A picture is worth a thousand emotions.

[Junket]

Ms. Rodgers suggested I put up a poster/collage of my past year, with emphasis on the work I did in New Orleans.

Now, I've been doin' really good in terms of the lost attachments I made while I was in AmeriCorps. Well, at least in comparison to how I could be doing.

My mind has been crazy busy the past 2 months with my new work at the school.

I have started a personal project that I'm trying to get the school to help with, which is basically locating Katrina/Rita survivors displaced to the Philly area and find ways to help them. I've already spoken to a 50+ year old couple about the possibility of assistance, but I can't make any promises, not yet.

It's a work in progress.

So as I was sorting through all my photos on kodak.com, picking photos that I want to put on the poster, of course I began to reminisce. Lots of pictures of the team, pictures of the destruction in NOLA and the gulf coast. And I came across this one picture that for whatever reason, just made me stop. It's a photo Amy took (before our relationship). On our first gut job. It's just me standing in the sun next to the trash pile at the end of the day staring down the street of the desolate neighborhood.

The picture: [URL=http://img12.imagevenue.com/img.php?image=24433_NOLA_122_451lo.jpg][/URL]


My emotions are a strange mix when looking at this photo. Feelings of omission, nostalgia, loneliness, struggle, and hopelessness...but not...it's just weird.

I dunno, I just felt the need to share that.

[cn176]

where? the pic

[vashti]

I wish you had posted a larger picture.

[Mathias]

I wish you had posted a larger picture.

Better than not posting a picture at all.

[vashti]

Actually, if you click onthe picture, you can get a better view. Awesome! It's amazing how good the house looks behind that pile of rubbish. Even the shutters are still intact. I wonder if they were able to salvage it.

[misombra]

wow. what do the letters and numbers on the other house stand for?

[Gigabitch]

Fras, I think I need you to come here and help me deal with my back yard. You're tough enough to look at it and say "Pffft! That's nothing!"

You're so damn cool.

[Junket]

wow. what do the letters and numbers on the other house stand for?

I don't remember all the specifics, or which number/letter was which, but main things were the Fire Department or Police Department which searched the house, number of bodies found...I forget what the other two were. I once saw a house with 8 dead bodies found...most have 0's.

Fras, I think I need you to come here and help me deal with my back yard. You're tough enough to look at it and say "Pffft! That's nothing!"

Y'know while I was down there, after the first week and a half, (right after I burnt out), I pretty much become jaded towards all the destrcuction. It just became a job, a job I was damn good at too. I took a lot of pride in my work. But I could no longer empathize with the victims, which is important, but risky for prolonged periods of time.

Sometimes I feel like there's a similarity between my service in NOLA, as a soldier's service in a war. Since I've been back, since I'm no longer surrounded by it, whenever I see pictures, hear about, or watch the destruction of NOLA, I get pretty emotional. Not outwardly, but it's like something in my chest just tightens. I know all of your emotions are processed and produced in your head, but it's one of the few times where I feel like it really strikes me in my heart.

That's why I'm trying to do what I can from up here, help the survivors here in my area, and trying to spread the word, remind people that there's still so much to be done. The rebuilding has only just begun.

[vashti]

Frasbee is going straight to Heaven when he dies.