried oyster po boys, raw oysters (of course!), chargrilled oysters, buffalo oysters with bleu cheese sauce, oyster dressing (just like yo' Mama used to make), oysters with pepper jelly sauce, oyster gumbo, oyster soup, oyster sauce over crawfish cakes -- you get the picture, I'm sure. And I have to give a shout-out to the incredible Red Velvet Torte for dessert -- a large square of red velvet cake completely dipped in hard dark chocolate and then topped with fresh whipped cream. OMG f'sure.
There was a contest for the fastest oyster shucker, and another contest for the person who could eat the most raw oysters in the shortest period of time. (I've been known to eat *quite a lot* of raw oysters at one, er, standing, but I would hate to shovel them down fast. I like to savor my oysters, and enjoy a little sauce with 'em. I believe the winner vacuumed up something like 8 dozen in 5 minutes or some other ridiculous figure. Better him than me.
There were bands playing, of course -- what's a New Orleans festival of anything without music?? And the heat was mitigated by drizzles and gentle rains, hardly needing an umbrella to fend off, but really making it pleasant on that blacktop. (The festival ground was a parking lot so it could have been brutal.)
There was an Oyster Heritage Tent set up, where local craftsmen were making lovely artistic oyster knives, in case you shuck at home, and showed beautiful variations of ceramic oyster plates. Save the Gulf had a display, as did several other organizations, and there was a scroll to sign and send greetings to Louisiana's oystermen and their families. P & J, in business since 1875, had a display as well. Big Man and I signed the scroll ("We love y'all and would do anything we can to help.")
There were also posters of the event (what's a New Orleans festival without an artist-designed limited edition poster?), which had a large fleur de lis (of course) fashioned out of raw oysters (naturally) labeled hopefully as The First Annual New Orleans Oyster Festival. May that be so, may that truly be so!
Wednesday, June 2, 2010
Memorial Day on Grand Isle
To regular readers of this blog, wherever you are --
I apologize for not posting lately. I have felt overwhelmed by all the emotions associated with the oil spill, and how many times can you write that you are sad, mad, scared, and helpless? And I have thought that posting about anything fun, like concerts or festivals, would seem like I was trivializing -- or, worse, forgetting about it. Believe me, whatever we are doing, however much fun we are having, the oil spill is never far from our thoughts and pervades our sleep.
But what can you do? After you get your hair salon and pet place to donate their cuttings to Matter of Trust, after you call/write your elected officials, there's really very little you can do. You can volunteer to help with clean up, but if you're not trained in animal/wild life rescue, they politely tell you you're not needed. And if you just want to do unskilled tar ball pick up or other such grunt work, you have to be very careful that you're not stealing what would have been paid day-labor for all the folks thrown out of work by the spill. So what's left?
Well, protest, for one thing. The first public Oil Spill Protest (the first of likely many to come, unless some unforeseen success takes place) was held in the pouring rain on Sunday, May 30, at 1 pm. (At least it wasn't hot.) There were lots and lots of signs, not all of them obscene (but some sure were!), with various ways of parsing the BP acronym (like "Bad People" and "Big Polluters" and even "Bitch Please!").
There were also lots of speakers, representatives of local organizations like Levees.org and Save the Wetlands and many others, and professors at Tulane and UNO and LSU, and leaders of the shrimpers and oystermen organizations -- when these latter speakers said their piece and mourned what was being lost, and how unlikely it was now that they'd be able to pass along their way of life to their children and grandchildren, they cried and so did much of the crowd. Even Dr. John, who's been a member of the Voices of the Wetlands group, spoke, in his inimitable style, angry, as he said, "That the criminals have been put in chawge of the crime scene!" He decried the blowout preventer (which term he couldn't recall and he said in frustration "that damn thing that shoulda stopped it but didn't "woik"), and demanded to know why there hadn't been a back-up plan.
It being New Orleans, the protest had a small pick-up brass band that punctuated what speakers said, played between speakers, and blatted out raspberries whenever BP's name was mentioned.
After all that, there didn't seem to be much else to do, but Big Man and I decided to spend Memorial Day driving to Grand Isle, where we could see first-hand what was happening, and where we could spend a few bucks eating lunch.
We felt so bad for them -- Memorial Day Weekend was supposed to be the big Grand Isle Speckled Trout Rodeo, and now no one was allowed to fish for speck off the island. Most people who had bought tickets in advance did not ask for a refund, and since the band had already been booked and paid, the party, such as it was, went on Saturday night.
The drive took us 2 1/2 hours, through Cajun Country that Big Man had never seen before and where I had not been in many years. Everywhere was evidence of the spill's widening ripples of influence -- boats docked that should have been out in the Gulf; protest signs in yards ("Mr. Obama, where are you?" said one); signs advertising "Disaster Work Catering Services" (at least somebody will be making money); closed roadside seafood markets, their signs listing everything they would have been carrying draped with sheets or tablecloths to cover them.
One unhapppy marshland resident went even further, and posed a mannequin dressed in a hazmat suit holding an oil-smeared plastic fish in an outstretched hand near the side of historic Louisiana Highway 1. Next to the adult mannequin was a small child mannequin in a small matching hazmat outfit, cupping its head in its two hands, as if sobbing. The figures had a big sign, "God Help Us." It was heart breaking.
There were media truck aplenty parked at the Grand Isle Marina, just as you cross over the bridge to the island, and we saw a lot of Army and Coast Guard vehicles as well. As we watched, two schoolbusses pulled up into the public beach area parking lot and unloaded scores of workers dressed in Tyvek suits. As we crossed over the dune to view the beach, we saw that a giant fat orange double-boom lay the length of the beach, and was backed-up by a small sand berm on the seaward side. (The bay side of the island is protected by booms marked "US Navy" floating in the water a few yards offshore.) Supervised by Coast Guard personnel, day laborers were scooping up tar balls on the beach and stuffing them into plastic sacks, and we could see workers on the Grand Isle Gulf beach as far as we could see in either direction.
We drove to one recommended Grand Isle restaurant, but it was closed -- although I had phoned there on Friday and been told it would be open. We ended up eating at the Starfish Restaurant, on the main road, and we asked to be served on the outside picnic table. There we enjoyed seafood gumbo, mini crabcakes, and platters of fried shrimp and oysters with onion rings (me) and a seafood platter with shrimp, oysters, catfish, and stuff crab with French fries (Big Man). (If you are gonna help an area by eating in one of their restaurants, then don't go there on a diet, for pete's sake, eat hearty!) The food was very good, and the servers thanked us for coming.
As we sat under the overhang and enjoyed both the food and the Gulf breeze, we watched as an enormous number of waste disposal trucks and military vehicles went by on the main road. Some young men in Army uniforms drove up in a military-camo jeep, and we were able to thank them in general for their service and in particular for being on Grand Isle right now helping with the spill.
Despite the pounding heat (it had rained earlier but the sun came out with a vengeance afterwards), we spent some time on the Grand Isle beach and we noted that the sand, while not sparkling white as in Alabama and Florida, was perfectly clean, and the beach was wide and empty. (The beach is closed to swimming -- obviously -- but the beach is OPEN for sun bathing and picnicking and whatever.) And there was no smell whatsoever of tar or gas or petroleum. None.
Driving off the island to go home, we noticed dozens and dozens of "for rent" signs on the raised beach cottages. I'm sure you could get quite a bargain renting a room or a cabin or a house for some time this summer on Grand Isle, and you would be doing the people of that beleagured island a big favor.
I apologize for not posting lately. I have felt overwhelmed by all the emotions associated with the oil spill, and how many times can you write that you are sad, mad, scared, and helpless? And I have thought that posting about anything fun, like concerts or festivals, would seem like I was trivializing -- or, worse, forgetting about it. Believe me, whatever we are doing, however much fun we are having, the oil spill is never far from our thoughts and pervades our sleep.
But what can you do? After you get your hair salon and pet place to donate their cuttings to Matter of Trust, after you call/write your elected officials, there's really very little you can do. You can volunteer to help with clean up, but if you're not trained in animal/wild life rescue, they politely tell you you're not needed. And if you just want to do unskilled tar ball pick up or other such grunt work, you have to be very careful that you're not stealing what would have been paid day-labor for all the folks thrown out of work by the spill. So what's left?
Well, protest, for one thing. The first public Oil Spill Protest (the first of likely many to come, unless some unforeseen success takes place) was held in the pouring rain on Sunday, May 30, at 1 pm. (At least it wasn't hot.) There were lots and lots of signs, not all of them obscene (but some sure were!), with various ways of parsing the BP acronym (like "Bad People" and "Big Polluters" and even "Bitch Please!").
There were also lots of speakers, representatives of local organizations like Levees.org and Save the Wetlands and many others, and professors at Tulane and UNO and LSU, and leaders of the shrimpers and oystermen organizations -- when these latter speakers said their piece and mourned what was being lost, and how unlikely it was now that they'd be able to pass along their way of life to their children and grandchildren, they cried and so did much of the crowd. Even Dr. John, who's been a member of the Voices of the Wetlands group, spoke, in his inimitable style, angry, as he said, "That the criminals have been put in chawge of the crime scene!" He decried the blowout preventer (which term he couldn't recall and he said in frustration "that damn thing that shoulda stopped it but didn't "woik"), and demanded to know why there hadn't been a back-up plan.
It being New Orleans, the protest had a small pick-up brass band that punctuated what speakers said, played between speakers, and blatted out raspberries whenever BP's name was mentioned.
After all that, there didn't seem to be much else to do, but Big Man and I decided to spend Memorial Day driving to Grand Isle, where we could see first-hand what was happening, and where we could spend a few bucks eating lunch.
We felt so bad for them -- Memorial Day Weekend was supposed to be the big Grand Isle Speckled Trout Rodeo, and now no one was allowed to fish for speck off the island. Most people who had bought tickets in advance did not ask for a refund, and since the band had already been booked and paid, the party, such as it was, went on Saturday night.
The drive took us 2 1/2 hours, through Cajun Country that Big Man had never seen before and where I had not been in many years. Everywhere was evidence of the spill's widening ripples of influence -- boats docked that should have been out in the Gulf; protest signs in yards ("Mr. Obama, where are you?" said one); signs advertising "Disaster Work Catering Services" (at least somebody will be making money); closed roadside seafood markets, their signs listing everything they would have been carrying draped with sheets or tablecloths to cover them.
One unhapppy marshland resident went even further, and posed a mannequin dressed in a hazmat suit holding an oil-smeared plastic fish in an outstretched hand near the side of historic Louisiana Highway 1. Next to the adult mannequin was a small child mannequin in a small matching hazmat outfit, cupping its head in its two hands, as if sobbing. The figures had a big sign, "God Help Us." It was heart breaking.
There were media truck aplenty parked at the Grand Isle Marina, just as you cross over the bridge to the island, and we saw a lot of Army and Coast Guard vehicles as well. As we watched, two schoolbusses pulled up into the public beach area parking lot and unloaded scores of workers dressed in Tyvek suits. As we crossed over the dune to view the beach, we saw that a giant fat orange double-boom lay the length of the beach, and was backed-up by a small sand berm on the seaward side. (The bay side of the island is protected by booms marked "US Navy" floating in the water a few yards offshore.) Supervised by Coast Guard personnel, day laborers were scooping up tar balls on the beach and stuffing them into plastic sacks, and we could see workers on the Grand Isle Gulf beach as far as we could see in either direction.
We drove to one recommended Grand Isle restaurant, but it was closed -- although I had phoned there on Friday and been told it would be open. We ended up eating at the Starfish Restaurant, on the main road, and we asked to be served on the outside picnic table. There we enjoyed seafood gumbo, mini crabcakes, and platters of fried shrimp and oysters with onion rings (me) and a seafood platter with shrimp, oysters, catfish, and stuff crab with French fries (Big Man). (If you are gonna help an area by eating in one of their restaurants, then don't go there on a diet, for pete's sake, eat hearty!) The food was very good, and the servers thanked us for coming.
As we sat under the overhang and enjoyed both the food and the Gulf breeze, we watched as an enormous number of waste disposal trucks and military vehicles went by on the main road. Some young men in Army uniforms drove up in a military-camo jeep, and we were able to thank them in general for their service and in particular for being on Grand Isle right now helping with the spill.
Despite the pounding heat (it had rained earlier but the sun came out with a vengeance afterwards), we spent some time on the Grand Isle beach and we noted that the sand, while not sparkling white as in Alabama and Florida, was perfectly clean, and the beach was wide and empty. (The beach is closed to swimming -- obviously -- but the beach is OPEN for sun bathing and picnicking and whatever.) And there was no smell whatsoever of tar or gas or petroleum. None.
Driving off the island to go home, we noticed dozens and dozens of "for rent" signs on the raised beach cottages. I'm sure you could get quite a bargain renting a room or a cabin or a house for some time this summer on Grand Isle, and you would be doing the people of that beleagured island a big favor.
Wednesday, May 12, 2010
Coping with the Oil Spill -- A Rant
I had a dream the other night in which my late colleague and best friend, SM, who died in January, appeared. She was angrily directing volunteer efforts for the Gulf oil spill from her sick bed, talking on the phone, sending angry emails. In my dream, she and I cried about it together. I woke up feeling sad and tired.
I find myself overwhelmed with competing emotions about the horrific disaster at the Deepwater Horizon rig in the Gulf of Mexico. I get enraged and scream at the radio and the TV when I hear reports of the testimony of officials from BP (which rented the rig that exploded), Halliburton (which did the work of cementing the rig -- or maybe I should say *didn't* do the work of cementing the rig), Cameron (the company that made the blowout preventer device for the rig that clearly didn't work), and Transocean (the company that owned the rig and employed the workers on it, who blew off basic procedures, thus either causing the blow-out or at least facilitating it). The four companies are all finger-pointing at each other, and, from what was said at the Congressional hearing, there was no governmental oversight at all -- just so-called "self-regulation." Self-regulation?? As far as I can see, self-regulation = NO regulation. My least-favorite quote was from the BP exec who said (of a giant, multi-million dollar containment device that turned out to be totally useless), "I won't say it failed, but it didn't work." Say what?? I am really working hard on the spiritual discipline of not hating them.
I am selfishly depressed at the thought of no more Louisiana seafood (or outrageously expensive seafood due to scarcity), and at the idea that I won't be able to just blithely get away any time I want to relax at a nearby pristine beach. I grieve over all the wildlife affected, even if the ones that are not edible. (My heart just about broke when I saw the aerial shot in the Times-Picayune of a shark appearing to bravely confront the huge oil slick all by himself -- it reminded me of the lone man bravely facing down the tank in Tiannenmen Square. See the photo at http://photos.nola.com/tpphotos/2010/05/oil_spill_gulf_of_mexico_2010_28.html.
The thought of the thick black goo on the edges of our fragile, disappearing marshland and coastal areas -- like we needed another insult to the Louisiana coast line! -- just sickens me. (To look at updated NASA satellite photos -- if you can bear it -- go to http://www.nasa.gov/topics/earth/features/oilspill/index.html.)
I worry about all the many, many people whose livelihoods and ways of life will be negatively impacted. Our friend the happy Shrimp Man on Claiborne Avenue is just one example of a whole class of people who have shrimped the Gulf waters for generations. Shrimpers, fisher folks, oyster folk, the restaurants all along South Louisiana who depend on that fresh catch, the oyster bars, the mom-and-pop po boy sandwich places, the little and big beach resort areas from Texas to Florida that are bracing for impact and facing cancellations of bookings, the private middle-class owners of non-luxurious beach houses that are paid for only through vacation rentals, the people whose businesses supply the boats that usually ply the Gulf waters -- the list of those affected goes on and on. All these people, all these families. Multi-generational ways of life threatened. It is too horrible to contemplate and yet we must think about it.
I'm mad at the federal government which is clearly complicit over several administrations -- and this new one gets no pass from us in Louisiana -- which is currently only offering *loans* to people whose small businesses are already marginal, and which are already carrying new loans post-Katrina. Loans? Is that the best we can do for all these folks??
I'm feeling betrayed by the markets and stores and restaurants in other states who are putting up signs bragging that they don't carry Louisiana seafood. Thanks so much for your support. I guess y'all thought we would purposely send out *bad* seafood for y'all to eat?? I'm still eating Louisiana crabmeat and shrimp, and if you care about us and our people, you'll eat it too.
I must admit I also feel implicated, guilty, responsible. Yes, I still drive my car, and sometimes, for convenience sake or just in order to save a few extra minutes, I confess I drive when I could have/should have walked. And believe me, I use air conditioning in my house, my car, and at the church, and I'm dependent on it. (It's only May, and it's already 90 degrees in New Orleans, for Pete's sake! I have trouble figuring out how people ever lived here without air conditioning.) Maybe I ought to be, but I am not yet prepared to call for an end to all offshore drilling.
But if we gonna do it, it ought to be safe. I can demand -- and all of you, wherever you live can demand -- that such drilling be done with adequate safeguards, with redundant safety procedures, with scrupulous inspections overseen by the federal government. We can demand that the state and federal governments require and strictly enforce such safeguards, processes, procedures, and redundancies. We can demand that this be declared a national disaster emergency, and allow the people most affected to get grants, not more loans, in order to get them through economically. We can support them through our consumer spending as well as our donations. We can call our hair salons, barbers and pet grooming places to keep collecting hair and fur clippings for the oil-soaking booms that are still needed. (These can be labeled and packaged and sent to Matter of Trust; see their website at http://www.matteroftrust.org/.)
And we can express our emotions -- our anger, depression, grief, exhaustion, worry, sense of complicity, and feelings of helplessness -- in our religious community, in our worship, in our small groups. We can help each other. There are no easy answers to this, and we must help comfort and support one another as we find our way through it.
I find myself overwhelmed with competing emotions about the horrific disaster at the Deepwater Horizon rig in the Gulf of Mexico. I get enraged and scream at the radio and the TV when I hear reports of the testimony of officials from BP (which rented the rig that exploded), Halliburton (which did the work of cementing the rig -- or maybe I should say *didn't* do the work of cementing the rig), Cameron (the company that made the blowout preventer device for the rig that clearly didn't work), and Transocean (the company that owned the rig and employed the workers on it, who blew off basic procedures, thus either causing the blow-out or at least facilitating it). The four companies are all finger-pointing at each other, and, from what was said at the Congressional hearing, there was no governmental oversight at all -- just so-called "self-regulation." Self-regulation?? As far as I can see, self-regulation = NO regulation. My least-favorite quote was from the BP exec who said (of a giant, multi-million dollar containment device that turned out to be totally useless), "I won't say it failed, but it didn't work." Say what?? I am really working hard on the spiritual discipline of not hating them.
I am selfishly depressed at the thought of no more Louisiana seafood (or outrageously expensive seafood due to scarcity), and at the idea that I won't be able to just blithely get away any time I want to relax at a nearby pristine beach. I grieve over all the wildlife affected, even if the ones that are not edible. (My heart just about broke when I saw the aerial shot in the Times-Picayune of a shark appearing to bravely confront the huge oil slick all by himself -- it reminded me of the lone man bravely facing down the tank in Tiannenmen Square. See the photo at http://photos.nola.com/tpphotos/2010/05/oil_spill_gulf_of_mexico_2010_28.html.
The thought of the thick black goo on the edges of our fragile, disappearing marshland and coastal areas -- like we needed another insult to the Louisiana coast line! -- just sickens me. (To look at updated NASA satellite photos -- if you can bear it -- go to http://www.nasa.gov/topics/earth/features/oilspill/index.html.)
I worry about all the many, many people whose livelihoods and ways of life will be negatively impacted. Our friend the happy Shrimp Man on Claiborne Avenue is just one example of a whole class of people who have shrimped the Gulf waters for generations. Shrimpers, fisher folks, oyster folk, the restaurants all along South Louisiana who depend on that fresh catch, the oyster bars, the mom-and-pop po boy sandwich places, the little and big beach resort areas from Texas to Florida that are bracing for impact and facing cancellations of bookings, the private middle-class owners of non-luxurious beach houses that are paid for only through vacation rentals, the people whose businesses supply the boats that usually ply the Gulf waters -- the list of those affected goes on and on. All these people, all these families. Multi-generational ways of life threatened. It is too horrible to contemplate and yet we must think about it.
I'm mad at the federal government which is clearly complicit over several administrations -- and this new one gets no pass from us in Louisiana -- which is currently only offering *loans* to people whose small businesses are already marginal, and which are already carrying new loans post-Katrina. Loans? Is that the best we can do for all these folks??
I'm feeling betrayed by the markets and stores and restaurants in other states who are putting up signs bragging that they don't carry Louisiana seafood. Thanks so much for your support. I guess y'all thought we would purposely send out *bad* seafood for y'all to eat?? I'm still eating Louisiana crabmeat and shrimp, and if you care about us and our people, you'll eat it too.
I must admit I also feel implicated, guilty, responsible. Yes, I still drive my car, and sometimes, for convenience sake or just in order to save a few extra minutes, I confess I drive when I could have/should have walked. And believe me, I use air conditioning in my house, my car, and at the church, and I'm dependent on it. (It's only May, and it's already 90 degrees in New Orleans, for Pete's sake! I have trouble figuring out how people ever lived here without air conditioning.) Maybe I ought to be, but I am not yet prepared to call for an end to all offshore drilling.
But if we gonna do it, it ought to be safe. I can demand -- and all of you, wherever you live can demand -- that such drilling be done with adequate safeguards, with redundant safety procedures, with scrupulous inspections overseen by the federal government. We can demand that the state and federal governments require and strictly enforce such safeguards, processes, procedures, and redundancies. We can demand that this be declared a national disaster emergency, and allow the people most affected to get grants, not more loans, in order to get them through economically. We can support them through our consumer spending as well as our donations. We can call our hair salons, barbers and pet grooming places to keep collecting hair and fur clippings for the oil-soaking booms that are still needed. (These can be labeled and packaged and sent to Matter of Trust; see their website at http://www.matteroftrust.org/.)
And we can express our emotions -- our anger, depression, grief, exhaustion, worry, sense of complicity, and feelings of helplessness -- in our religious community, in our worship, in our small groups. We can help each other. There are no easy answers to this, and we must help comfort and support one another as we find our way through it.
Wednesday, May 5, 2010
The Oil Spill
The explosion on the high-tech oil rig leased by BP nearly 50 miles out in the Gulf of Mexico happened April 20th. Immediate word was that there had been casualties, but some workers had been able to evacuate in time and were saved. Local news showed footage of the fire in the Gulf, and anxious relatives being ferried to a hotel near the airport to await their loved ones -- or word that their beloveds were among the lost. More reports later focused on the funerals of the men (they were all men -- for whatever reason, oil rigs are not known to be havens of gender-inclusivity).
Announcements were made on April 21st or 22nd (hard to remember now) that the oil well was being capped as it blew, so (the announcement, presumably from BP, said) there would be minimal leakage of oil into the waters of the Gulf. As I packed for my New York trip on April 23rd, the news seemed to be changing. There WAS a spill, but it wasn't too bad. When I arrived in New York on the night of April 24th, the media was in full retreat from earlier stories. There WAS a spill, and it WAS bad, it was very bad indeed. It might even be the worst ever.
Storms in the Gulf not only dropped rain on Jazz Fest revelers, it sent the oil slick moving rapidly toward the ravaged Louisiana coast. By the second Jazz Fest weekend, April 29-May 2, some folks in Irish Bayou and even Slidell, claimed they could smell it on the wind. (It may or may not have been the reason that the Queen of Soul Aretha Franklin gave to Jazz Fest officials about canceling her set, even though her tour bus was already in New Orleans, and nobody was claiming to be able to smell it from there.)
Folks at Jazz Fest lined up in record numbers to get raw oysters, joking sardonically that it could our last raw oysters for 5-10 years. (If the seedbeds of Louisiana oysters are disturbed, new seed oysters will have to be obtained after the beds are cleaned and then carefully nurtured. it would take between 5 and 10 years to be able to harvest from such new beds.) While they made remarks steeped in disaster-humor, their eyes were alternately angry and sad. Hearing that Halliburton contractors had been involved on the rig, one man said, "Let Cheney pay for the clean-up." The lead singer for Pearl Jam, on stage at the Fest, suggested that the children of BP executives spend their summer breaks working on the clean-up. He was wildly cheered.
Whether you live here in poor belle NOLA or anywhere else around the country, I know that all of us have been deeply affected emotionally and spiritually from this disaster, and the slow pace and inadequate scope of clean up. I know that all of us, young and old, well-off and struggling, want to do something, but we don't know what. We know something of what this disaster means in terms of our lives and livelihoods and delicious food and our beautiful marshlands and fragile coastal areas, and the strange and wonderful wild things that live in those places, but there is still a mystery in terms of what happens next, what might happen next.
Here are some concrete ideas for things that can be done, right now, right away, to have a positive effect on the spill clean-up. And if there are those of you who read this who know of other things we can do, please do let me know so I can help spread the word.
#1 It is well-known that the containment booms for oil spills are filled with waste materials like hair, fur, and old nylons. (Check-out the YouTube video clip entitled "Hair Soaks Up Oil Spills".) Collections of hair clippings from barbers and salons and fur clippings from pet groomers would be of tremendous assistance. A local hotel is working with a local environmental organization, Matter of Trust, to coordinate donations of old hosiery, pantyhose, stockings, clipped hair, and fur from pet groomers; that is the Ritz Carlton Hotel, 921 Canal St., NOLA 70130, 504-670-2817. Packages must be clearly labeled, such as "PANTYHOSE" or "HAIR CLIPPINGS". If you live in New Orleans, you can drop off labeled packages of your old stockings right at the valet entrance of the hotel. You can also call your hair salon and dog groomer and request that they save all hair and fur for this important cause.
#2 If you are financially able, you can contribute to help the people who are hurt most. A fund has been set up by the Greater New Orleans Foundation, the Gulf Coast Oil Spill Fund, to collect money to benefit local communities (in Plaquemines, St. Bernard, and lower Jefferson parishes) most adversely affected by the disaster, who are mostly poor/economically marginal, Islenos, Vietnamese, or African American). Donations can be made online, and more information gathered, at www.gnof.org.
#3 If you are able and willing to, you can volunteer to help. In-person volunteers can register with the Coalition to Restore Coastal Louisiana at www.crcl.org, or through the Sierra Club at action.sierraclub.org/Oil_Spill_CleanUp. Recovery from this, as from Katrina, will be a marathon, not a sprint. We will need a lot of help for quite some time to come.
#4 If you live or visit near the Louisiana-Mississippi coast, and need to report damaged wild life or shoreline, these are the numbers to call: for oiled wildlife 866-557-1401; for damaged coastal areas 800-440-0858.
#5 Write and call your elected officials at the federal level. Demand clear procedures for emergencies in the Gulf. Demand accountability for when inevitable accidents happen. Demand immediate federal aid for the coast line, the wild life, and the human communities affected by such disasters.
Finally, we can all pray/meditate/send good thoughts when gathered in our faith communities. We can support and comfort each other in our rage and grief over this new disaster. We can use the work of our hands and the power of our minds to make this better and prevent its recurrence.
To all of you out there standing in solidarity with us in South Louisiana and the Gulf Coast, we thank you from the bottom of our hearts.
Announcements were made on April 21st or 22nd (hard to remember now) that the oil well was being capped as it blew, so (the announcement, presumably from BP, said) there would be minimal leakage of oil into the waters of the Gulf. As I packed for my New York trip on April 23rd, the news seemed to be changing. There WAS a spill, but it wasn't too bad. When I arrived in New York on the night of April 24th, the media was in full retreat from earlier stories. There WAS a spill, and it WAS bad, it was very bad indeed. It might even be the worst ever.
Storms in the Gulf not only dropped rain on Jazz Fest revelers, it sent the oil slick moving rapidly toward the ravaged Louisiana coast. By the second Jazz Fest weekend, April 29-May 2, some folks in Irish Bayou and even Slidell, claimed they could smell it on the wind. (It may or may not have been the reason that the Queen of Soul Aretha Franklin gave to Jazz Fest officials about canceling her set, even though her tour bus was already in New Orleans, and nobody was claiming to be able to smell it from there.)
Folks at Jazz Fest lined up in record numbers to get raw oysters, joking sardonically that it could our last raw oysters for 5-10 years. (If the seedbeds of Louisiana oysters are disturbed, new seed oysters will have to be obtained after the beds are cleaned and then carefully nurtured. it would take between 5 and 10 years to be able to harvest from such new beds.) While they made remarks steeped in disaster-humor, their eyes were alternately angry and sad. Hearing that Halliburton contractors had been involved on the rig, one man said, "Let Cheney pay for the clean-up." The lead singer for Pearl Jam, on stage at the Fest, suggested that the children of BP executives spend their summer breaks working on the clean-up. He was wildly cheered.
Whether you live here in poor belle NOLA or anywhere else around the country, I know that all of us have been deeply affected emotionally and spiritually from this disaster, and the slow pace and inadequate scope of clean up. I know that all of us, young and old, well-off and struggling, want to do something, but we don't know what. We know something of what this disaster means in terms of our lives and livelihoods and delicious food and our beautiful marshlands and fragile coastal areas, and the strange and wonderful wild things that live in those places, but there is still a mystery in terms of what happens next, what might happen next.
Here are some concrete ideas for things that can be done, right now, right away, to have a positive effect on the spill clean-up. And if there are those of you who read this who know of other things we can do, please do let me know so I can help spread the word.
#1 It is well-known that the containment booms for oil spills are filled with waste materials like hair, fur, and old nylons. (Check-out the YouTube video clip entitled "Hair Soaks Up Oil Spills".) Collections of hair clippings from barbers and salons and fur clippings from pet groomers would be of tremendous assistance. A local hotel is working with a local environmental organization, Matter of Trust, to coordinate donations of old hosiery, pantyhose, stockings, clipped hair, and fur from pet groomers; that is the Ritz Carlton Hotel, 921 Canal St., NOLA 70130, 504-670-2817. Packages must be clearly labeled, such as "PANTYHOSE" or "HAIR CLIPPINGS". If you live in New Orleans, you can drop off labeled packages of your old stockings right at the valet entrance of the hotel. You can also call your hair salon and dog groomer and request that they save all hair and fur for this important cause.
#2 If you are financially able, you can contribute to help the people who are hurt most. A fund has been set up by the Greater New Orleans Foundation, the Gulf Coast Oil Spill Fund, to collect money to benefit local communities (in Plaquemines, St. Bernard, and lower Jefferson parishes) most adversely affected by the disaster, who are mostly poor/economically marginal, Islenos, Vietnamese, or African American). Donations can be made online, and more information gathered, at www.gnof.org.
#3 If you are able and willing to, you can volunteer to help. In-person volunteers can register with the Coalition to Restore Coastal Louisiana at www.crcl.org, or through the Sierra Club at action.sierraclub.org/Oil_Spill_CleanUp. Recovery from this, as from Katrina, will be a marathon, not a sprint. We will need a lot of help for quite some time to come.
#4 If you live or visit near the Louisiana-Mississippi coast, and need to report damaged wild life or shoreline, these are the numbers to call: for oiled wildlife 866-557-1401; for damaged coastal areas 800-440-0858.
#5 Write and call your elected officials at the federal level. Demand clear procedures for emergencies in the Gulf. Demand accountability for when inevitable accidents happen. Demand immediate federal aid for the coast line, the wild life, and the human communities affected by such disasters.
Finally, we can all pray/meditate/send good thoughts when gathered in our faith communities. We can support and comfort each other in our rage and grief over this new disaster. We can use the work of our hands and the power of our minds to make this better and prevent its recurrence.
To all of you out there standing in solidarity with us in South Louisiana and the Gulf Coast, we thank you from the bottom of our hearts.
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