It's a Beautiful Morning!

As I walked into the front room/library/temporary home office Thursday morning I saw a big Entergy truck driving slowly in front of the house. So what? Who cares? We need power in the back building, not the front. But wait! The billing address for the back building is on Grand Route! I ran out and asked him if he was looking for Apartment C -- and he was! Shortly he was stringing the long-awaited drop from the pole and we had enough electricity to power the refrigerator, microwave, and all the toys of modern civilization.

Satisfied that Thursday was going to be a good day, I went back into the house for breakfast. Sitting at the counter, I looked out of the back windows & saw -- Roofers! You don't realize how good roofers look until you've been waiting weeks to replace sheetrock, but afraid to start because a heavy rain might wash the temporary roof patch, and with it all the new sheetrock.

Apparently my several early-morning trips to the roofing company to ask when, oh when, would they start on the office roof finally took. All right!

Guerrilla Home Improvement

Early one morning two weeks ago I was driving from Baton Rouge to Lafayette on business. As Iurned onto Interstate 10 from Hwy 415 I saw a hitchhicker standing on the entrance ramp, looking pretty forlon. Not unusual. There are lots of older men trying to get across the country to a better opportunity. The grass is always greener...

I've got a soft spot for these guys, and if I've got the time and they don't look too dirty or dangerous, I'm likely to offer them a lift. Who knows, maybe this time they'll make it. Anyway, their stories are usually interesting.

So I pulled over & asked him where he was going. "Dallas."

"I'm only going to Lafayette, but you can catch I-49 from there." He threw his bag in the back seat & slid in. A tall thin man , he didn't look drunk or dangerous.

As I drove, he told me his story. His name was Michael Crook, on his way back home to Dallas from Bay St. Louis. A master painter who'd been lured to Mississippi with the promise of a $20/hour job, when he got there the guy said he'd hired a bunch of "wetbacks" and didn't need him, but if he wanted to hang around he'd pay him $8 or $10/hour. That wasn't what Michael had signed up for, so having spent all his money on a bus ticket down, he was hitchhiking back to Dallas.

We talked on. He told me he did plastering and sheet rock. He expounded on all sorts of technical minutie about different brands of paint and plaster. He really sounded like he knew his business. By the time we got to Lafayette I was trying to figure out how to hire this guy.

He gave me his sister's phone number & a few days later I called. It seems she's been helping Michael and his wife for some time when things get bad. I told her that I had some work for him and I'd pay his way back down here, but if he wasn't really skilled, then she would be doing nobody a favor by telling me he was, cause he'd just end up stranded in New Orleans with no way home. She assured me he was good at his craft.

So I sent the money; Michael caught the bus with his trunk full of tools and dropcloths; and here he is. He moved into the guest room in the cabana, the one room which is not a total wreck after the pecan tree fell through the roof, and started work last Friday. And yes, he does know his craft.

Where there were huge holes in our bedroom and hall ceiling, all is smooth and beautiful. Where there was mold, the surfaces were treated with bleach, sealed and painted. The attic was treated. The ceilings and walls are being painted, and we'll soon be on to start working on the office.

Things are looking up.

And Happy New Year

It's a warm New Year's Day in New Orleans. About 83 degrees F (28 C) and humid. And in case the Katrina debris still lining the streets weren't enough evidence of global warming, tropical storm Zeta, the last named storm of 2005, is still spinning around the Atlantic as the new year rolls in. Happy New Year, everyone. Let's hope 2006 is less eventful, eh?

The Times Picayune was loaded with interesting items today. It seems that the city is repopulating faster than expected, with 30% of New Orleans population returned already, and overall the greater New Orleans population is about 70% of the preKatrina total. That's a loss of almost 400,000 people, but it bodes well for the rebuilding, with so many people staying in the area, if not in the city proper.

Another article from the newspaper will be of particular interest to our German friends. (Our "German families"? That's how I think of them, connected as we are through Moritz & Philipp.) The Schleswig-Holsteinischer Zeitungsverlag newspaper chain in northern Germany, through an appeal to it readership, has raised over $150,000 in donations for New Orleans. This money will be spent to help Kingsley House, The Missouri Baptist Disaster Relief Fund, City Park, and needy individuals. It is yet another example of the help and kindness being extended to us by people from all over and in all situations.

Wherever we go, when we meet our neighbors and friends now returned home after the diaspora, we hear story after story of the kindness of strangers. People who knew nothing about us except that we were from New Orleans were quick to give or do anything they could to help.

There was a story in the paper several weeks ago about a group of African women who pooled their meager earnings to send a donation to the city to help the rebuilding. It is humbling to see how people have come to our assistance so many times and in so many ways.