First below is my short post from a year ago tomorrow (Saturday) night – several hours before Katrina actually hit. I was already on the road fleeing what would be its terrible wrath.
This morning is the first time I’ve read these words again and they still, one year later, give me a chill.
I knew, but I didn’t have any conceivable idea. I was not afraid. My faith was deep and strong even then, I thought, yet I had no idea how far it would take me or in the end how glorious the outcome would be.
I was uncertain and apprehensive. I did not want to go through the days to come. That very night I did not sleep, but lay next to Tom, keeping him close, all night long. I wanted time to stop. But it didn’t.
Over the next few days I will post a few excerpts from those days. They are too painful, still, to read them all. And we were the very lucky ones.
Below my thoughts from that “hot August night” (think Neil Diamond), are photos from Week 1 of the home we are creating. It’s rained heavily the past several days, for the first time all summer, naturally. So nothing else has gotten done. But it is a beginning and we all must begin somewhere. Sometimes toward a new life altogether.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Saturday night, August 27, 2005
It’s 9 p.m. Saturday night and Tom and I both drove up to Picayune about 8 p.m. He’s at the newspaper and I’m here with my son, Mark, and his family.Things are looking really horrible right now for not only New Orleans, but coming straight north at us in Slidell and then on north up through Picayune. However, at this time, me and Mark and family are planning on staying here at their house.
I really should be going on up to Jackson to stay with some family up there, but that would be kind of a hard trip for me to make by myself and things up there don’t look much better, anyway – just a lot further away.
We still have a little time for me to decide. I could leave as late as mid-morning tomorrow, although traffic going north up I-59 will be horrendous by then.
Since 4 p.m. this afternoon, I-59 from its beginning in Slidell all the way north for a good number of miles (I’m not sure how many at the moment, but miles and miles)is ONLY northbound traffic on both sides of the interstate.
Please pray for us that we’ll all be safe and that our homes will be spared from wind, tornadoes, falling trees, flooding, etc. Our house has flooded twice in the past because of excessive rain that couldn’t drain off, so it is a major concern.
Also, the forecast is for category 3+ hurricane winds and rains right over Slidell, with category 2 hurricane winds and rain here in Picayune.
Mark and Lynn have Zoe, 2 1/2, and Hannah, 2 months, here to worry about and care for, too. So, please pray we will all be safe.
Dee
View from the left front looking back toward the magnolia.
~Moi on the back porch~
Your back porch needs something … not sure just what, but something.
Those traumatic events in life are difficult, if not impossible, to remove from our emotional savings accounts. But we do move on with our lives.
I don’t know for sure but is that a glass of Iced Tea in your hand as you sit/stand on your porch?