Rita and Me

December 27, 2005 (rev January 29, 2006)

On September 24,2005, hurricane Rita came ashore just to the west of my parent's home in Lake Charles, LA, causing significant damage to the community and to their house. I was pressed into service to help them move and the following is a diary of my experience.

(click on thumbnails for larger versions of the photos)

Background: 1962 - 2005

My parents got married in St. Louis in 1962 and I came along around a year later. After living in Dallas and Wichita for a time, we moved to Lake Charles, LA in 1970 when my father took a position as an electrical engineering professor at McNeese State University. Following some time in a rental home on 422 West Lagrange St., my parents built a house in the Peyton Place subdivision just to the Southeast of the city limit off Highway 14. It was a nice 1,800 sq. ft. three-bedroom house on a full acre of land with a swimming pool and a concrete tennis / basketball court.

1962
1965
1966

1973 - a rare Louisiana snowstorm
1977

1973
1977
1979

1983
1988
December, 2001

November, 2003
Thanksgiving, 2003
April, 2005

The subdivision was named after the owner of the farmland upon which it was built and I'm not certain they were completely aware of the association with a similarly named series of books and movies dealing with the social and sexual dysfunction of postwar suburban America. Unfortunately for me, we were the first people in this young neighborhood to have a swimming pool and in the intense heat of that first summer I gained alot of neighborhood "friends" who were interested in my friendship primarily for my natatorial possession. Having interests that were more cerebral than athletic or gustatory, the abundant opportunities for and interest in outdoor activities were lost on me. Isolated from the city by a busy two-lane highway with no shoulder, there was no way to venture outside the neighborhood until I became old enough to drive. Also, as a multi-racial half-Asian child growing up in schools that were technically integrated but still intensely polarized on black / white lines, I did not quite fit in with either group and have a "people" to call my own. These factors, along with a hereditary disposition toward stubbornness, led me to the early development of a distrust of people and a penchant for self-sufficiency that has been a mixed-blessing throughout my adult life. I never entertained the notion of settling in Louisiana and upon graduation from high school in 1981, I left for school in Texas and only returned to Lake Charles for sporadic holiday visits thereafter.

Nevertheless, it was a generally safe and friendly neighborhood to grow up in. While most people in the neighborhood (then and now) left their lots largely bare to make lawn care easier, my father ringed the lot with young pine saplings and planted numerous hardwood and fruit trees - a choice that would come back to haunt my parents later.

As the years passed, my father became increasingly involved in electrical contracting in addition to his duties as an Associate Professor of Engineering. The extensive amount of attention needed to maintain the house received decreasing priority as his workdays became longer and longer.

This cycle culminated in 1994 with my father's catastrophic hemorrhagic stroke, probably caused by untreated high blood pressure and a family history of stroke. My father was initially not expected to live and ended up staying in the hospital for six months. He had handled all the physical maintenance of the house as well as all the financial affairs and the chaos of his life was reflected in the disorganization of all associated paperwork. This left my mother quite unprepared to deal with the maintenance of the home as well as overseeing his care at the hospital. Shirking my familial responsibilities, I continued my faltering acting career in New York City as my mother undertook the leviathan task of caring at home for a stroke victim. Surprisingly, mom managed to hold it together for 11 years, although the decline of the house and the disorder of it's contents steadily progressed throughout that time.

In 1975, my parents bought 70 acres of land in Salem, MO from my grandparents as a way of honorably supporting them in their old age. In the summer of 1976, my father and I built a small one-room cabin on that land, next-door to the crumbling remains of the two-room shack where my mother had grown up. Their one-room cabin became a vacation home when my parents would visit once or twice a year. In 2003, she contracted with a nephew to add an additional bedroom on the back. This investment turned out to be surprisingly prescient.

1976
1976

1976
2005

September 21, 2005 - September 24, 2005: The Evacuation

On September 14, my parents went to their vacation home outside Salem, Missouri, a tiny hamlet in a very isolated part of the northern Ozarks. Lacking detailed news about the hurricane brewing in the Gulf of Mexico, they set off for home on Wednesday, September 21. They spent the night in Sheridan, AR and decided to continue on home despite hearing about the hurricane on the news. Although I'm not entirely certain why my mother chose to return to Lake Charles, the stated reason was that she needed to get her vital documents and needed to get my father's prescriptions so they could be refilled.

As they made their way through Louisiana they encountered bumper-to-bumper traffic leaving in what turned out to be a mandatory evacuation order by the Mayor and Governor. However, they decided to press on and got in around 6PM on Thursday, the 22nd. They picked up their papers and immediately left - there would be no prescription refills at the closed Wal-Mart.

Unfortunately, the major artery through Southwest Louisiana is the east-west Interstate 10. The north-south roads are all two-lane, making a northward migration by a quarter million people very difficult. My mother remarked later that she had never seen anything like it in her life, with overheating cars, ambulances and roads becoming parking lots.

Alexandria, LA is normally a three-hour drive north, but on this evening it took them around ten hours. The traffic started to abate somewhat at this point and although my mother wanted to pull over and rest for awhile, my father would not allow her to sleep. Showing his diminished mental state, he even said that he would rather go back home and die there rather than evacuate. However, mom finished the drive to stay with friends in Homer, LA.

Because I was starting my first year teaching at a middle school in the South Bronx, my days were extremely long and I did not keep my cell phone on. My mother left a message right before they left Louisiana, but since she had lost her cellphone charger and did not keep her cell phone on anyway, I was not able to contact them as they made their way North. I finally heard from them Friday afternoon, when they had safely arrived in Homer and had rested a bit.

September 24, 2005 - October 1, 2005: The Storm

The hurricane came ashore early on the morning of Saturday, September 24, 2005, with the eye centered just to the west of Lake Charles. The hurricane cut a wide swath of destruction, effectively wiping a number of coastal towns off the map and causing extensive damage throughout Southwest Louisiana and Southeast Texas.

09/23/2005
09/24/2005

Numerous hurricanes had struck Southwest Louisiana over the half-century before Rita, but none had been overwhelmingly destructive or deadly since Audrey hit in 1957 with a 13-foot storm surge and winds gusting to 180 mph, killing 390. However, the death toll from that storm was largely due to the poor forecasting of the time (an era before satellites of any kind). The widely covered destructiveness of Katrina on the other side of the state gave Louisiana residents newfound respect for hurricanes. If anything good can be said of Katrina, it was responsible for the high evacuation rates for Rita less than a month later.

The bulk of the damage from Rita was related to wind. While low lying areas did experience flooding, Lake Charles is well above sea level and not subject to the levee breaches that proved so deadly in New Orleans. However, the wind destroyed large parts of the electrical grid and toppled thousands of large trees that seemed so invulnerable just days before. While the number of buildings that suffered structural damage from the wind was minimal, the wind caused widespread roof damage, subsequently resulting in interior water and mold damage.

11:13 10/04/2005
Sign-age was another common victim of the wind
11:13 10/04/2005
Downed power lines on Highway 14
11:23 10/04/2005
Seamed-steel roofs are normally considered more durable than shingles...but I guess you need some wood under it.

11:47 10/04/2005
The Hibernia bank building downtown is one of a handful of tall buildings in the city. Because of its proximity to the TV station, damage to it was featured prominently in news coverage of the area. But it was certainly not the most important or serious damage in the area.
11:50 10/04/2005
Numerous hotels were knocked off-line right at the time they were needed most. Piles of wet carpet and hotel furniture were a common sight.
11:51 10/04/2005
Recreational watercraft piled up against a damaged railroad trestle like so much cord wood

11:55 10/04/2005
Damaged pier on the east side of the lake, just north of the Civic Center
11:55 10/04/2005
Lake Charles is home to a number of floating casinos. The Harrah's was very severely damaged, prompting speculation of divine judgment.
11:59 10/04/2005
The Civic Center, on the East side of the Lake, was used to house Katrina victims. After Rita, it's voluminous parking lots were used as staging areas for emergency vehicles and office trailers.

12:00 10/04/2005
Lakeshore Drive littered with downed trees
12:07 10/04/2005
My mom's former dentist
12:11 10/04/2005
McNeese State, my dad's former employer. Many buildings had extensive water damage but were spared structural destruction.

12:12 10/04/2005
The hurricane stopped at the McDonald's playland and got a bit rough.
12:15 10/04/2005
Downed trees in a drainage ditch off McNeese Street.
12:16 10/04/2005
Used to be a convenience store.

12:19 10/04/2005
The Burton Coliseum. A totally redundant venue originally built for rodeos and later acquired by the university. Used to house Katrina victims and as a staging area for emergency equipment.
12:25 10/04/2005
My parents' post office. No mail today.
12:36 10/04/2005
Off Highway 14. One of the few houses that I saw that was blown apart by the hurricane.

17:28 11/28/2005
Prien Lake Road. McDonald's tall signs were especially vulnerable to the wind.
17:29 11/28/2005
Prien Lake Road. The canopies at filling stations seemed especially inclined to flying away.

17:30 11/28/2005
Prien Lake Road. It needed to be torn down anyway.
16:41 11/15/2005
12th Street

Meanwhile, my distraught parents were watching news coverage of the storm. Because most of the members of the press had evacuated as well, news from the area was slow in arriving. Because of the wide area affected, what little news came out was not specific enough to allow individuals to know the state of their own homes based on a few camera shots from outside the television studio. However, it was obvious that significant damage had occurred in the area and that few people would be going home anytime soon. A state of emergency and curfew was declared, limiting access to the area in order to prevent both injury and lawlessness.

September 27, 2005 - October 1, 2005: Refugees

Faced with this situation, made more difficult my my father's lack of mobility, my mother decided to retrace their trip from the north and return to their vacation home in Missouri. I was able to gain access to some information on the Internet via blogs that allowed the few people who were still in the area to share their observations. The area newspaper (The Lake Charles American Press) and the television station (KPLC-7) also had some information on their websites, although their ability to report was limited by the state of emergency and the impassibility of streets littered with tree limbs, shattered glass and downed power lines.

The storm downed a significant portion of the area's electrical infrastructure including lines in residential neighborhoods, lines to substations and generating plants. While initial fears were of outages lasting months, electrical crews from around the country converged on the area and managed to get a significant percentage of Calcasieu Parish back up within two weeks. However, faced with a sudden disappearance of revenue, staggering costs for repair, and the limited amount of available cash associated with newly "streamlined" and deregulated utility companies, Entergy declared bankruptcy on 9/23.

Most of us are only vaguely conscious of how dependent our modern lifestyles are upon a reliable source of electrical power. Aside from the need for electrical appliances for food preparation and storage, in my parent's case, power was also necessary to power the water well. Air conditioning has also become basically essential to combat the oppressive sub-tropical South Louisiana heat. Without electricity, my parent's home would have been uninhabitable, especially considering my father's condition.

Since it was obvious that my mother would not be able to drag my disabled father around a disaster area, I volunteered to take a reconnaissance trip the following weekend.

October 2, 2005 - October 5, 2005: The Reconnaissance Trip

As conditions in the city improved, parish law enforcement entered a "Look and Leave" phase with a dusk-to-dawn curfew. This was to prevent looting and supposedly anyone caught outside after dark would be hauled off to jail. There were also tales of helicopters with infrared detectors patrolling selected neighborhoods at night...maybe the rich folks on the other side of town. People that stayed in the neighborhood said they never saw any cops patrolling, although no one I spoke with in the neighborhood had any looting problem. Regardless, in the absence of electricity, grocery stores, gas stations and other essentials of contemporary life, the community was not capable of supporting thousands of returning evacuees.

I flew out of New York into St. Louis on October 2, rented a car, drove down to Salem to spend the night and then left for the 16-hour drive to Louisiana. Because of the curfew, it would not be possible to do the drive in one day and get in before dark. Because of the displacement of people, it would not be possible to get a hotel anywhere close to Lake Charles. So I decided I would simply pull over when I got tired and sleep in the car.

Paradoxically, the road trip was not entirely unpleasant, as I was accompanied by a new Sirius Satellite Radio receiver and had no rigid time constraints. I pulled off briefly to visit a couple of attractive Missouri springs and the Bill Clinton Presidential Library in Little Rock - which is adjacent to a fascinating, old, abandoned early 20th-century railroad bridge. I spent the night in the parking lot of a hospital in Winnfield, LA.

06:35 10/02/2005
Dawn on the Upper West Side
11:20 10/02/2005
Manhattan
18:05 10/02/2005
The first of many Burger Kings

19:38 10/02/2005
A valley in Northern Dent County, MO
10:30 10/03/2005
The Cabin
11:23 10/03/2005
Round Spring, MO

11:32 10/03/2005
Feed into the Current River
13:29 10/03/2005
Mammoth Spring, AR
17:15 10/03/2005
Abandoned railroad bridge near the Clinton Library

17:25 10/03/2005
Paying homage to my hero
06:03 10/04/2005
Overnight in Winnfield, LA
08:38 10/04/2005
Utility trucks

When I woke up early the next morning, I filled up with gas in Alexandria, LA, anticipating difficulty in getting fuel in Lake Charles. The attendant said he had only recently began receiving fuel shipments again, since his normal distributor was based in Lake Charles.

I got to Lake Charles early on Tuesday, October 4. Although I saw extensive damage and downed power lines on my way out to the house (about 5 minutes off the Interstate), I was surprised to see little observable external damage to the house. There were two large trees down in the front yard, but they fell away from the house, sparing would would have been catastrophic damage. The primary observable damage were patches of shingles that had been blown off the roof.

09:08 10/04/2005
Kinder, LA
09:43 10/04/2005
Lake Charles' Greenwich Village. Nothing like its namesakes in London or NYC...even before the storm.
09:44 10/04/2005
Dramatic power line damage on Highway 14.

09:48 10/04/2005
One of the nicest houses in the neighborhood. The wind caused a chimney collapse and extensive associated damage.
09:48 10/04/2005
My first view of the house
09:50 10/04/2005
The rear of the house

09:51 10/04/2005
Roof damage on the NE side
09:51 10/04/2005
No tennis today
09:51 10/04/2005
Old microwave TV antenna. They company went bankrupt years ago, so no one ever came to get the antenna.

12:50 10/04/2005
NE side roof damage
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SE side roof damage
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E side roof damage

12:51 10/04/2005
Downed trees in the front yard
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NW side roof damage
10:50 10/04/2005
Downed trees in the front yard

10:51 10/04/2005
Downed trees in the front yard
10:52 10/04/2005
S side roof damage
10:54 10/04/2005
Downed trees in the front yard

19:38 10/04/2005
Remarkably, the persimmons hung on through the wind. The squirrels came by later and got them.
19:39 10/04/2005
Shingles litter the West side of the house
19:40 10/04/2005
The wind blew down the last vestige of a wooden fence that used to surround the pool in back of the house.

19:41 10/04/2005
Downed trees in the front yard
19:41 10/04/2005
Downed trees in the front yard
19:41 10/04/2005
Downed trees in the front yard

As I entered the house, it became obvious that that the seemingly minimal external damage had resulted in a major internal problem. Water that had entered the house during the storm and rainfall on subsequent days had entered the ceilings and walls under the affected roof areas. This resulted in large and colorful patches of mold in my parent's bedroom, the living room and a bedroom used as a storage room. The "Den" and my old bedroom in the back of the house were unaffected, although the smell of the mold was very strong throughout the house. The mold in the master bedroom was especially attractive, with orange patches that observers said were completely novel to them. While there is a notorious black mold that emits deadly toxins, this did not appear to be that variety, since I was able to spend a considerable amount of time in the house over the next two months with no observable respiratory distress.

10:48 10/04/2005
Master bedroom
10:48 10/04/2005
Master bedroom
08:13 10/05/2005
Master bedroom

08:14 10/05/2005
Master bedroom
10:48 10/04/2005
Master bedroom
08:12 10/05/2005
Master bedroom

08:12 10/05/2005
Master bedroom
10:48 10/04/2005
Orange mold - folks said they'd never seen anything like it.
08:13 10/05/2005
Master bedroom closet

10:49 10/04/2005
Master bathroom
08:14 10/05/2005
Master bathroom
08:14 10/05/2005
Sewing room

10:48 10/04/2005
Sewing room ceiling
08:14 10/05/2005
Sewing room
08:15 10/05/2005
Foyer

10:49 10/04/2005
Foyer ceiling
10:49 10/04/2005
Living room ceiling
10:49 10/04/2005
Living room walls

08:11 10/05/2005
Living room
08:15 10/05/2005
Living room
08:15 10/05/2005
Living room

08:16 10/05/2005
Living room
08:16 10/05/2005
Living room
08:16 10/05/2005
Living room

08:17 10/05/2005
Living room
10:49 10/04/2005
Back hallway / laundry room
08:18 10/05/2005
Laundry room

08:17 10/05/2005
Hallway / laundry room
08:12 10/05/2005
Unaffected den
08:12 10/05/2005
Unaffected den

My two primary tasks then became putting a tarp on the roof to prevent further damage, and emptying the freezer to prevent a serious biohazard. I also spoke with my mother by phone and got instructions on what clothing, papers and photos she wanted brought back to Missouri.

FEMA and a number of other organizations were supplying reinforced blue plastic tarpaulins along with wooden slats and roofing nails for providing temporary roof repairs. These "Blue Roofs" began springing up all over town as people began slowly returning to the area to assess damage. I took a drive downtown to survey the damage to my parents' church (First Baptist Church) and was surprised to find the building was largely undamaged and serving as a distribution point for blue tarps which were the same type as the FEMA tarps but branded with the name of a Christian organization. My rental car was not large enough for the wooden slats, but I was able to get a couple of rolls of tarp and some roofing tacks and head for home. (For FBC, the initial relief turned to sadness as they ended up being diagnosed with a mold problem a few weeks later).

11:27 10/04/2005
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11:38 10/04/2005
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The freezer and refrigerator proved to be one of the more unpleasant jobs in a season that was filled with unpleasant jobs. The refrigerator hadn't been cleaned in perhaps 15 years and would have been a nightmare even in normal circumstances. Having sat for a week and a half with no power, the contents were quite aromatic. I got some heavy garbage bags from the garage and a pair of rubber gloves from the sink and started pitching. Nine fetid bags and two hours later, the job was done.

15:07 10/04/2005
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15:07 10/04/2005
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15:21 10/04/2005
That used to be a head of lettuce

16:33 10/04/2005
If you have any question why we discarded the freezer from the garage...
12:56 10/04/2005
I was surrounded staring bovines during the entirety of my travels. Maybe those Hindus are on to something.

With the invaluable assistance of a next-door neighbor, Charlie LeBlanc, I was able to get the Blue Roof on later that afternoon. Without the wooden slats and in the hands of two amateurs, the job was not as attractive or secure as might be desired, but it ended up holding for most of the next two months.

19:37 10/04/2005
19:39 10/04/2005
19:49 10/04/2005

I elected to sleep in the undamaged back bedroom that night. Much like much of the rest of the house, in recent years it had become more storeroom than bedroom. Lacking electricity or water and in 85 degree temperatures, it was a fitful night. Because the screens were not completely secure and allowed mosquitoes in, I was unable to open the windows. But I wasn't there to sleep and the evening and the morning were the first day.

08:18 10/05/2005
08:18 10/05/2005

The next morning, I took some additional photos of the interior and some shots of the damage to the neighborhood. Charlie pulled his trailer up and we joined our bags of refrigerator detritus for a trip to a household garbage pickup point. On the way back, we stopped at a mobile claims unit set up by State Farm to check on the status of his adjuster.

07:49 10/05/2005
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11:11 10/05/2005
I fell out of this tree and broke my arm when I was 12. Still standing tall.
12:09 10/05/2005
Pretty, isn't it?
12:13 10/05/2005
Nothing quite like a cooling mud bath

Having done all I could reasonably do, I left for the return trip to Missouri around 1PM. As I was leaving, the electrical service trucks began repairing downed lines in the neighborhood. Interestingly, a satellite was simultaneously snapping a photograph of our neighborhood. If I'd been a day later, I would have had power.

12:38 10/04/2005
10:55 10/05/2005

12:13 10/05/2005
10/5/2005
Satellite view of our blue-roofed neighborhood

On my way out of town, I took some additional shots of the chaos.

12:29 10/05/2005
My high school football stadium. No night games this season.
12:31 10/05/2005
The bell won't be ringing any time soon
12:36 10/05/2005
Note sign for a roofing company using a number deceptively close to the FEMA Blu-Roof program number

12:40 10/05/2005
Folks lined up for free food from a church. It's hard to eat at home with no power or refrigeration.
12:41 10/05/2005
People lined up at the main post office trying to get their mail.
12:42 10/05/2005
The other side of the post office.

12:43 10/05/2005
Somehow I don't think she will have to worry about that overdue library book.
12:44 10/05/2005
A downtown office...intact except for missing windows.

October 6, 2005 - October 23, 2005: Waiting

Having always hated the predominantly two-lane drive northward through Louisiana, I elected to return to Missouri via I-10 to Baton Rouge and I-55 north through Memphis. This does make the trip a bit longer but it requires less stress than constantly having to pass logging trucks in timber country. Following a night at Knights Inn somewhere in Mississippi, I pulled in to Salem on the afternoon of October 6.

13:00 10/05/2005
Those ubiquitous utility trucks
08:39 10/06/2005
Knight's Inn
15:03 10/06/2005
Americans do have a trouble with apostrophes

15:55 10/06/2005
Take me home, country roads...
08:13 10/07/2005
More staring bovines.
10:14 10/07/2005
Breakfast

My mother was somewhat relieved that the house had not been completely destroyed, although I'm not sure she completely grasped the extent of the mold damage and the fact that solving the problem would require, essentially, gutting and completely renovating the house. Although her comments seemed to indicate a desire to return to her home, the trauma of the evacuation (as well as memories of a less chaotic evacuation for Lily in 2003) seemed to have loosened her previously stubborn refusal to move into a less maintenance-intensive living situation. She compared her situation to Abraham and suggested that perhaps, "This was a sign. That it was time for a change." We agreed that the best course of action would be for them to stay in Missouri until it was safe to return to Lake Charles and make arrangements for a temporary or permanent relocation.

11:04 10/07/2005
Dent County Courthouse, Salem, MO
15:04 10/07/2005
Lambert Field
16:35 10/07/2005
Lambert Field

19:39 10/07/2005
Charlotte, NC
23:05 10/07/2005
LaGuardia
00:25 10/08/2005
Manhattan

I returned to New York and gave two-weeks notice to my school, putting a premature end to a long seven-week career as a middle-school math teacher in the New York City Public Schools. It was a mixed blessing since my teaching experience had been quite difficult. While first-year teaching is always unspeakably hard, I was team teaching an inclusion class of mixed special-ed and regular-ed students. The driver behind inclusion is that the observation that special-ed students perform better when placed in a situation that provides additional special-ed support but is more like a regular class than the stigmatized special-ed-only classes. In practice, since most special-ed disabilities manifest themselves in discipline issues, inclusion ends up being a dumping ground for the school's behavioral problems. Dealing with that kind of student requires a very special kind of personality that is oriented around people and is comfortable dealing with constant conflict... something I don't have.

Thankfully my co-teacher was a seasoned veteran capable of handling the discipline issues in those multitudinous situations where I was over matched by a room of screaming urban 12/13/14-year-olds. But my life was miserable and it was obvious from the assessments that I was not teaching them anything. Success in this situation would have required me making a considerable change in my way of thinking...something I was not prepared to do. While it was a violation of the trust placed in me by my principal, my students and my colleagues, I had a legitimate excuse for jumping ship and I took it. However, this did entail jumping out of the frying pan and into the fire...and Karma be swift.

On October 17, I got a call from one of my parent's neighbors saying she had heard that FEMA was providing trailers to people who weren't able to get back into their homes. I called the number she gave me, but was told that I would have to apply in person.

Also around this time I was contacted by Mary Kate, a FEMA contracted adjuster who wanted to get into our house to verify the damage. Aside from keys, she needed my mother to sign some kind of release form, a difficult prospect since they were nestled deep in the Ozarks and access to a Fax machine would be difficult. Since my parents and I were far from Lake Charles and no one in the neighborhood had the keys to our home, I told her there was no way to let her in until we got back to town. Mary said she was on a tight deadline but would see what she could do. I never heard from her again.

October 23 - 26, 2005: Back To Louisiana

My new life as a novice aid worker started off with a bang. I have hated flying for years and have used Amtrak whenever possible. But since I was going one-way to an extremely remote area, the logistics of ground travel became somewhat complex. The plan was to take Amtrak overnight to Chicago, take a nine-hour Greyhound bus from Chicago to Rolla, MO, and finish off the trip with a one-hour cab ride to my parents' farm in Salem. When my uncle heard about this plan, he insisted on picking me up at the bus station in Rolla, which would save a rather chunky cab fare, but introduced some potential problems since he did not have a phone and my parents' farm is out of cellphone range.

The problems started when the train to Chicago was delayed four hours due to freight congestion caused by damaged track that was caused by a derailment. This caused me to miss the bus connection to Rolla. I left a message on my mother's voice mail, hoping she would be able to contact my uncle so he wouldn't be waiting at the bus station in vain. Since I figured it was best to keep moving, I took the Texas Eagle train to St. Louis. But since it would not arrive until 8PM, the next bus I could catch to Rolla didn't leave until 3AM with a nasty 5:30AM arrival time. But...keep moving.

15:25 10/23/2005
Penn Station, NYC
16:21 10/23/2005
The Mighty Hudson
16:23 10/23/2005
More Hudson

07:54 10/24/2005
Nighttime on the Lakeshore Limited
09:02 10/24/2005
Rural Indiana
10:49 10/24/2005
Trailers!!! Perhaps for us?

14:15 10/24/2005
Union Station, Chicago
15:49 10/24/2005
Union Station, Chicago
15:50 10/24/2005
Union Station, Chicago

The train to St. Louis was uneventful, although the Viewliner cars (unlike Superliner cars used on East-coast routes) do not have electrical outlets, making it impossible for me to do any work on my laptop. A lady on the train from St. Louis was not entirely certain where the bus station was, however I wondered whether it could be accessed via the Metro light rail that is a block away from the train station and she said that might work. On arrival in St. Louis I began walking to the Metro station and was followed by a pesky homeless guy who, thankfully, ended up being harmless.

Although there was a Metro employee at the station and a number of people waiting for the train, no one seemed to know where the bus station was. One gentleman suggested the convention center stop on the train, and finally, a nice lady said her bus passed right by it and she would show me the way. The weather was starting to get cold and the bus took about half an hour to arrive, but... keep moving.

Taking Greyhound is a unique cross-cultural experience for those of us who try to remain cloistered in middle-class existence. All the folks that can't afford cheap air fairs take buses, as well as people from all those remote rural towns that aren't serviced by air travel. The bus station was a converted 1927 Cass Bank building that turned out to be nowhere near a Metro stop. The initial impact of the relatively well-preserved rococo bank interior, inhabited by the huddled masses (including a family of Amish) and lit by garish modern (sodium) lamps (i.e. street lamps) was somewhat overwhelming, considering that I was at diminished mental capacity from 30 hours of travel. I bought a ticket and tried to get some sleep (on seats designed to keep people from sleeping on them). Finally, around midnight, I decided to give into biology, take a cab to a hotel room, and... stop moving.

The Econo Lodge was a dirty but good choice, I got up at 7AM and took a cab back to the bus station and got on the 9AM bus...which was 30-minutes late. My 55-pound bag was 5 pounds over the weight limit and I pulled out some books to save myself $25 (clandestinely replacing those books before boarding the bus). However, I was not entirely certain what I would do when I got to Rolla. I had left a message on my mother's voice mail about my approximate arrival time and in transit to Rolla she got the message and left a message for me that she would come pick me up...if she could find the bus station.

08:26 10/25/2005
Econo Lodge, St. Louis
08:49 10/25/2005
Jones Dome, St. Louis
08:51 10/25/2005
Eads Bridge?, St. Louis

09:17 10/25/2005
Bus Station - 1927 Cass Bank Building, St. Louis
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Bus Station
09:22 10/25/2005
Bus Station

Turns out, the bus station was a parking lot in back of a McDonald's just off the interstate. There are very few people that take the bus to Rolla and, accordingly, no one knows where the bus station is...because there is no bus station. So, my mom is driving around Rolla, asking folks in stores where the bus station is and getting contradictory answers. I asked a cashier at the McDonald's, got the name of the street in front of the restaurant and called mom. However, I misunderstood the street name I was given and when she didn't show up in 15 minutes, asked again and got the correct name. Finally...48-hours later we had contact, and drove back to Salem, packed up the car and, via the Hilcrest in in Sheridan, AR, headed back to Louisiana.

Wednesday, October 26, 2005

We got to Lake Charles in the late afternoon and as my mother surveyed the damage, my father settled into his recliner and began watching TV as if nothing had happened. Our next door neighbor had contacted me a few weeks before about clearing the two trees in the front yard and he had made good on his word, although the stumps were still there and waiting to be grounded down.

18:19 10/25/2005
Mammoth Spring, Arkansas
17:42 10/26/2005
Yet another Burger King

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Home...kinda
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Yes, it's spreading
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Stumps...

19:43 10/26/2005
Stumps...
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Stumps...
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Stumps...

In preparation for the trip I had searched on line for available hotel rooms but the closest I could find was a Super 8 in Natchitoches, about two hours north. My initial plan was to drive to Natchidoches on Wednesday and then be able to have pretty much a full day in Lake Charles on Thursday. However, my mother wanted to get to Lake Charles as quickly as possible so we got into town on Wednesday but were only able to spend a couple of hours looking around before having to leave again for the drive back up north.

My father doesn't handle driving after dark very well and becomes quite agitated in the back seat, constantly asking, "How far???" and responding to any explanation, no matter how reasonable, "Too far!!!" The drive is made even more unpleasant by his insistence on cranking the heat up, regardless of the outside temperature. When he insisted on going to the Super 8 in Lake Charles, we drove by. The large pile of storm-damaged carpet and furniture in the parking lot should have satisfied my father, but in his diminished mental state, he did not seem capable of completely understanding the situation.

We stumbled in to Natchitoches around 10PM. Since my father insists on having three meals a day, regardless of the schedule, my mother and I had to go to a grocery store and pick up some nasty sandwiches. Upon returning to the hotel, I declined the evening meal and went to bed.

Thursday, October 27, 2005

As we drove back down to Lake Charles, we jotted down the names of some promising looking hotels along the way that were closer to home. The extensive commute left us with very little time, but as my mother ran some errands around town, I tried calling a number of hotels in the Lake Charles area. Around half of them were closed due to storm damage and the others were booked solid for weeks with evacuees. Thankfully, the Stagecoach Inn in De Ridder (about an hour north of town) had available rooms and I booked a few nights.

11:26 10/27/2005

One of my mother's nephews had agreed to consider coming down from Missouri to do the repair work on the house. He drove in on Thursday to scout the house and went back to DeRidder with us that evening.

Friday, October 28, 2005

When we got up, my cousin came over to discuss the work on the house. His gave us a very reasonable rough estimate with a prediction of two months of work...once he was able to get materials and get started.

I tried calling the hotels again and, to my surprise the Microtel had a vacancy for a week. In perhaps my stupidest and most inexplicable move of this whole experience, I only took three days of that vacancy and I would rue that conservative choice with every futile exploratory call over the next month.

With my mother taking my father to a doctor's appointment, I rolled the refrigerator and freezer out into the front hard for a chlorine shower. The odor was less from decomposed food than from some kind of aromatic spice or spicy fluid that had been revived by the heat. The garden hose spray and chlorine solution got rid of alot of the smell, but neither unit was ever quite right. The chest freezer in the garage had a terrifying brown liquid in the bottom when I visited earlier and I did not even attempt to clean it.

Throughout our six weeks in Lake Charles, one of the major problems was finding something to eat. Most of the restaurants and grocery stores received some level of damage and were having problems finding staff (for reasons discussed later). Mom loves Wal-Mart because you can get everything in one place, and it's comparatively cheap. Although I avoid them because of their predatory business practices, meager payment of associates and virulent anti-unionism, it's hard to argue with her logic. However, centralizing retailing in a few large buildings has the unintended consequence of removing the redundancy needed for disaster tolerance. Damage to the Highway 14 Wal-Mart (my mother's fave) instantly removed alot of critical retailing capacity from the city. The Nelson Road Wal-Mart, which was relatively intact, became Mecca for desperate area shoppers and that resulted in a continuous traffic nightmare reminiscent of the week before Christmas. Thankfully, other grocery stores came back on line within a couple of weeks and I was able to retain some level of progressive dignity while satisfying my shopping needs.

Restaurants were a different story. With lots of folks living in hotels and trailers, eating out became a regular way of life. But like the grocery stores, many restaurants were also damaged and having problems finding staffing. Adding to the problem was my father's finicky eating habits, which led us to eat a tremendous amount of Arby's gelatinous ersatz "roast beef." I will not be willfully eating at an Arby's again any time soon and I can be thankful that they are hard to find in Manhattan. We also were frequent patrons of Fire Mountain (a bulimia buffet), Hunan Buffet (Hunan is Chinese for eating disorder) and Piccadilly Cafeteria (loved by geriatrics all over the south). While I was quite content to grab a sandwich and get back to packing, the folks cherished their "good meals" and the added complexity of transporting and feeding my father could suck a good two hours away from the day's work.

Friday was our first and only visit to the local FEMA assistance center, located in the gym of an abandoned Baptist church just south of downtown. With their core constituency moving further away from the city center into bright new suburban homes, Trinity Baptist made a strategic choice to abandon their traditional downtown building and construct a new church further South. They had just built a new "Family Life Center" (i.e. gym) in the late '70s and in the mind of someone who left town about that time, it was still a new building. But it was now outdated and abandoned and it was odd to walk in and take the time trip.

We had heard about the potential availability of temporary trailers for evacuees and this was confirmed. However, the representatives were not able to give us any time frame or a firm commitment when or if we would ever get a trailer. Oddly, the fact that my father was handicapped and a veteran (albeit of the South Korean Army) was supposedly criteria that would push us up on the list. The fact that we had land that could be used to house the trailer was also a plus. Trailers set up in "FEMAville" trailer parks would take another four to six months to get set up and another FEMA rep who was passing by suggested that these would not be desirable places to live due to crime - perhaps coded language.

15:43 10/28/2005
17:38 10/28/2005

We also found out how FEMA assistance would work:

The first tier of assistance was the expedited $2,000 in emergency aid that I had applied for on line. Supposedly that money was deposited directly into my parents' account and was supposed to help with the expenses of evacuation.
Second, whatever personal insurance would cover, FEMA would not cover
Third, everyone needed to apply for a low interest loan, which would be administered by the Small Business Administration regardless of whether the applicant was a business or not. If qualified, the loan would cover expenses not covered by personal insurance. But as a loan, it would have to be paid back.
Finally, if declined for a loan, supposedly, FEMA would then actually start paying cash in the form of grants.

Since my parents were well insured and anticipating an equitable settlement, the loan was unnecessary and, therefore, we could expect no help from FEMA except for, possibly, a temporary trailer. The loan application was, in fact, a loan application with the customary intrusive questions. Although over the next few weeks my mother often considered going through the loan process, ultimately we deemed it unnecessary.

Staying in a hotel room with my father is not a restful experience. He wakes my mom up once a night needing assistance to go to the bathroom. And regardless of when he or my mother gets to bed, at 6:00 AM each morning he insists on getting out of bed to watch TV. While this is an unpleasant but tolerable problem when the TV is in another room, it is very difficult to sleep with the sound of chirpy morning anchors and the flash of the idiot-box glow.

With that in mind, I chose to brave staying in the back bedroom while the folks went to the Microtel. Again, it was a bit warm and the odor wasn't pleasant, but my first solid night's sleep in a week proved to be quite refreshing.

Saturday, October 29, 2005

Saturday was notable for a visit from the Allstate house adjuster. For some reason, this event required corresponding with five different insurance adjusters: A house adjuster, a mold adjuster, a home contents adjuster, and an extra living expenses adjuster.

The housing adjuster was a very gregarious older gentleman from Arkansas who was contracted by Allstate. The legend going around the neighborhood was that you would get a better deal from contractors (who were paid on commission) rather than Allstate employees (who were incentivized to keep claims as low as possible). The adjuster took copious notes as he examined the house carefully. His most notable comment was as he was reviewing our policy: "Aw, man... You need to up your insurance!"

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The mold adjuster contacted us a few days later from Florida and given the extent of the damage documented by the house adjuster and in my photographs, gave us the maximum $10K.

The living expenses adjuster contacted us some time later and ended up giving us a modest lump sum. We were not required to send him receipts.

The contents adjuster was the final person to contact us. Despite the amount of water damage to the house, most of the meaningful contents of the house were spared. My mother related the conversation she had with the man, who seemed quite relieved to be speaking to someone pleasant and seemingly honest. People were throwing out perfectly good stuff and claiming losses. Adjusters were being threatened by irate claimants and that one had even been kidnapped and had his car burned. Apparently, the criminal element that had been uprooted from New Orleans and dissipated around the country was taking root in it's new surroundings. He echoed a refrain that can be heard from many people around the world: "What you see on the news is not what's going on."

Over the 34 years that my parents lived in that house, they accumulated a tremendous amount of material, much of which they had forgotten they had and had no use for keeping. However, both parents were "collectors" that, when given the choice to keep or throw away, would almost always keep. It was a hereditary tendency since my grandmother packed her house full before having to be forcibly taken to a nursing home in her late 80's. Clean out of the house was something I had been dreading since my father's stroke and, in some ways, it felt good to finally be getting it over with.

Sunday, October 30, 2005

Sunday was the cleanout day for the attic and the first of two outdoor storage sheds. Both were hot, noxious jobs. Unfortunately, I neglected to take "before" shots of either area, but I can say that raccoon droppings look very similar to dog crap.

The shed cleaning allowed me to revisit a couple of old motorcycles that my father had bought in the mid '70s. He had some kind of arrangement with one of his engineering students that bartered for an old Honda C110 series 50cc street bike for me and a Suzuki 250 two-cylinder, two-cycle bike for him. The Honda 50 was fun for a 12-year old, but was no match for the 70cc dirt bikes that my neighbors owned. While they were happily risking their necks driving across the rice field, I was stuck on the streets deathly in fear of being accosted by the State Troopers that would sporadically patrol our neighborhood. Dad's Suzuki 250 never worked quite right despite considerable work by him and the guy who gave it to him. Over the years I had hoped to give these bikes away to someone who had an interest in classic machines. But it turned out that the gas tank on the Suzuki had corroded and given the wretched state of the Honda, they now became not treasured machines but toxic garbage that I had no idea how to get rid of.

My first payback for not taking the week at the Microtel was having to drive my parents to Alexandria, the closest I could find a hotel. Because my mother has very poor vision at night, I had to do the driving and the subsequent commute chewed up alot of time.

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Monday, October 31, 2005

On the way to our confirmed reservations in Alexandria, I noticed a number of vacancy signs in Kinder, LA - a boomtown that has sprung up around the Coushatta Indian Casino half an hour Northeast of Lake Charles. On the way back, I was able to get the folks a couple of nights in the Kinder Inn, an establishment that had just recovered from minor storm damage.

The tennis court had been the bane of my existence for three decades. My father used to force me to play tennis with him, which I hated at the time and which contributes to my distaste for the game to this day. I had a colleague in High School who derided me as being "rich" for having a tennis court - thus demonstrating the strange values system I endured during my youth and also demonstrating a lack of knowledge about the comparatively small cost of laying a recreational concrete slab. As the house declined in the late '80s, my father inexplicably used the court for storing bricks, sand and gravel. Weeds and fire ant nests began to grow through the cracks and by the early '90s it had been largely recovered by nature. In 2003 when I hauled a number of the bricks off to build a pathway behind the house, I unwittingly exposed myself to poison ivy, resulting in a very unpleasant rash on my arms for the next two weeks. There's not much you can do about poison ivy except allow the affected skin to peel off. Zanfel seemed to help some, although I developed a secondary allergic reaction to that cleaner after using it for a few days.

With all this in mind, I had revenge in mind as I hoped to clear off the court on Monday. However, the task was much too large to do by hand as just hauling off the sand and gravel would have taken a day to do with a wheelbarrow. I did clear off some of the weeds and old wood, but upon encountering a young copperhead preparing for winter, I reluctantly retreated from my effort. My next door neighbor brought his tractor and box blade over to demonstrate what could be done if we paid him, but another neighbor ultimately volunteered to do the cleanup along with a much needed cleanup of the rest of the yard in gratitude for all that my father had done for him in the years before.

My defeat led me to realize that part of my distaste for Lake Charles was the presence of so much flora and fauna that was trying to hurt me, all exacerbated by the oppressive heat and humidity that blankets the area for most of the year. All stuff we don't have in the more temperate urban areas I have come to love:

Poison ivy, oak and sumac
Poisonous Snakes
Fire ants
Mosquitoes
Wasps
Biting flies

The retreat from the tennis court did give me time to start cleaning out the cabinets in the garage that had been used for storing paint, automotive fluids and other toxins. As with the rest of the house, there was stuff in there that had been forgotten since the '60s...including my father's diplomas!? Although I could have taken the low road and bagged the stuff up for FEMA to haul off, I started a collection on the driveway in hopes of finding some more ecologically sensitive destination in the future. I never found such a place and our contractor ultimately had to volunteer to deal with it at some point in the reconstruction.

1979
2005
What a difference 25 years makes.
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Scavengers
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Succotash dinner

Tuesday, November 1, 2005

Up there with the cleanout of the fridge, the cleanout of the main shed was pretty damned unpleasant. This had been my father's work shed when I was growing up. Upstairs was a small attic play area where I spent numerous nights of fantasy of places far beyond Lake Charles.

As my father's activities kept him away from home more and more, this shed degenerated into a storage area and home for small furry animals. The garage also became a storage area for large piles of equipment for his contracting work, making it almost impassible for walking, much less parking a car. When he had his stroke, I boxed up and transferred much of this garage material into the shed - discovering the bones of a mother possum and four babies along the way. Somehow, leaves also began settling in this area building up a carpet of humus over the concrete to go with the animal droppings.

Into this scrum I descended armed with shovels and dust masks. Although I had hoped to be able to sort the hardware for potential sale later, the poor condition and intermingling with garbage made the task much too difficult and, ultimately, futile. I dragged and scooped the material into a wheelbarrow loads and hauled most of it to the curb.

Fall, 1972
Fall, 2005
10:35 11/01/2005

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Voila!
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The upstairs playroom
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With my folks somewhat closer in Kinder, I was able to stay at the house and experience a few peaceful moments of rest and Elysium.

Wednesday, November 2, 2005

When the world was young, the clouds of mosquitoes drifting over from the drainage ditches and rice fields made it very difficult to enjoy the comparatively mild evenings outdoors in the Spring and Fall. Our neighbors built a recreational screened in patio behind their home and used it to great effect. My mother always wanted one and my father started a somewhat more elaborate one with multiple sliding glass doors and ceiling fans. However, he only partially completed it before his stroke and, as with pretty much every other space in their house, it became primarily a storage area for plants and gardening tools.

Wednesday was the day for cleaning up the patio, although disputes arose with my mother on my desire to basically put everything on the curb rather than have to pack and haul a lot of dirty stuff around to a new home. Ultimately, I was able to get most of it disposed of, although she insisted on moving a number of heavy, dirty and fragile clay pots.

17:29 11/02/2005
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Wednesday was also the day for a visit from a Realtor regarding sale of the house. Joan Johnson was an agent from Flavin Realty recommended by a neighbor. She looked over the house and made numerous observations and positive recommendations for the reconstruction:

It was a seller's market before hurricane and although no one was certain what would happen after the hurricane, the speculation was that with numerous people both from the area and from Cameron (which was almost completely wiped off the map) will be looking for new houses.
When she researched the neighborhood, she found it to be extremely stable. Only one house had been sold in the last three years.
As with many people who saw the house, she really liked the brick
She suspected that the mold we were seeing on the walls was not the toxic black mold that can cause death and sends lawyers into a tizzy. But without further confirmation, it was better to be misled than dead.
Paneling and wallpaper are no longer fashionable. They also covered the walls of a large portion of the house. Although many of the walls now needed to be gutted to remove the mold, mom really liked the paneling and thought, perhaps, a potential buyer might have similar tastes to hers and would not be concerned with trends in interior design. I disagreed, but it's her house.
We had become so used to the rice field next door that we never really thought much about it. However, it does introduce some unknowns both as an area for future (undesirable) development and for the absence of protection from strong storm winds that could come sweeping down the plain unabated by other buildings.
Lowered kitchen ceilings were a strange period feature of early '70s houses. Mom loved hers and they do give the kitchen a more intimate feeling. But some might call it claustrophobic, and she consented to having our contractor raise the ceiling during reconstruction.
Ultimately, the mantra in selling an old home is "Don't do more than you need - you may not get money back." It's a nasty balancing act because if you don't do enough you might have a harder time selling and/or be unable to get the price you want.
Beige or taupe paint is preferred over white for walls.
Laminate floors are cool, but expensive.
The marketable square footage only includes the heated area, not the garage or patio.

Interestingly, she pointed out that the biggest drawback to the area was the quality of the schools (Fairview / F.K. White / Lagrange), since the more attractive growth areas are on the Southwest side of town. In the polarized climate of suburbia, this may also have been code for race as our side of town was and is much more integrated than the more affluent areas.

Ms. Johnson later passed on to me the name of an Environmental Inspector (who is a member of Industrial Hygiene Association and has a CRMI Certification) who could come into our house during renovation and give us some indication of the level of remaining mold in the house. He would come in after the demolition and chlorine treatment but before reconstruction to take two indoor samples, one outdoor sample, maybe one surface sample. After the results were processed in a lab, the resulting 30-page report would, basically, indicate whether mold was in one of three level categories: background, above background, or way above background. While he could not guarantee the absence of mold (which is impossible since there is mold everywhere), his job was to provide quality assurance...and give the new buyer some indication that the cleanup was done right.

Right around the time the Realtor arrived, I got a call from the Allstate adjuster. The initial assessment of our damage was quite generous and above the initial estimated cost of the repairs. Financially, at least, the folks might actually end up a bit ahead of where they were before the storm.

For a number of years, my mother had mentioned Ruston as a place she might like to relocate. Although I had always hoped she would move back to Missouri to be closer to her remaining family, she insisted that the limitations of my father's state health plan necessitated staying in Louisiana. On their frequent trips to Missouri, they always passed trough Ruston and she always though it looked like a nice place to live. Now was the chance to explore that possibility.

Supposedly, FEMA would be hauling away damaged materials if placed on the curb. The stuff was starting to create a truly fearsome pile and I was growing concerned about what would happen if FEMA never showed up.

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Thursday, November 3, 2005

Much to my father's consternation, we drove to Ruston after dark on Wednesday night. I had explored Realtors on the Internet earlier in the week and set up an appointment with a Realtor in West Monroe for Thursday and in Ruston for Friday.

Prior to meeting with the Realtor, we drove around West Monroe to get a feel for the place. Although my mother had been told by neighbors that West Monroe was a nice place to live, what we saw was thoroughly unimpressive, at least in our price range. My father has become deeply negrophobic in his dotage and I also discovered he is deeply repulsed by houses with drainage ditches in the front yards - something quite common even in nice suburban Louisiana neighborhoods. I also discovered that my mother was insistent on having a garage, something surprisingly rare in homes under $200K.

The Realtor was surprisingly unfriendly and gave us some listings in our price range that we could view for ourselves. West Monroe has experienced significant growth over the past few years and the response has been feeble attempts at gentrification with modest new homes being build in older, less desirable neighborhoods. Compounding this issue is the presence of a very odoriferous paper mill just south of town.

The one nice thing to come out of the meeting with the Realtor was introduction to a very nice lady who discussed financing options with us. It is possible to get a "Bridge Loan" to finance a new house until your old house is sold. However, given my parents' excellent credit, options like just getting a regular mortgage and paying it off early might be cheaper. Later, we found out that one of my aunts was having problems with her bridge loan because she was unable to sell her old house, so this scared my mother away from serious consideration of this option.

Despite my mother's distaste for apartments (which I think would be perfect for them in their situation) I was able to get her to view one unit in a relatively nice complex I read about on apartments.com. This led to the significant discovery that most apartment buildings and homes have 23" doorways to the bathrooms. Because my father's wheelchair is 25" wide from rim to rim, this has presented a major obstacle in finding a new place for them to live.

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Friday, November 4, 2005

Friday was a much more promising day as we met with Anita Gray, a very gregarious and helpful agent at Barnes Realty in Ruston. She sat with us and discussed the neighborhoods in the city (again, drawn on racial lines) and took us to see a number of new and existing homes, most beyond our initial $125K limit. We also came to the realization that trying to buy a new home in two weeks was technically possible, it was probably not the most sagacious course of action. Although we were unable to close a deal and solve the gaping question of our ultimate destination, we felt we had found a friend.

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Oil change

Saturday, November 5, 2005

On our way back to Lake Charles, we scouted some additional apartments in North Monroe and in Alexandria. With our late start, driving back took most of the day and the folks ended up at the Stagecoach Inn in De Rodder for the night.

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Sunday, November 6, 2005

Sunday was a day for sorting through the stuff I had dragged down from the attic. There were numerous boxes of old toys, books and papers from my childhood in the '70s. I also found a few boxes of my mother's moments from the '50s, including a photo of an old boyfriend. Some of these materials I re boxed for continued storage, while some of the toys I boxed with the potential for selling them on Ebay at some point.