Katrina’s lessons
Jan 10th, 2010 by terry
Hurricane Katrina Neighborhood
Wall Street’s bonus season, with speculation that some compensation could be in the eight-figure range, exhibits a stupefying level of cluelessness from a supposedly bright segment of the population. Bright but out of touch.
Four million mortgages are either in foreclosure or more than 90 days behind in their payments. The bailed out banks repaid their loans, not because they were so profitable, but because they didn’t want any government interference on executive compensation. Presumably due to fog, only one bailed out banker bothered to attend a meeting with Obama, although the trains between New York and Washington ran just fine. Congress, rendered impotent by bitter partisan politics and beholden to well financed lobbyists, caved to the banking industry and narrowly defeated a bill which would have benefited homeowners. Who, you might ask, is running the country? Apparently the lobbyists and the bankers. The New York Times explored, with surprising nuance, whether homeowners should walk away from their mortgages.
To those who are nervous about keeping their jobs and their homes, Hurricane Katrina survivors could tell us that broad-scale help is not coming soon enough, or with programs that are effective enough, to avert the economic implosion that is crushing our spirit. The collapse unfolding before us brings with it such searing pain that it will take a generation, perhaps longer, to get over it. The experience will be burned into our psyches like a brand.
We are at a crossroads: some families are so broken that they cannot be reconstituted, millions of families are stretched very thin, some families don’t exist at all. One million school children are homeless.Veterans comprise 23% of the homeless population. The Iraq and Afghanistan wars return veterans with injuries that they would have died from in any preceding war. When they go home, their families care for them without support systems to make this manageable. Families, the bedrock of our civilized society, are in trouble.
Carolyn Baker’s excellent piece, Healing Transition Trauma in the New Decade, makes the case that we are all affected by post traumatic stress disorder. If you feel that you are immune from this, just walk out your front door. Having experienced first hand the effect of my father’s PTSD on my family, I know that the only way to heal from these traumas is to do the soul work to get beyond it.
Our fellow Americans need the emotional tools and safe, secure environments to support the internal and external work to salve these wounds and get on with productive lives. Living in Chicago near Uptown and working on the West side, I see a gritty side of life every day. Unless and until we provide safe, secure foundations and the tools for deep healing, we can look forward to years of seeing and fearing broken people trying to get by in a difficult world.
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Photo credit: BBC News, Hurricane Katrina neighborhood
Beautifully written and right on, Terry. I feel this malaise, apathy, helplessness, and perhaps impending doom that seems to permeate so much of society. But I am greatly relieved when I realize many see the “challenge” as an opportunity to rebirth with our neighbors, to lend a helping hand, to buy locally, to share, and most of all not simply be marketing tools for large corporations.
When stuck in the Superdome during Katrina, I didn’t want to face the awful truth that the U.S., the most powerful (supposedly) in the world really had no safety net for us. That was hard to swallow but pretty much true at the time.
Value your families, love, friends, be prepared in life, and try and fight off fear. I work at it all the time but I will never give up.
Peace,
Paul Harris
Author, “Diary From the Dome, Reflections on Fear and Privilege During Katrina”
Thanks, Paul. What an interesting perspective, to be a tourist and end up in the Superdome! I’ll check out your book.
It is clear to me that the government’s safety net is the concrete pavement and our only other safety net is each other. Through my website, blog and promotion of community gatherings I’m working to foster that shift.