Take Deep Breaths: Post-Katrina New Orleans

 By Kalamu ya Salaam

“How did it feel when you first came back home?”

“I didn't,” I curtly reply to the earnestly asked question, “I'm here, but here is not the home I left.”

Waiting for me to elaborate, none of the four-man crew say anything. The whole room seems to be holding its breath.

Had I been on my toes, I would have declared living in New Orleans is like trying to breath under water. You can't. What you do is grab gulps of air, drop under for as long as you can, pop up shortly, gasp another mouthful or two, and duck back down, re-submerging your head below the water line.

Isha, one of my younger grandchildren, was all excited last weekend. She is taking swimming lessons and had learned how to put her tiny face under water. She was so proud, so very, very proud of her little five-year-old self, proclaiming she's going to open her eyes next.

And now, suddenly, for no particular reason, I'm hearing Etta James singing “I'd rather go blind, than see you walk away from me.” I second that emotion—I'd rather go blind than see New Orleans like it is: inundated by an awful post-hurricane funk.

What I'm seeing hurts my eyeballs.

My good friend Jerry appears ok, but there's a disquieting edge to his silence. Sledgehammer (that's me) and surgeon (that's Dr. Jerry Ward) meet every Thursday to socialize over a meal. This is our first tete-a-tete after a two week interruption. Initially, even though I didn't remember him saying anything, I thought maybe he was out of town but since I was so preoccupied with my own seemingly endless to-do list, I just moved on when he didn't answer my phone calls. I had no way of knowing Jerry had been in jail.

About a month ago Jerry had checked himself into a hospital; that same afternoon he was released but given a vigorous recommendation: seek professional help for what was diagnosed as depression. And now here he was telling me that he had totaled his car.

Jail? A wreck? What the hell was going on?

My own terrible secret is that I was not really surprised. Sure, I was taken aback a little, but in post-Katrina New Orleans we all are predisposed toward expecting the worse because for natives bad news is now the norm.

Fatou served us our regular order: a plate of coco rice, sauteed spinach, plantains and a filet of steamed talipia-mild for Jerry, mine was spicy liberally sprinked with dark red cayenne. Jerry had ginger beer, I had “half-and-half” (half ginger beer, half wonjo, a red zinger-based herbal brew). When we entered, Fatou was in the back. I had called out to her and as she came to our table with her soft smile and charmingly-accented English, she simply asked “the usual?”

I had nodded yes to her, now I was nodding as Jerry told me the details of his thirty-some-hour adventure in central lock up.

”I didn't sleep on the floor, but some did using their shoes for pillows. They were rapping on and on. At one point I said loud enough for everyone to hear, why don't yall rap about conditions in jail? ... Their favorite word was 'bitch,' but it didn't have a gender designation. Some of them felt the need to modify the word when they referred to someone they really didn't like, like some of the guards, who were 'pussy-bitches'.”

I admire Jerry. Although he holds an endowed chair at Dillard University, a PhD in English, and has taught at the college level for over thirty years, there are no pretensions about him. He often chides his colleagues who don't dance when dancing is appropriate.

Jail did not frighten Jerry; he had been in Vietnam. Built like a welterweight, he is a fierce little man who is proficient at taking care of himself regardless of where he is.

Jerry volunteered as a polling official in the just past mayoral race, but now he holds a newly developed contempt for the police, engendered not by how they treated him, but rather by the corruption they displayed toward everyone during his ordeal. “You know they allowed them to smoke marijuana in jail?”

I was not surprised.

”I couldn't eat. They gave us two sandwiches. I don't know what was on those sandwiches.”

Our conversation slowed as we both dug into our consistently wonderful meal at our favorite African restaurant. True Benechin was the only African eatery now open; nevertheless our favorite dish, which we always order, was always, always really satisfying. The spinach never overcooked. The plantains unfailingly sweet. The rice moist. And the fish succulent.

After we ate, we lingered in conversation, commiserating about the un-merry place our home has become. Jerry confesses he just couldn't bring himself to leave the house last Thursday. I knew the feeling.

As we walked out of the French Quarter to Esplanade Avenue, where I have parked, I admired the beautiful, golden time of day—the atmosphere lit by a lustrous, buttery, almost dark, deep yellow twilight.

I tell Jerry I am working on a piece about being weary. He smiles grimly and affirms, yes, you must write that. Then he looks at me, and without a trace of sarcasm or bitterness, wearily utters, “you know it's a shame when two old men like us have nothing to look forward to but the taste of perpetual misery.”

I silently suck Jerry's words into my tightly clenched jaws. Unfortunately, the syllables fit well within my mouth: per-pe-tu-al mi-se-ry.

When I drop Jerry home, our firm goodbye handshake seems necessary, so necessary for us to touch, to hold, to not let go.

I take a deep breath, look around for oncoming traffic, slowly back out Jerry's driveway, and push on to my next destination—no rest for the weary, there are many more rivers to cross before I get over.

posted 28 July 2006