i have lived in the greater new orleans area nearly my whole life–i was 11 when katrina hit and i have lasting memories but some exact details are a blur. at 28, ida was like katrina 2.0 in so many ways, when it made landfall, the quick escalation, how suddenly i was uprooted. for both storms, and many others in between, i evacuated with my parents. each time all you can do is prep n hope for the best, and maybe enjoy the road trip with just a weekend’s worth of clothes. evacuating during a global health pandemic adds layers to safely traveling, but after not seeing family for 2+ years, a forced family reunion in florida is a bit of a silver lining.
that drive up to your house/apartment when you return, anticipating the worst and still hoping for the best with bated breath. the outdoor cats who hide away long before the storm, they come trotting back crying for affection, food, water, because what you left out for them is long gone too. my apartment, one half of a shotgun duplex, was filled with mold, furniture wet and moldy, the air hot, light fixtures filled with brown water–the ceiling was on the floor. my landlord, a mid-30s white woman from the midwest who bought the 9th ward home after post-katrina house flips–she came out in a long, flowy dress to say, it’s not as bad as it looks. she didn’t evacuate, and let me know she grilled the meats in my freezer so they wouldn’t go bad. we came back once all the neighborhoods got power. i had told her at the beginning of hurricane season that rain was leaking through smoke alarms. she said she’d look into it but ultimately left it alone as she did with most of the house’s upkeep, because cosmetically it was fine. i’ll never understand if her nonchalance was to underplay the severity of my new housing situation, or was her own way of handling homeowner stress in southern louisiana. probably both, although her half of the house was unaffected, so she was running AC while i was worried any electricity would spark something on my (her) half of the house.
i spent the next few days cleaning and packing; mask on, hair up. moving swiftly to reduce time spent in a molded building, but moving so slowly as i sorted through what was unscathed by the mold. despite the incessant presence of mold on everything, i was unwilling to toss things aside, and simultaneously unwilling to keep things that could just be thrown away again next year when i inevitably will start over after another major storm. only a few of my belongings are truly precious and irreplaceable, but my time, my memories, my existence at this apartment is a root i’ve planted myself as i continue investing my life here.
it’s been over a year and my things are still crammed away in my parents house, moderately organized into heavy duty trash bags, milk crates, doubled-up paper grocery bags. even within the stress of cleaning and packing, there is a part of me that compartmentalizes and plans for the future me, in hopes that i can eventually unpack the contents of each drawer and cabinet dumped into a bag into a new drawer or cabinet, so that starting over and transitioning in a new house begins with more physical ease than it will emotionally. it could’ve been worse, but it could’ve been so much better. it could always be better.
-anonymous