Underserved community in need of a skate park

Mack in front of his 9th Ward Village Skatepark

Ward “Mack” McClendon wanted to convert an old sugar refinery laboratory building in the Lower Ninth Ward into a garage for antique cars. He figured classic cars would be needed when New Orleans became the no. 1 place in the country for movie production. That dream ended when the neighborhood flooded after Hurricane Katrina.

“The need for the community overrides my need for cars,” he said recently.

Since then, McClendon has struggled to turn his 10,000-square-foot warehouse called the Lower 9^th Ward Village into a skateboard park and multipurpose community center.  A year ago, Mountain Dew funded the concrete ramps, but no more.

“They wanted to do something in the Lower Ninth Ward,” he said.

The ramps are built and ready for young athletes, but the building’s electrical system must be brought up to code and liability insurance acquired before he can let the neighborhood kids inside.

On Saturday, Nov. 30, from 1 p.m. until 10 p.m., McClendon and friends will hold a fundraiser at the Lower 9^th Ward Village, 1001 Charbonnet St., to start working toward that ambitious $30,000 goal. They plan to serve homemade gumbo, red beans and rice and entertainment, including local musicians and comedians.

In the summer of 2012, the Ninth Ward Village partnered with Just One Board, the Make It Right Foundation, the Tony Hawk Foundation, Urban 9 Skate Shop and Humidity Skate Shop to give 1,000 children refurbished skateboards. McClendon hoped to be able to open the skate park shortly thereafter.

“I’ve never taken on a project this big. I definitely could not see from beginning to end,” McClendon said with resignation. “It’s like the world has forgotten about us.”

“Skaters are not attracted to traditional sports,” said Peter Whitley, program director of the Tony Hawk Foundation, a San Diego nonprofit that supports the creation of public skateboard parks that promote healthy, active lifestyles. His organization helped local skaters negotiate with the city of New Orleans to get an official skate park under I-610 in Gentilly. The nonprofit the skaters formed is called Transitional Spaces.

Last February, the City of New Orleans voted to make the Parisite, near Paris Avenue, part of the New Orleans Recreation Development Commission, but it is too far away for Ninth Ward skaters without transportation.A city this size usually has three or four skate parks, said Emilie Taylor, design build manager with Tulane City Center, which completed “visioning” designs for the Parisite skate park.

Meanwhile, McClendon continues to fundraise for the 9^th Ward Village.

“A skate park would give kids an opportunity to do something different to express themselves because there are not many other recreational activities in the area,” said Keisha Henry, co-owner of Café Dauphine and a trained recreational therapist.

Two recent University of California Berkeley graduates who studied environmental policy, Rebecca Fisher-McGinty and Chika Kondo, are helping McClendon raise money. They have committed to work a year to assist with his Lower 9^th Ward projects, including an oral history.

“We volunteered here three years and developed a deeper understanding of the place,” Kondo said.

“Mack’s values align with mine,” she said.

Tickets to the Village fundraiser are $15 at the door, $10 pre-sale. Call (504) 302-1920 or (504) 402-4284 for tickets.

This story originally appeared in The New Orleans Advocate.

  

Volunteers try to restore cypress swamp

Photo credit: Katelyn Clift Forsberg

Darryl Malek-Wiley, Sierra Club’s local organizing representative, has lived in New Orleans since 1982, but never heard about Bayou Bienvenue till after Hurricane Katrina.

Older Lower Ninth Ward residents remember the freshwater cypress swamp from the time they were children in the 1950s, he said, but many others didn’t know it was there.

“There were rumors of snakes and alligators and many people were afraid to go,” recalled John Taylor, wetland specialist for the Center for Sustainable Engagement and Development (CSED), who has spent his entire life near the place that once was a dense cypress-tupelo swamp.

As kids, Taylor and his brothers would sneak over to explore the bayou. After a while, their mother stopped worrying.

“I made money catching rabbits, snapping turtles and nutria for the hide,” he said. “I could go in the swamp and make more money than my daddy did.”

The Bayou Bienvenue Wetland Triangle, a 427-acre body of open water, was the “back of town,” a natural wonderland where residents could survive off hunting and fishing.  The bayou is all that remains of a once great Mississippi River Delta swamp extending from New Orleans to Lake Borgne.

“When I was a boy, you didn’t need a paddle for the boat. The trees were so close together, you could pull yourself by grabbing a tree,” Taylor said.

In 1956, the construction of the Mississippi River-Gulf Outlet (MRGO) Canal was authorized by an Act of Congress to create a shorter shipping route between the Port of New Orleans and the Gulf of Mexico, but also changed the bayou’s fresh water to brackish.

“Salt water intrusion killed the vegetation, including the cypress trees, and eliminated protection from high winds, water surges and wakes,” Taylor said. Loss of the cypress trees made the Lower Ninth Ward more vulnerable to flooding from hurricanes.

After Hurricane Katrina, a surge barrier and a rock dam closed the MRGO canal, halting the influx of salt water and allowing restoration of the ecosystem to begin.

“That’s gonna be the laboratory and we’re going to figure out how to fix this,” Taylor said of the complex environmental project. “Once we fix that, we’ll know how to fix the rest.”

Several community groups are actively working to restore natural vegetation through labor-intensive and experimental projects. Common Ground Relief has shifted its focus from home construction to wetlands restoration.

Photo credit: John Taylor

James Stram, Common Ground Relief's wetlands project manager, supervises cypress tree plantings in wooden boxes placed in the shallow water. Without protection, nutria or rabbits would quickly devour the young plants.

Last month, the Coalition to Restore Coastal Louisiana and The Sierra Club organized 31 volunteers to plant 6,000 plugs of California bulrush grass in an effort to prevent further erosion and create wildlife habitat.

In 2007, community groups and volunteers built a 30-foot wide, wooden viewing platform so environmentalists, tourists, volunteers, legislators and celebrities could bear witness to the degraded swamp with cypress “ghosts” and open water that still host abundant wildlife. A new, interpretative sign was recently erected at the platform.

“It has become an incredibly powerful spot to get an environmental perspective on the city’s woes,” said Joshua Lewis, a research analyst for the Tulane/Xavier Center for Bioenvironmental Research. There is a multibillion-dollar plan to restore the damage done by the MRGO, but no funding, he said.

Taylor spends much of his days standing on the platform, giving informal tours. “That place is full of birds in the summer, but the species have changed,” said.

He paddles his pirogue to the other side to observe and photograph wildlife.

“Wetlands are restorative,” Taylor said.

This story was originally published in the New Orleans Advocate.

Lower 9th Ward garden cultivates community

“Ernest, the goal is not to make a trench,” said Jenga Mwendo as she showed a group of school children how to prepare the soil for planting.

Students from the AdinkraNOLA home school were visiting the Guerrilla Garden at Charbonnet and Chartres Streets and learning the correct method for sowing seeds. The boys vigorously took to the task of breaking up clods of dirt with hoes.

“Now that we’ve loosened up the soil, use your fingers,” Mwendo directed. Marci McDaniel, 4, crouched demurely, deftly wielding a cultivator.

Children like to dig and play in the dirt, said the schoolteacher, Elizabeth Fletcher. “They have a chance to see what they planted last year,” she said.

The school children also enjoyed eating fresh figs picked right off the tree.

Through a Kellogg grant, Backyard Gardeners has been holding free workshops in the Guerrilla Garden six afternoons a week to continue through the end of November. So far, activities have ranged from food demonstrations, art workshops, storytelling and composting with the goal of fostering community spirit and a love of gardening.

There was a time, not long ago, when almost every home in the Lower Ninth Ward had a backyard garden, Mwendo said. Communing while growing food was a longstanding neighborhood tradition, she added. Many of those gardens disappeared after Hurricane Katrina.

Mwendo saw the potential and opportunity to use gardens to rebuild community, revitalize the neighborhood and increase access to quality food. In 2009, she started the Backyard Gardeners Network, which currently maintains two community gardens where local residents grow their own fruits and vegetables, as well as share common experiences.

“The vision is a vibrant community space,” Mwendo said.

A second place, the Laurentine Ernst Garden, on the corner of Forstall and Chartres Streets, offers a tool lending library, an educational resource library and a small cottage donated by the Preservation Resource Center.

“This was an empty lot before 2009,” Mwendo said, describing the Guerrilla Garden. Aloyd Edinburgh, a neighbor, used to throw seeds on the ground there for the neighbors to pick whatever grew.

 “Then a few neighbors got together to decide what they wanted to develop,” Mwendo recalled.

First, they cleared the land of stones, rocks and bricks. Their first fundraising event paid for fencing and a driveway.

The Guerrilla Garden is planted with broccoli, collard and mustard greens. There are also fig, grapefruit, lime, lemon and kumquat trees and an okra bush. Some people pay a seasonal for a private vegetable bed.

Other groups use the garden for meetings and classes. The previous week, Thaddaeus Prosper, owner of Sheaux Fresh Sustainable Foods, conducted a hands-on fall planting workshop for a few teenage boys.

“Growing food is in my blood.  My father instilled ideas if hard work and his mother cooked dinner for needy families,” he told them. The entrepreneur, whose business is growing fresh food in underserved neighborhoods, explained its career potential.

The Recirculating Farms Coalition recently helped Backyard Gardeners Network further improve the property with a wooden structure that provides a shaded rest and recreation space. The Coalition donated a hydroponics system, which pumps nutrient-rich water over the roots of grape and luffa vines that will eventually climb and cover the structure.  The new system is eco-friendly, using collected rainwater and solar energy.

Edinburgh is proud of the progress the neighborhood has made because he believes farming is a valuable experience.

“We’ve got an obligation to the kids to teach them something,” he said.

Volunteers continue arriving by the busload

Volunteers keep coming to New Orleans to help. And God knows, we still need it. Many blocks in the Ninth Ward seem untouched since Hurricane Katrina. Common Ground Relief claims to have worked with 35,000 volunteers since Hurricane Katrina, gutting and rebuilding homes, creating urban gardens, starting a legal clinic and a women's shelter. Now they've got a tree farm to replant the bayou. But the neighborhood is still pretty desolate.

Volunteers come in all shapes, sizes, ages and races. This group, however, surprised me. I saw them from a distance, arriving in a Ken Kesey-style school bus. The message, "NY 2 NO," was painted on both sides, so the group's origin was clear.

One of the National Wildlife staff members was probably giving them an explanation about how the levees broke, detailing the inadequacies of the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers.

Consider that most of these kids were in junior high or elementary school when Katrina knocked New Orleans off her feet. That was a long time ago yet, for some neighborhoods, not much has changed.

I believe Global Warming is a concern for those who may still be around when the waters seriously start to rise. The glaciers are melting at a rate that is even faster than scientists predicted. Manhattan may even find itself submerged.

Perhaps stories of Hurricane Katrina became more relevant to those who experienced Hurricane Sandy firsthand last year.

I might have interviewed them so they could see themselves online, but young people have every kind of mobile device to chronicle their own adventures.

Country in the city

No, ladies and gentlemen. These are not dyed Easter eggs. They come right out of the hens in those beautiful pastel colors when the chickens are 9th Ward and free-range. I buy them from a local resident with a large flock in his yard. He sells eggs, raw honey and homemade jams every Saturday morning at the Sankofa Farmers Market.

The word sankofa comes from the Akan language of Ghana and translates to return - go - seek. In Akan culture, the Sankofa represents the importance of respecting wisdom of the past while planning and working toward the future.

My egg seller Calvin has a sunny disposition and wears a big straw hat. His spot at the market is under a giant oak tree. He instructs me to return the egg cartons for recycling and I do. Last week, I got $1 off on a second dozen for my next door neighbor.

These eggs are not like any you've ever tasted! They don't require cheese or spices to liven them up. They are deliciously healthy.

Vendors sell kick-ass kale at the market, too. Sometimes, there's live music if you care to linger.

Any reason for a parade

In New Orleans, there doesn't have to be much of a reason for a parade. Just an open day to march down the streets.

My car was in the shop last week, so I had to do the cross-town trek to pick it up, taking two buses and a streetcar to the land of services. My neighbor cautioned there was a second-line on the main street, so I doubled back to get my camera.

Sure enough, a handful of floats were trundling down the side streets, one carrying some sort of queen and others just folks partying. I asked somebody standing on the curb what the parade was about. He said, it always happens this time of year. Whatever.

Cars were pulled up on the neutral ground as well as huge barbecues. It was bound to be an all day affair.


As I stood watching the floats file by, two guys shouted out and handed me a giant velvet rose. Eventually, the bus came through.

Just another ordinary day in New Orleans.

Miracle on St. Claude Avenue

 By Prescotte Stokes III, NOLA.com | The Times-Picayune 

Seven years after Hurricane Katrina ravaged the Lower 9th Ward, the area's residents are still struggling to rebuild. A walk around the neighborhood -- bounded roughly by the Industrial Canal, St. Bernard Parish, Claiborne and St. Claude avenues -- reveals patches of homes, beautifully rebuilt with clean porches and manicured lawns. But never far away are thousands of blighted properties and vacant lots that cast a depressing shadow.

EnlargeChris Granger, NOLA.com | The Times-PicayuneTutor Joan Ann Brown, right, helps Kaniyah Ervin, 6, work on some math problems during an after-school tutoring program at the All Souls Episcopal Church & Community Center in New Orleans on Wednesday, November 28, 2012. (Photo by Chris Granger, Nola.com / The Times-Picayune)After school program helps local children gallery (7 photos)

There isn't a single grocery store or drug store. Gas stations are the only places within walking distance that residents can go to for milk and other staples. Many families, particularly the elderly, depend on sporadic public transit to take them into St. Bernard Parish or the Upper 9th Ward to shop, visit a doctor or take their clothes to a laundromat.

But in the midst of this lingering malaise, something wonderful is happening at the corner of St. Claude and Caffin avenues inside a renovated Walgreens drug store: All Souls Church and Community Center is running a free after-school tutoring program that offers hope, structure and sustenance for 80 neighborhood students four days a week.

Jacqueline Yang, director of All Souls Church and Community Center, says that rather than wait for broad government or private sector support, nonprofit organizations such as hers are attempting to bring the neighborhood back to life one family at a time.

From about 3 until 7 p.m., All Souls provides neighborhood children with tutoring and homework help, orchestra lessons, cooking lessons and dinner. A van service picks up the students from school and drops them off at home after dinner.

"Many of the students in our program attend M.L.K. Charter School and their parents work late into the evening," Yang said. "If kids can finish their homework and get in the routine of doing their homework, they start to understand the value of education, and education is the number one thing where we can break the poverty cycle."

A structured environment

Breaking that cycle starts with providing the students with structure. The building has 10 rooms, with three serving as administrative offices for the staff.

There are two large halls where program participants meet with instructors and volunteers for their homework sessions. Program such as this, Yang is convinced, steers children away from trouble in their free time.

Miracle on St. Claude Avenue: All Souls Church and Community CenterSeven years after Hurricane Katrina ravaged the Lower 9th Ward, the area's residents are still struggling to rebuild with the help of non-profit organizations who are inspiring the area's children to expand their horizons and reshape their community's future. All Souls Episcopal Church and Community Center is one such organization, running a free after-school tutoring program that serves up hope, structure and sustenance to more than 80 neighborhood students four days a week.

"They may just go outside and play, or they're going to go outside and deal drugs or get into trouble," said Yang. "At All Souls we are trying to prevent that and give them a foundation through finishing their homework and then having enrichment activities like cooking, music or sports."

The community center has a small staff with three full-time instructors who have taught English, mathematics and music on a college level at the University of New Orleans, Loyola University and Tulane University. The rest are former public school teachers, parents and volunteers from around the country.

Elizabeth Thomas was an English professor at UNO for more than 20 years and is now on the full-time staff as a tutor and librarian.

On a Tuesday afternoon she's sitting at a table between Jalil Gioustovia and Jayzon Washington, with books, pens, pencils and tablets sprawled across it. She's inside the library, where the bright yellow walls are covered with a large mural that was painted by the children.

The library has a complete catalog system with more than 1,200 books and is searchable by a computer in the corner of the room. It was all donated and set up by Trinity Wall Street Episcopal Church in New York City.

"I mentioned to them that the students could benefit from having a library and they came down in four teams to help me set it all up," said Thomas. "That's phenomenal to me. Trinity Wall Street has been a huge supporter of not only All Souls but this tutor program as well."

Both Jalil and Jayzon are reading on a seventh-grade level, which Thomas attributes to the amount of time and effort they put into their homework.

"Jalil's mom called me when he got his first-quarter report card and wanted to thank me for my participation in the tutoring sessions," said Thomas. "I felt like I couldn't take any of the thanks because he does so much on his own, and I'm really just being his support system."

MLK Charter School students benefit most

About 90 percent of those who attend the program are students of MLK Charter School. Although the school has no affiliation with the program at All Souls, the students are reaping the benefits.

Besides making sure the students complete their homework, the program provides various boot camps that teach the children to be more responsible.

One session, paid for with a grant from Second Harvest Food Bank, provides healthful meals to the students each day. The afternoon snack and dinner is served in a large, fully-equipped cafeteria and kitchen area.

After early particpants in the program left the cafeteria a mess, Yang devised a boot camp that taught the children how to clean up after themselves. Students now not only clean their area and the grounds of the center once dinner is completed, they also help Second Harvest unload and test the quality of the meals brought in each day.

"Kids had to learn to recycle trays, sweep the floor, take out the trash and take care of your area," Yang said. "That's what we're promoting here, and it's a huge responsibility for the students here."

Older students in the program, mainly seventh- and eighth-graders, also participate in a Second Harvest program called Cooking Matters. Three nutritionists take the students to the grocery store once a week and let them choose ingredients for healthy meals to prepare for themselves and their families.

"They've made turkey sausage and chicken gumbo, veggie quesadillas and hummus," Yang said. "These are types of food that they aren't exposed to here."

Strike up the band

Another enrichment program at the center is the Youth Orchestra of the Lower 9th Ward.

The orchestra is composed of 42 students ranging from 6 to 14 years old. They've been together for about two years and have had opportunities to perform throughout the city with the Tulane University Orchestra.

They recently traveled to Syracuse to perform on a local morning news show. Laura Patterson, executive director of the Youth Orchestra, says it's a haven for the children.

"We're providing them with role models and a safe space to come and let out positive energy," Patterson said. "And you know what? They also get to have fun."

The music staff comprises volunteers from the music department at UNO, the Louisiana Philharmonic Orchestra and local musicians.

"We have a staff of really wonderful teachers," said Patterson. "The kids love them and they love music, and a lot of them can't get enough of it."

All Souls' program is the brainchild of the Rev. Lionel Wright, the church's former pastor. The former owner of five McDonald's franchises in the New Orleans area, Wright started the program in 2009 with help from Trinity Wall Street Episcopal Church, Trinity Episcopal Church in New Orleans, St. James Episcopal Church in Baton Rouge and St. Michael and All Angels Episcopal churches in Dallas.

He's big on teaching kids healthier eating habits and thinks it's an important enrichment exercise for the kids.

"We had a summer camp teaching kids how to grow vegetables and make a fresh salad," Wright said. They loved it and ate every bit of it!"

Dr. Kevin Huddleston, director of mission and outreach at St. Michael's Episcopal Church in Dallas, came here to help renovate the All Souls building with Wright in its early stages. He believes that having Wright and the center is a huge thing for the Lower 9.

"They have someone who understands the community, and he's not willing to let them (have) a victim mentality," said Huddleston.

Wright gathered volunteers from St. Alvin's Episcopal Church of Ohio and students from Marquette University after the Episcopal Diocese of Louisiana struck a deal with Walgreens.

"Walgreens agreed to let us rent the building for $2 a year for 10 years," Wright said. "They also agreed to give us the opportunity to purchase the building at a favorable price after 10 years."

Huddleston points to Wright's work ethic.

"This guy has more energy than any human being alive," Huddleston said. "He's 72, looks 52, and acts like he's 22!"

'You see their whole world open up'

Wright, a 9th Ward resident before Hurricane Katrina, is committed to improving the quality of life in his old neighborhood.

"There has to be a new paradigm here, and that paradigm starts with knowledge," Wright said. "That's what kids are getting here through our enrichment programs."

The music program is part of the Harmony Project of New Orleans and is modeled after their Los Angeles organization. It has had enormous success using music to help nearly 1,500 kids become better students. Margaret Martin, who runs the project in Los Angeles, received the Citizens Medal in 2011 from President Barack Obama for her work with that program.

She sees the value of having these types of after-school programs for children living in less wealthy neighborhoods.

"After spending about six months with them, you see their whole world open up. Our program is working in communities all across America with about 95 percent of the students graduating high school and going to college."

Even with that type of success, programs like this still have to raise money and continue the programs without help from bigger educational institutions.

"We're thinking about having car washes and bake sales to help raise money for the programs," Yang said. "I don't think people out there realize how much money it takes to run both programs and offer it for free."

Although that fund-raising takes time and effort, Martin says they're keeping them going.

"The programs are committing to the kids at a younger age," Martin said. "They want to learn everything and learn it now."

Huddleston echoes the same message. He saw the after-school program at St. Michael's transform students in a low-income area of Dallas, once one of the local schools began partnering with their program.

It "was one of the worst-performing schools in Dallas, and now it's one of the best," Huddleston said.

All Souls is hoping their program can have that same effect on the children in the Lower 9th Ward.

"We want them to know that each and every teacher and volunteer loves them and wants them to do well," Yang said. "We want to see them grow and become responsible adults."

Prescotte Stokes can be reached at pstokes@nola.com.

 ©  NOLA.com. All rights reserved.

9th Ward rebuilds

Today, a group of volunteers helped clean trash and debris from several empty lots in the 9th Ward to allow forklifts to clear the land. The National Builders Association in partnership with the NFL is helping to construct brand new homes in an area devastated by Hurricane Katrina. The program is called, Touchdown for Homes.

Our new City Councilman, James Gray, was leading the cleanup effort accompanied by a PR entourage.

Monica

A dozen volunteers showed up at 9 a.m. to walk through tangles of brush and collect slate, old boards, styrofoam and trash. I recognized somebody who'd performed in a musical with me a couple of years earlier - Monica.

She sings in choirs at St. David's church nearby on St. Claude Avenue and at St. Louis Cathedral and lives in the Marigny.

We were done in a couple of hours, although the work is far far from done.

Here's where we're coming from.

"Hell of a job, Brownie."

Volunteers still arriving

Yesterday, I was taking a walk along the top of the levee all the way to the Domino Sugar refinery in Chalmette. It was a gorgeous day with warm sunsine and a refreshingly cool breeze. The day before I had seen two blue herons, a white pelican and a bunch of monarch butterflies. It's still a habitat for wildlife.

I walked briskly past a man who was wearing an apple green "Sustain the Nine" T-shirt. As I passed him, I said:  "Like your shirt." I assumed he was a 9th Ward neighbor. But he told me he'd bought it at the office of the Lower 9th Ward Center for Sustainable Engagement and Development, an agency located at the back of the Greater Little Zion Baptist Church on Chartres Street.

He was here helping to rebuild a woman's home, which was toppled seven years ago in the flooding after Katrina. A volunteer from Virginia, this is his first time in New Orleans. Others in his work group have come to the 9th Ward seven times to help.

A college friend asked me last week how the 9th Ward was coming along. Not too good, I said. If you drive from my house to Claiborne Avenue a short distance away, you pass many abandoned homes still with the marks left by the National Guardsmen searching for bodies. The land slopes down from the river and the homes were submerged deeper and deeper the further north you go. If homeowners did not have flood insurance, they probably evacuated and never returned. Some people waited years for help from FEMA and didn't have the resources - jobs where they continued to receive paychecks - or other places where they could temporarily live. They worked service jobs that went away when the tourists and conventions stopped coming.  All their family members' and friends' homes were also destroyed.

Another friend who lives in Palo Alto, Ca., asked why people live there? Well, they are poor, for one thing, and it was a solid community. Also, the area wouldn't have flooded if the Corps of Engineers hadn't first dynamited the Industrial Canal and then rebuilt the walls improperly. That wasn't the residents' fault.

It is interesting now to listen to news reports about Hurricane Sandy. Journalists confidently say that other cities have rebuilt after such disasters - take New Orleans, which is better than ever. That is true to some extent as many aspects of the city have improved over several long, slow years. But some neighborhoods are just the same. Sure, there are a few enclaves of rebuilding. My little Global Green development, for example, Habitat for Humanity, Brad Pitt's "Make It Right" and Preservation Resource Center homes. But most of the 9th Ward is still struggling along with pot holes in the streets, no grocery store and limited public transportation.

I don't know why people don't get what happened here in the 9th Ward. Maybe the events were too complex or too gruesome to want to understand. Maybe it is too difficult to think about like those poor Haitians who get hit every year - if not by hurricanes, then an earthquake.

New Orleans still needs help, y'all. It's a special place and deserves your support.

The other side of New Orleans

I live on the Misery Tour trail. I'm now in the 9th Ward, which was completely flooded for days following Katrina when a barge - that wasn't supposed to be in the Industrial Canal - hit the wall and sprung a leak.

But I'm not miserable. I am also in a Global Green house, built after the storm to demonstrate how housing could be constructed in an environmentally friendly way. So, now I am on the Recovery tour, as well.

Saturday morning, I looked out my front window and saw a phalanx of cyclists coming toward me atop the levee. I heard someone yell, "Now, we're going to see the green house." They must have had an appointment with an Americorps volunteer to tour the model house.

My house isn't as nice as the model, but it is energy-efficient with solar panels that reduce energy bills to almost nothing and water-saving devices. The five Global Green houses are raised a few feet off the ground just in case we get a lot of water. And they take advantage of being able to see the ships passing on the river.

Every night about 7 p.m., I can hear strains of jazz floating from the Natchez Riverboat dinner cruise. On Sunday evenings, I see the Norwegian Spirit take off for its Caribbean cruise.

Welcome to the neighborhood

The weather cooled down last weekend and I took my first walk around the new 'hood.

Some of the houses are very nicely kept and other places look like they were under water a short time ago.

House with FEMA trailer

I saw one house still with a FEMA trailer in the yard. Maybe the owners weren't living in the house at all.




Starting along the top of the levee, I walked with a regular who said he'd been taking this tour since he was a boy. I sat on a bench for a while and contemplated my life. I could hear roosters crowing behind one of the houses.

So many people have told me how much they loved this area. The river is part of it. The isolation has to be a factor. We're cut off. I keep getting caught by the drawbridge that lets boats pass through the Industrial Canal. You just have to wait - patiently.

I chatted with people as I walked around. They congratulated me on my new home and welcomed me to the neighborhood.

I know that I will see them again and that they'll remember me. That's something.

House with mural and escaping dog

Post-Isaac recovery process

Congregants at the All Souls Church meeting outside Sunday morning

After several frustrating days, I finally got power back - which means electricity, lights, air-conditioning, phone and Internet. I had out-of-town friends pleading for me to tweet, text, post, e-mail or phone, but could do none. I could hardly move, it was so hot and muggy, and I was having trouble figuring out what I could still eat. Isaac was "only" a Cat 1. I can't imagine Katrina.

I was suffering from a major bout of caffeine withdrawal until I realized the gas stove still worked. I had to go buy one of those Melita one-cup-at-a-time brewing cones from way back when. I threw open the windows and enjoyed the warm breezes off the levee and got a few things accomplished.

Cafe Dauphine

A couple of days after the storm, I hoped to get some errands done Uptown. I figured that neighborhood would be in better shape. But the bank was offline. Tellers came outside to get customers' deposits and give us handwritten deposit slips. I saw the security guard coming back from Walgreens with bags of supplies. Walgreens was sold out of insect repellent given everyone had been sitting outside on their porches to keep cool and getting bitten. Winn-Dixie had no ice. I looked for an Internet cafe, but there were no connections. Home Depot had just a few lights on. I'd hoped to take a shower at the health club, but it was shut down.

The cafe's owner despondent.

I wanted to get out of the house and the dark Saturday night, driving first to the Chalmette movie theater. Not only was it closed, but the entire shopping center was dark. I then went to the Old Mint to see a cabaret, but it wasn't happening. Though lights were on in the French Quarter, they stopped at Esplanade. Frenchmen Street would have been completely dark if it hadn't been for The Spotted Cat where Washboard Chaz and his band were playing and folks lindy-hopping thanks to a generator.

The house is still standing and we're alive. There are many power lines, telephone poles and trees down, blocking roadways, but signs of recovery are already in view. Last night, our local restaurant was giving away grilled food the owners had bought thinking the power might come on earlier. They were planning to drive around the neighborhood and give it away.

But, generally, everybody is okay. We all stop politely at traffic lights that don't work, drink warm beer and eat canned spaghetti while we wait for the electricity and garbage trucks.

I somehow volunteered to clean out a house in LaPlace today - grateful it's theirs and not mine.