The story told by images of the Katrina devastation comes not from what is shown, but from what is missing. Mile after mile, neighborhood upon neighborhood, scene after scene - all devoid of people - these pictures reveal the stillness of a moment that never changes, no matter how long we look, the antonym of New Orleans.

These pictures were taken in October and November 2005, and are included in the exhibition “Katrina Exposed” at the New Orleans Museum of Art, May 20 - September 3, 2006.

Please click on the URL to go to the photographs:

http://www.diversity-nyc.com/ijc/Katrina_Antonym/

Citizens – be aware: beginning tomorrow, a battle will be fought in Arabi, the results of which will undoubtedly have a profound impact on the reconstruction of New Orleans, and could affect the shape of city planning in this country for generations. Unlike the military battle fought almost two hundred years ago – in virtually the same location, on the plains of Chalmette - this will be a battle of intellectual positions, real estate interests, marketing powers, and political forces, but the outcome will be no less consequential than if it were fought with cannon, long-bore rifles, and bayonet.

In the simplest possible terms, this is what will take place: between 7 – 15 March, the Miami architectural and urban planning firm of Duany Plater-Zyberk (DPZ) will conduct a “charrette,” an intensive design session in which members of their firm will work “on –site” with members of the local community to develop a scheme for replanning St. Bernard’s Parish. Organized by the Louisiana Recovery Authority, the intent of this effort is ostensibly to provide not only a framework in which future building efforts can take place, but, for DPZ, to recommend the components of every aspect of the rebuilding – down to a level of detail specifying the size, materials and colors of building materials used.

DPZ has already established themselves as a major player in the world of Urban Planning, the principal spokespeople for the New Urbanism, and key members of the effort to rebuild the Mississippi Gulf Coast. Andres Duany is a highly articulate, handsome, charismatic spokesman. His success has come from his astute understanding of three critical factors: 1, identifying a niche in the marketplace (primarily housing for the middle class, and therefore developers as his clients); 2, playing to the developer’s need to help their customers visualize the finished product in familiar, recognizable terms; and 3, selling the scheme to the larger municipal authority by rendering the concept in a what appears to be a historically sensitive style - a contextual reference – highly valued for new construction in places with neither history nor tradition.

New Orleans would do well to view this approach with caution.

This will not be a charrette in the original sense (a process that begins with unfettered idea generation), but instead a highly choreographed effort to sell the public a set of ideas that DPZ has been slowly spreading across the country. The Congress for the New Urbanism promulgates a vision for the city that on the surface is based on a set of values few of us would refute – small scale communities, a close relation of the house to the street, walking-distance proximity of homes within neighborhoods to community facilities (groceries, and the like). Yet the visual form of these developments, mostly “virtual” gated communities (i.e., with highly restrictive covenants controlling every aspect of their appearance and use, if not a physical gate) nonetheless always takes shape as a sort of vernacular village – a pastiche of some American past that rarely existed, and bears no relationship to the realities of life in the 21st century. The formula is proven - consumers are attracted to what they recognize (leafy renderings of classic cottages), and fearful of the unknown (always portrayed as hard-edged international style modernism).

DPZ’s true clients are large real estate developers who will be providing a product, not a community. Anyone who visits an existing “New Urban” development will see a place that is very different from the communities that existed in Arabi prior to Katrina. The charrette will be the beginning of a process that takes away local control of the rebuilding and delivers it into the hands of a private company, all under the guise of “inviting the community to participate.” The pre-Katrina community will be placated by “being heard,” seduced by evocative images of a 21st Century “Mayberry,” and left looking from the outside of the gate at the community that replaced them.

Duany confided to me that Arabi was the beachhead through which he hoped to make his entrance into New Orleans proper. As such, he views his success in Arabi as a stepping stone, with the hope that success there will lead to an invitation to plan/replan the Crescent City his goal, the jewel in the crown for the New Urbanist movement.

This, for me, is a problem, and it should be a problem for New Orleans, as well.

What gives New Orleans its soul is the accretion of more than 300 years of habitation, of generations of the same families living and working here, of the slow building of traditions that have become so ingrained as to be taken for granted. It took all those hot humid summers, heavy rains and autumn hurricanes. It takes things that happen with regularity, and it takes anomalies, idiosyncrasies, and one-of-a-kinds. It took Yellow Fever epidemics and Mississippi River floods, and even Huey Long. It takes that long to develop a city which has its own culture of language, cuisine, music, art and architecture. Before Katrina, this was universally recognized to be one of the great cultural centers not only of the United States but also of the world. The torn fabric of the city cannot be so easily rewoven, and certainly not overnight with a flourish of any single planner’s pen, no matter now brilliant that planner, whatever his intentions. It must come from within, over time, from many minds and hearts.

So, I say to the people of New Orleans, think back to our ancestors who united and stood fast at Chalmette. The scenario that begins tomorrow is not all that different. And, hold your fire until you see the whites of their eyes.

A city is defined by activity. That is, after all, what differentiates one group of buildings from others we call monuments. More so than any other American city, movement defined New Orleans – a place so imbued with a beat that it gave birth not only to Jazz, but also to an entire culture – infusing the cuisine, the art, and a local philosophy of life. “Laissez les bonnes temps roulez” (Let the good times roll) is not simply an anthem, but a reminder that good times move – time does not stand still.

For over 100 days and counting, time in New Orleans has stood still. Katrina came, the inhabitants went away, and what was left behind is withering, a dark and lifeless shell in which the clock has stopped. What do we call a place where there is a past but no future? A cemetery. As the days of federal intransigence go by, this once thriving metropolis is being transformed into a reminder of times past – theme park or necropolis, depending on your propensity for irony.

It need not be that way, but it is, and will continue to be until such time that public sentiment persuades the national leadership into action. Meanwhile, as those who have returned to New Orleans adjust to the new routine, a daily struggle, the rest of us must ask ourselves, and our elected officials, what can we do to save this city and the region?

My hope for the New Year is that we succeed in shaking our country into action before we wake up to discover this terrible nightmare is not a dream.

Let us now consider what is, and what is not happening in New Orleans in a different light - not as destruction in a dimension we can see, touch, smell, or feel, but in the context of time.

John Barth, in The End of the Road, makes this observation:

“In life…there are essentially no major or minor characters… Everyone is necessarily the hero of his own life story…Suppose you’re an usher in a wedding. From the groom’s viewpoint he’s the major character; the others play supporting parts, even the bride. From your viewpoint, though, the wedding is a minor episode in the very interesting story of your life, and the bride and groom both are minor figures… [In the same sense], every member of the congregation at the wedding sees himself as the major character, condescending to witness the spectacle.”

So, here we are – three months after the fact – witnesses to a spectacle we can continue to watch on television or read about in the newspapers, a tragedy that affects others – all of them minor characters in the story of our own lives. We can choose to believe what we wish – a true suspension of disbelief, since the magnitude of the disaster never grows larger than the size of the little screen, and it goes away with the push of a button on the remote control.

Meanwhile, for everyone displaced by the storm, the reality is quite different, a disaster of such dimension that even at this point, it is difficult to grasp. Time moves at a very different speed for people who are displaced from their homes, their jobs, perhaps their families, and certainly from their neighborhoods and their circle of friends. When people are displaced from all the things that determine the framework of their lives, they are also displaced from the traditional structure of time - past, present, and future. Of necessity, one must focus exclusively on the present, because with no fixed points of reference – there is no horizon against which to measure progress, or anything else for that matter.

Years ago, Rabbi Marshall Meyer explained to me a similar phenomenon – that it was pointless to think of promoting governmental ideologies in the third world – i.e., democracy – without first addressing the basic human needs for shelter, food, and healthcare. Ninety days and counting, with large parts of New Orleans still in darkness, the affected are a Diaspora in all 50 states. Each individual is dealing with the same phenomenon - struggling to find a way to make ends meet. So, while many outsiders with good intent have participated in conferences, forums, and colloquiums intended to explore the shape of a future New Orleans and Gulf Coast, I fear they overlook the underlying fact that a significant number of the inhabitants of New Orleans simply will not return because of the “Meanwhile” factor. While the rest of us debate what can, or should be done, meanwhile, life goes on.

Many will not return because they cannot afford to do so – they lost all their possessions – all that remains is the debt. Many will not return because they have already begun to make new lives for themselves – they have found new jobs, new housing, new schools, new friends, so they no longer have the incentive to return. Many will not return because the infrastructure of the city is so badly damaged that they cannot conceive of exposing themselves to the risk, again. And, many will not return because there are no mechanisms in place to allow that to happen – i.e., no places to live while their houses are repaired, nor sufficient work force to enable reconstruction on a timely basis.

In this context, meanwhile is not what is happening at the same time, it is what is happening – period. Meanwhile, people need a place to live – including the workforce. Government and corporate businesses have in essence taken over all of the available hotel rooms within a two-hour driving radius, adding to the costs and extending the timeframe of rebuilding for the typical homeowner. Yet, within a month, FEMA will discontinue payment for hotels for evacuees. It is ironic that the federal government can set a deadline for these payments (i.e., a withdrawal from responsibility), without having established (or executed) a plan to return the evacuees to their homes. Meanwhile, this same government is unable to set a deadline for withdrawal of troops from Iraq, citing as a reason the inappropriateness of abandoning a people without first providing stability in their lives.

Despite the considerable effort expended, and a lot of work has already been done, the extent of the devastation is such that it cannot (has not, and will not) be managed by local, state, or regional authorities. In early November, I spent another five days in New Orleans and its environs, my third trip back. This time I went for a different reason, to chauffeur the photographer Lynn Davis, who came to New Orleans at my invitation. She photographed the wasteland, from New Orleans to Gulfport, and put into images what I have attempted to convey through words. An account of our travels will follow shortly.

In my first commentary, days after the storm, I urged the Federal Government to immediately form a WPA/ TVA/ New Deal type initiative, or to institute a draft to populate the rebuilding. All of our elected officials at the national level should have already made a mission to Louisiana and Mississippi, to see the devastation for themselves. Were they to do so, they would understand why rebuilding should be a national priority. But sadly, this has not happened, nor is it likely.

Meanwhile, time is passing. Meanwhile, the culture and the city of New Orleans are withering, because it is a vacant, dark and silent shell. Meanwhile, a debate over new forms of urbanism is raging, but for the people who made New Orleans their home for generations, who want to return and can’t, this is an academic irrelevance. What was needed early on and is still sorely needed even today is a workforce and materials. You need both to rebuild, and without the two, it is pointless to argue urban planning or architectural ideologies. Meanwhile, the worst natural disaster in the history of this country has reduced a vibrant culture and a historic city to a backdrop for a horror story. And most of our elected officials won’t even take the time to go and see it for themselves.

Meanwhile, evacuees are adjusting their internal chronometers to their new locales in their new homes, and as they do so, they are no longer evacuees. If New Orleans dies, it will do so not because the cost of reconstruction is too high, but because so many of the people who gave the city its unique character will never return. The New Orleans we have known will fade and become a memory, just as the shadows from the overhanging boughs of the great and mighty oak trees fade and disappear at dusk. And then, meanwhile will no longer be; it will just be too late.

A Horror story from mid October

Approaching New Orleans from the Louis Armstrong Airport, shortly after the point where the road crosses the boundary between Jefferson and Orleans Parish, the I-10 takes a sharp right turn south, dips under a railroad crossing, and then rises on a long gradual incline to an overpass – a straightaway that at the high speed of an expressway gives the same sensation in a car as an airplane at takeoff, with only the sky and horizon visible directly ahead. I was at the stick of a rented gold Cadillac, throttling down this runway, when my glance was diverted sideways, and I realized all around us was pitch dark. To the right was Metairie Cemetery, to the left lay the lightless, seemingly lifeless city of New Orleans, and directly ahead, the full moon was rising. It struck me then that this thin black strip of roadway – our flight path - was a latter day River Styx, the only thing separating the City of the Dead and the Dying City of New Orleans. And, once again, we were headed into the uncharted territory of the unknown.

I make no excuse for the melodramatic. Historically, New Orleans has been a city of melodrama, but never so much as at present. The past, present, and future are commingled; in effect, there is no sense of time at all. There is only the uncertainty of the present. The immediate past has already become history, and the future, if there is to be one, is in doubt. At one moment, there is a feverish pace of activity, yet at the same time, the face of the city is one expanse after another of desolation, ruin, and silence. I am not sure which is more frightening – the vastness of destruction that extends as far as the eye can see under the cloudless early autumn sky, or the void of darkness that descends with every night.

The I-10 turns again, due east towards the shadowy bulk of the Superdome and the high-rise towers of the Central Business District loom in the distance. From within some of the buildings, lights glowed dimly, but most of the landscape was otherwise shadowy darkness upon darkness. We made our way to Lee Circle, the node at which the CBD connects to the arterial of St. Charles Avenue, where we were to stay for several nights at the Hotel Le Cirque.

There is a slightly lawless, Wild-West flavor that has overtaken New Orleans during this gold-rush. I have never seen so many people in law enforcement; it seemed that everyone was wearing a dark blue tee shirt with bold white letters silk screened on the chest: “Police,” or “_ _ PD,” or “Security.” The night staff at the hotel consisted of a single female clerk, accompanied by a policeman (“Police”) on loan from Mobile, AL. We didn’t feel scared, but we didn’t feel entirely comfortable, either. All these police, but nothing was in its proper place. The lawlessness to which I refer is the breakdown of certain accepted social or legal conventions. At some point, when normal systems are down, other modalities become acceptable, as in wartime. In New Orleans, this battlefield mentality constitutes a cosmic shift. So, for example, all manner of business is conducted in casual dress; reservations are usually not taken at restaurants, and our hotel only provided maid service and laundered towels once a week. Few traffic lights work – most replaced with stop signs – and a “rolling” stop is the norm. Parking on the median is perfectly acceptable – we sidled up our gold steed between a beefy SUV and a pickup truck on the grassy knoll of Lee Circle, under the watchful eye of the General.

There is a lot of work to be done – more than anyone who has not toured the city is likely to grasp – and a lot of people have shown up for the party. After all, there is a lot of money to be made in this reconstruction. So, here’s one snapshot – work hard, play hard, drink hard, and gamble, and what do you have to show for it at the end of the day? Sounds like the New Orleans you remember? Think again. Or, think about it for the first time. What, exactly, makes a city, and what makes this city different from others?

So many people have left, so few have come back, and there are so many metaphorical leaks in the levees – schools and hospitals that haven’t and can’t reopen. Museums and zoos, shopping centers and theaters – all closed. The New Orleans Museum of Art laid off 70 of its staff of 86 in early October, and the Aquarium lost almost all of its 3,000 animals. Neither will reopen for some time. Only a limited number of restaurants are open, on limited schedules, with limited menus. A vast number of municipal employees – laid off, moved away, gone. The systems that are operating are straining under the load of too much work to do, too few people to do the work, and too little time before another gives out, or gives up. So many trees have fallen that Joshua Mann Paillet, a prominent dealer of photography, was quoted in the NYTimes to say that it appears the result of a giant weed-wacker taken to the landscape, the look and texture of the city forever changed.

How much work is a lot? Consider this analogy, put forth by my cousin Linda Dennery (the former publisher of the Times Picayune) – think Hiroshima, Dresden, Berlin; think 25-35 years, a generation or longer. Then think about the question of whether the New Orleans that will be rebuilt will resemble the New Orleans you have known, and you will begin to realize you are already into the second chapter of the horror story that began with a storm.

And so, the question becomes, not what is there, but what is missing?

People on the highway seem to be in a big hurry to get somewhere. I’m not sure where. When we got off the Interstate, and drove through one neighborhood after another, we rarely saw other motorists. We saw people working, and we saw the evidence that people had been at work. We saw cars piled onto the broad grassy medians that divide the larger avenues, waiting to be towed to the scrap heap. We saw dead trees piled thirty feet high. We saw refrigerators and freezers, like so many vertical coffins, lining the sidewalks. We saw carpeting, and furniture, and flooring, insulation and the remains of gypsum board panels piled in front of one house after another, the contents of one lifetime and another and another spewed like entrails. We saw broken windows, and within, emptiness – perhaps the torn and tattered remnant of a curtain still fluttering in the breeze, but otherwise, nothing.

We drove the length of St. Charles, Carrollton, Tulane, Canal, Napoleon, Claiborne, Washington; Esplanade from the River to the Art Museum. We zigged and zagged – Jefferson, Freret, Fountainbleau, Audubon, Prytania, Magazine. We took Pontchartrain Blvd to the lake, and traversed Lakeshore, Lake Vista, City Park - and everywhere we went, the constant was one of solitude. Perhaps we saw one group of people working in a city block, but all the other buildings on that block were empty. We never found a single gas station open in New Orleans, only in Jefferson Parish.

And then, we drove through the city again at night – not on the Interstate this time, but on the smaller streets and boulevards. And this was out-and-out scary. Stupid scary. Scary stupid, like the people in horror films who always want to go down into the basement, when everyone in the theatre knows that the guy with the knife is just waiting downstairs, and down they go, despite our shrieks and warnings. We drove into the void – an unforgettable darkness for which I know no equal.

Our path was lit by our headlights, and by the full moon in a cloudless sky. We rolled down the windows – and inhaled that slightly musty, slightly sweet, slightly acrid whiff of decomposition and damp rot. The only sound was that of our engine, and the crunch of tire on I know not what, but I suddenly realized, possibly sharp and potentially dangerous stuff. Think flat tire. We drove for miles and minutes without seeing another soul, not a light, and not a sound. There was nothing romantic about being under the overhanging boughs of a great oak tree this time, only the strange sensation of being in the shade of the moonlight –the dark branches outlined against the blue-black sky.

To those who read and are shaken by my suggestion that New Orleans is a dying city, let me tell you, it is hard not to come to this conclusion. Cities are complex organisms, which take generations to build. They are not the work of a single mind, nor a single lifetime. They are the accumulations, the accretions of one act upon another. And, more than most cities, New Orleans has benefited from generations of citizens who have built new upon old, and who have worked through natural disasters and disease that forced people to leave other locations similarly affected. Yes, New Orleans also suffers from inbreeding, but this is not a terminal genetic flaw. Indifference will kill New Orleans. More than two months after the Hurricane, why is there no federal program for the reclamation of one of the country’s great cities and the Gulf Coast region? When the various commissions that have been formed to recommend master plans for the rebuilding of the city, the state, and the region – none of whom actually communicate with one another – eventually issue their final reports, who will head up the effort and pay for the work?

If New Orleans is to be saved, it will require a greater effort than the people of this region alone can muster. They are trying, every day – but the task is larger than they can bear. I know firsthand. My Dad has spent the past month trying to empty the contents of his house – the month before, he and Marianne were itinerant evacuees. In mid October, my sister Lauren and my oldest son Kevin joined me along with Peter Drobny and Jay Craig of Steuben Glass, to rescue the folks collection of Steuben and contemporary art glass. Peter and Jay drove a truck down from Corning, NY laden with packing supplies, and we rescued from the muck, cleaned, catalogued, photographed, wrapped, packed, boxed, and transported back to Corning over 500 pieces. This was just some of the stuff in my parent’s home. Multiply that single effort times the thousands of people affected, and you begin to get some idea of the level of personal misery – and this doesn’t address the question of what one is to do in the meantime for housing, income, etc.

Meanwhile, the insurers are circling their wagons, and the great debate about who is liable and who will pay the costs has not really begun. A great city, a region, and a culture needs the help of a great and united people. It needs a federally backed initiative, WPA caliber effort. And, this clearly will not happen under the watch of the current administration, unless perhaps, the beat of the tom-tom at grassroots level gets louder.

This is what has compelled me to write – to ask those of you who have read this far to think about what has been lost, and to focus your mind’s eye not on the pictures of the destruction, the things we can see, but on the things that are missing. Perhaps then, out of this darkness, a voice will emerge. I hope it is not too late.

I head back to New Orleans on Wednesday.

Click on this URL for pictures of New Orleans I took in mid September and mid October.

http://www.diversity-nyc.com/katrina/katrina-images

It has taken me longer than anticipated to write this next installment. My sister Lauren and I went to Louisiana last weekend to join Dad & Marianne for their first return to the house. This is what we saw, what happened over the course of those several days, and a bit of what has happened since. It is all a bit of a whirl.

On Thursday night, 8 September, Dad phoned me to say that he had secured a special pass, which would permit us to go with them to the house in Metairie, Jefferson Parish otherwise closed to non-residents. Lauren & I decided to go as soon as possible, and I immediately went on line– Expedia, Travelocity, etc., as well as the sites for Delta, American, and Continental Airlines - to see what flights were available. Continental offered the most direct, favorably scheduled, inexpensive option, so I proceeded to try to complete the booking through Expedia, only to be blocked at the final step each time. When I called the Expedia 800 number for assistance, I discovered that the agent was looking at the same screen as me, and that she had no idea what to do next – except that during the time it took for her to reveal her incompetence, the few remaining seats were taken. So I called Continental directly – now desperately worried that in addition to losing the discounted $688 roundtrip (less than the $1,100 norm), I might also be blocked from any seat at all. I told the agent what I was trying to do, the flights I had hoped to catch, etc, and waited for her response. OK – we’ve got two seats for you on each of those flights, her answer. Great, at what cost, I hesitated to ask. $462.80. Huh? Have we got this right? I asked her to repeat the itinerary. She confirmed. Then I asked her name, so I could thank her. When she answered, I knew that the journey I was about to begin was into the unknown, and that Rod Serling was surely looking down and smiling - Katrina.

(“There is a fifth dimension beyond that which is known to man. It is a dimension as vast as space and timeless as infinity. It is the middle ground between light and shadow, between science and superstition, and it lies between the pit of man’s fears and the summit of his knowledge. This is the dimension of imagination. It is an area we call the Twilight Zone.”)

One has to pack appropriately for such a journey, so I did what any right-thinking person might do; I went to the local hardware store. There, I bought latex gloves and a pair of construction gloves (the woven sort, with latex dipped palms and fingers), and N-95 breathing masks for each of us, fresh batteries for the flashlights, tape and plastic drop-clothes. I rummaged through my closet and pulled together a wardrobe of the worn and threadbare, including two much beloved Lorenzini long-sleeve shirts – one for Marianne, one for me – these to wear while in New Orleans, to protect against the reported infestation of mosquitoes and black flies. As further precaution, I also packed my “illegal” bottle of Ben’s insect repellant – 95% Deet – far more dangerous than a nail clipper, but not on the TSA’s list of prohibited items. Marianne had procured the final wardrobe item – shin high rubber wading boots – though these were never put into service.

Sunday, 11 September

Entrance to the Twilight Zone passes through gateways that typically go unobserved. Not so this journey – note the date above, and as we left the gate at LaGuardia, the names of those killed four years earlier were being read at Ground Zero. Our first stop, IAH, the International Airport of Houston, is otherwise known as Bush Airport. The second flight was filled with a broad assortment of rescue workers – divers, chaplains, police/ military, and folks like us – from all over the country, and the flight was quiet, as if all of us knew we were headed into a battle of sorts.

Dad & M met us at the airport. We were glad to be together. As Dad drove us to lunch, it was clear that both were more than physically exhausted. There had been no rest – they were in a rented car, in an unfamiliar city, sleeping in a hotel bed, eating out for every meal, wearing the same few clothes over-and-over. They had no clear idea of what might lie ahead, nor any sense of a timetable for the future –whether (or how badly) the house was damaged, how long it might take to repair, when that work could even begin. The future horizon was only two days away, at best – when Lauren and I would return to New York. We learned that they had not had a through-night’s sleep in two weeks, and frequently found themselves up at 3AM – early even for them, that Dad had fallen while in the bathroom at Elise’s house during the blackout. He had bruised his back – no ribs broken, but had been in some pain for several days.

After lunch, we went to Albertson’s and Wal-Mart for some final provisions for the next day’s journey. Sandwiches, cookies, snacks – and a Styrofoam cooler. Marianne had already stocked the car with 24 half-liter bottles of water, and Dad had loaded in two 5-gallon tanks of gas. I have been in K-Mart, Home Depot, and Ikea, but never in a Wal-Mart. Let me say that this can be a very disorienting experience – in spite of the very clear signage – the scale of the operation is overwhelming. (Can you hear the theme music of the Twilight Zone)?

We ate dinner with our relatives in Baton Rouge, and retired early for the long day to follow.

Sunday, 12 September

It was still dark when we left Baton Rouge at 6:30 in the morning, dawn breaking as we entered onto the I10. I drove. Traffic moved at a good pace, and illuminated signs at roadside warned that the left lane was reserved for Emergency Vehicles Only. Within moments, I saw a stream of red, white, and blue flashing lights in the rear-view mirror, and a convoy of more than 25 almost-identical SUVs – Louisiana State Patrol – driving at speed approaching 80MPH whizzed past. We stayed in the right lane, and in spite of the traffic, our speed almost never dropped below 70MPH. Within an hour, we came to a military checkpoint – the entrance to the elevated portion of I10 over the Bonnet Carre spillway at LaPlace – beyond which we had been told only emergency vehicles were permitted. I held up the pass - we expected to be rerouted to US61, the Airline Highway – and was surprised to be waived on. We crossed a threshold at that point, beyond which I can only say we had entered a place and time unlike anything that I have ever known, or would ever have anticipated.

We drove for the next 20-30 minutes in eerie silence. We never saw another vehicle, coming or going, for the first 5-10 miles as we crossed the spillway. As we came into Jefferson Parish, all alone, the silence was punctuated only by our collective gasps as we saw the first signs of destruction – trees toppled, roofs gaping open, entire sides of buildings ripped off, exposing the interiors of houses and apartments, like so many oversized dolls houses. One billboard I spotted, held aloft by two massive steel H columns, was now bent completely over like a pretzel. The detritus of urban life was strewn everywhere – and ahead of us, as far as the eye could see, the I10 - now 6 lanes wide, and empty - narrowed into the horizon.

We turned off at Bonnabel, and headed towards Metairie Road, the principal thoroughfare. We could tell that we were not the first – fallen trees had been cut, cleared, and piled neatly at street edge. But the roads were still empty. We crossed the railroad tracks – the high ground, and turned into Metairie Club Gardens, and the landscape changed dramatically. There was no water in the streets, but there were telltale signs that it had come and gone – the ground was no longer green, but brown. There was an unusual amount of dirt in the streets, and we could see some staining at the bottom of some houses, with bits of grass and leaves stuck along that edge, like coffee grounds. We passed the houses of friends and relatives, and pulled up in front of Dad’s house, the only car on the street.

The sun was up, and the sky was blue, and at first glance, the house looked undisturbed, but the lawn was completely brown, the grass now resembling thatch. Up to a certain level, the bushes looked like they might in a northern winter, denuded of their leaves, though above that they were green and full. It was rather like the Magritte painting, The Empire of Lights, in which a daytime sky is above, and a nighttime street scene below. There was a slightly burnt, slightly musty smell, a whiff of rot and decomposition. And in that moment getting out of the car, as in Bemelman’s Madeleine, we knew all was not right. For those who don’t remember, the doctor summoned in the middle of the night was Dr. Cohn, but now it was morning, and Dad quietly asked, Where are all the animals? And then, we knew what was missing, and what had come upon us – Rachel Carson’s worst fears, the nightmare of The Silent Spring. There was no life – no birds, no squirrels, no insects (as it happened) – nothing but silence. In the face of such a catastrophe, one might understandably wonder about the presence or absence of a God.

The words, Oh My God, were the only ones I heard Dad say when we opened the front door. What lay before us was worse than his worst fears, a scene of such devastation that though I can describe it, and will refer you to a website where I have posted pictures, simply thinking about being there brings on a sadness for which words fail. The waters had risen in the house to a height of perhaps 2 feet, and everything it touched bore the marks. What we stared upon was more a frozen seascape than landscape, though one devoid of water, the parquet floor rising and falling in great waves moving across each room. As the water had risen, it had literally pushed through the sub floor, and the parquet tiles were now frozen in tilted shapes resembling oceanic peaks and valleys. The carpets were still damp, and the floor covered with slippery brown ooze. The smell was awful, rot, damp, fetid. The house was dark, all the shutters and curtains drawn, and the dampness was pervasive.

With flashlights drawn, we inched our way into the house, seeking the low path, since the tilted boards would not bear our weight. Only later did I realize that if I could knock down but one, the entire assembly would collapse, like a house of cards. But at first, we inched our way through the mess. As the water rose, it made everything buoyant, and so things had moved, and come to settle elsewhere. As cabinets floated, or the floor below them tilted, whatever was upon them was thrown down – but they did not break, since they landed in deep water.

I went outdoors and pulled open the shutters that Dad had nailed shut, and this strange surreal interior was brought into the light of this new lifeless day. We would work for perhaps 45 minutes, and emerge bathed in sweat, our gloves covered with this ooze. A bizarre surgical suite, this interior – for which we had donned the latex gloves and the construction gloves and the breathing masks. And the car became the safe haven. We would peel off the gloves, drop the mask, and wash ourselves with Purell. Cold water never tasted so good, but Dad & M had little appetite. I ate. I learned my lesson last summer, bonking at the Tour de France, and this was every bit as challenging.

We discovered we were not alone. First, the local Sheriff’s office patrol came by; then two Humvies, with National Guardsmen from Ft. Bragg. Then the helicopters – all different sorts of helicopters large and small – flew over on a regular but erratic schedule. The President was in New Orleans, perhaps he did a flyover – he certainly didn’t touch down for a photo-op, nor would he have found one. Later in the day, we saw neighbors at work in their homes – all of us in the same predicament – though some houses, closer to Northline and the golf course, were inundated to even greater depths, no less than 4 feet on the first floor.

We continued to make our way through the house until we had surveyed every room on the first floor. This required that I break the door into Marianne’s study, which was jammed against the warped floor, but in truth, the door was already broken, swollen from the flood. Now, I am sorry to report, the story becomes more difficult.

Before Dad and M left the house, they had taken every precaution to protect their beloved collections of glass and art. All of the major pieces of Steuben were put into their original red leather presentation cases (if available) or into boxes. These boxes were set against the base of the walls in the Living and Dining Rooms, along the hall – wherever they would be most sheltered from the high winds. The painting were all taken off the walls, and placed similarly. And, so, that is how we found them – the boxes still in place, but no longer red – now covered with a green mold. The paintings, drawings, whatever, showed just how deep the water had come, though remarkably, none had actually fallen entirely into the slop. We did not touch any of the Steuben, and moved only two pieces of art glass so that we had a place to walk. Where would we put it, after all? The artworks, I triaged – standing them up, raised off the floor on pieces of salvaged parquet, tilted against the wall, so that they had air circulating – what air there would be in the otherwise sealed environment.

Mold was everywhere – creeping up the curtains, the upholstered sofas, the bedding, and on all of the walls. The magnificent furniture repeated the surreal image of the landscape outdoors – the tops looked as though they were ready for a party – wiped bare with finish unblemished - the bottoms swollen, veneer delaminated, pieces broken off, mold growing. We made our way to Dad’s study, where he needed important papers from his desk drawer. The desk, perhaps the single finest piece of cabinetry in the collection, flawlessly built and finished, one of two ever made (the other owned by Senator Jacob Javits) – can I say that it was badly wounded. I tried to open the drawer, but it would not budge. I tried to open the adjacent drawer, and a part of it came off in my hand. I told Dad that we would have no choice but to pry it open, and he instructed me to proceed. This was like an amputation to save the patient. I was successful, the damage limited to the drawer face itself, though that may have been of little consequence. I reached in and extracted the soggy mass of papers. We put them in a plastic bag, and took them to the car. We took the Mac, sitting on the nearby table – it untouched by the deluge. And later that evening, I was able to download and save the data. I could tell exactly how high the water had come – below the computer desk surface was an in-out tray Dad used for letterhead. The lower tray was filled with a soggy mess; the upper tray looking like it was just taken out of its wrapper.

We went to the bedroom to help retrieve some clothing. Dad’s shoes were covered with the same ghastly mold that I previously described. Marianne had a few new pairs high up, and these we took. And so it went. In the end, we took very little, not even too many personal mementos. The day was getting long, it was beastly hot, and there were now more questions than before – can we rebuild? is the mold toxic?, who will do the work?, how long will it take?, how much will it cost? Where will we live meanwhile?

There is another dimension to this disaster, and that is the impact on the human psyche. I cannot be sure what toll this is taking on Dad & M. They have been so brave in the face of so much pain, but I want to share with you two vignettes of how little things matter. Over the course of this long day, we all at one time, or should I say several times, had to use a toilet. But there was no indoor plumbing, so the side yards became the men’s (on the right) and ladies (on the left). Before we left, each of us, in turn, went to those places, stripped bare, and changed into clean clothes we had brought for the purpose. The soiled clothing was left in bags at the curbside for garbage removal, whenever that service is restored. The clothing was tainted with the mold, and we could leave it behind, but the memory of this final ignominy will not quickly be erased.

We drove around the neighborhood, where we saw the same scene repeated over and over. Trees toppled, houses flooded; signs that people had come, and gone; utility workers making repairs to power lines, but otherwise, more of the same eerie silence. We drove to the 17th Street canal, the division between Jefferson and Orleans parish, the fault line of the levee. The stench was horrific, and the water level surprising low, given the ongoing pumping.

We drove to the house of my stepsister Judy – her house completely untouched by the flood, the only damage a broken piece of glass in a screen door. Dad & M packed clothing and a few personal items for Judy, and we left. We do not yet know when Dad & M will return. They stayed the rest of the week in BR, and have now moved on, first bringing Judy to the airport in Houston where she boarded a flight to Denver, and they to Minneapolis (visiting Marianne’s grandchildren Allison and Jake). Friday, they will arrive in New York for 10 days, and then, they return to Louisiana, where they have rented a house in Lake Charles.

Our day was not over, and, I am sorry to say, nor was the final assault on the human spirit. We drove back to Baton Rouge in almost total silence for more than half the 90-minute drive, this time passing an enormous sand camouflaged military convoy (coming, or going?) and then talked only about the plans for the evening. We took Dad & M to the hotel so they could relax, take a bath or shower, change. Lauren and I returned to Elise where we did the same, and then returned to pick them up for dinner.

We went to a quiet place, well perhaps not as quiet as we might have preferred, and ordered stiff drinks. As we began to relax, soft, warm French bread was brought to the table, and Dad took a piece. With the first bite, his front teeth fell out. We thought he had lost a bridge, and Lauren produced dental epoxy from her purse. Dad said he was totally unaware that he had a bridge, but there was clear evidence of dental work. The epoxy failed, and I drove to a nearby Rite-Aid for a tube of Polygrip. Nothing worked, and the effect to Dad was no less than that of being kicked when down. I tell you this because you need to know, and we can only hope, if hope is the right thing to feel, that this will indeed be the low point for him and Marianne in this whole horrible tragedy.

When Dad was finally able to see a dentist in BR two days later, the dentist told him he had broken good teeth, and asked if he had recently received a blow to the face. We do not know if this had it’s beginning in the bathroom fall at Elise; all we know at this time is that when Dad arrives here Friday, he will still be without his front teeth. We have an appointment scheduled for him first thing Monday. Dad told me to forewarn Adrian of this, in addition to the possibility that he may not be wearing a tie – a certain sign of change.

Change does not come easy to anyone turning 84, certainly not to someone whose entire life has been molded by principles whose origins can be traced to antiquity, scripture, institutional or family history. Dad’s dad, who I called Grandcup, was of the generation Alvin Toffler described in his book, Future Shock – a generation which was born while the horse and buggy was the typical means of transportation, and who lived to see a man stand on the moon. I submit that Dad is now in a latter day version of this evolution (and he may yet, understandably, be in shock), which we may call Present/Future Shock. All of the standards that he has known have been washed away with this storm, some friends already making plans for permanent relocation. The teaching facility at LSU Medical Center that bears his name was under some water, and the school is temporarily relocated to Baton Rouge. And, without a fixed, permanent address to receive mail, he has already been confronted by the bureaucracies of investment services that refuse to provide him with passwords to access his accounts on the Internet, for the simple reason that they insist on mailing him the authorization codes. His conversion may be as simple as going from a paper-based system to an electronic one. Or it may be as complex as to sharpen his focus on the ephemeral, the moment that is fleetingly here, and then gone, but with the capacity to be carried in our memories in ways that outlive those that are fixed and permanent.

I do not pretend to know what the future will bring. I can only tell you this: We will all return to New Orleans. What you have just read is the personal account of two individuals impacted by this catastrophe, but they, and we know that the problem is broad and deep. As I have written in earlier e-mails, and will write more in days to come, rebuilding New Orleans and the Gulf Coast is an obligation, a debt that our generation owes to those that follow, and we cannot rest until that work is done.

The index of this morning’s NYTimes listed the obituaries to be on page C15, the penultimate page of the Business Section, but in fact, the first Obituary appeared on page 1 of that section. There, below the fold, is an article titled, “Ruth Built the Steakhouse. Katrina Intervened.” In print, this is the first account of a decision by a New Orleans-born, nationally-based business to relocate away from the city, in the wake of Katrina.

As I read the article, I heard Joe Scarborough in an interview on the Today show, saying he believes that within six months, the entire Katrina story will be relegated at best to back page coverage, unlike 9/11, forgotten by the American people. So much, so very much is said by these two items of news that I am compelled to write, again.

What will it take for the American people, and our elected leadership to hear the cries of the displaced, the orphaned, the dead? What will it take for Americans to rally to the cause of our brethren - our Fellow Americans? In my mind, I hear the voices of Peter, Paul and Mary, and I think of the irony that Bob Dylan’s anthem is titled “Blowin’ in the Wind.”

Eight generations of my family have lived, and are living in Louisiana. The house in which I was raised, and in which my father and stepmother still live is surrounded by water, and their home - my home - is almost certainly flooded beyond repair, but my lament is not personal. It is the grief of loss that in modern times can only be compared with that of the Holocaust. We have already lost so much, and at risk is even more - the loss of a culture. As the people of New Orleans are evacuated, we may resent the use of the term refuge, but we cannot deny that a Diaspora is upon us. With the unanimous decision by executives of Ruth’s Chris Steakhouse to abandon New Orleans, citing the difficulty of relocating twice as their reason, has a harbinger of things to come been sounded?

So, I ask, who amongst our elected leadership will finally hear the cries, and set right the priorities of our nation? Who will rise to this occasion, address us as a people, and unite us to the task of rebuilding New Orleans and the Gulf Coast?

This is too big a task for private enterprise and personal charity. The scope of the devastation is too broad even to estimate - clearly evidenced by the daily reassessment of the costs, now rising in increments of billions - and the consequences of our failure to act too great to even imagine. This is the job of government, but it is a job that cannot be left to government officials alone.

This is not a question of assigning blame, nor is it a problem that can be solved simply by throwing money at it - ie, increasing the level of federal funding. It is a question of response. We must rededicate ourselves to the task of rebuilding our country. We must create a federal system similar to the Peace Corp or the WPA, possibly instituting a draft. We cannot relegate the death of a great American city to a small article in the Business section, below the fold. We cannot ignore the consequences of relocating an entire people from their father-or-motherland, foolishly debating whether these people should be called refugees or evacuees. This is happening now, in our own country, and it is up to us to act as a people. We have a responsibility to our children and their children, to preserve not simply our past, but our living present, if they are to enjoy in some near and distant future the same benefits our forefathers and mothers provided for us.

The answer, my friends, is NOT blowin’ in the wind. The wind has come and gone. In Katrina’s wake, it is left to us to insure that the obituary is premature, and that what we do next is write a history, not bury one.

In 1848, a seventeen year old German Jew named Jacob Farrnbacher packed his bags, left his home and family in Bavaria, crossed the ocean, and entered the United States - we know not where - searching for a place to begin a new life for himself and for the family he planned. After four years, he found his way to Baton Rouge, LA, settled there, and wrote home. His bride-to-be Babetta Hirsch, and her mother Henrietta Wolf quickly followed; they were married in 1856 and began a family, eight children in all. Descendants of the family still live in Baton Rouge - amongst them, eight generations later, are my aunt, her children, grandchildren, and great grandchildren.

Why Baton Rouge? New Orleans had already taken its place as a city of international destination - a place of culture, commerce, and extraordinary economic opportunity. But New Orleans existed in a delicate balance. Annually, the Mississippi River overflowed its banks followed by the reappearance of Yellow Fever - an as yet unexplained disease that each year claimed countless lives, some years in the thousands. Baton Rouge may not have been as exciting, but it was safe.

The attraction to the possibility of wealth in spite of risk is a great force. Most cities grow because they are economic engines - population growth creates new challenges, and attracts, in turn, additional opportunities. The port of New Orleans - a connection linking the middle of a rapidly growing US and the rest of the world, was one of great strategic value. Location, location, location - the mantra of real estate value - was the basis for the growth to follow.

By the 1850s, New Orleans was already a beautiful city, set between Lake Pontchartrain to the north and the Mississippi River on the south. The French Quarter was an amalgamation of French and Spanish influence, built in styles and materials and of permanence unusual for the young United States. New forms of indigenous architecture were created and built in response to the harsh climate. French cooking techniques were adapted to utilize local produce and a new cuisine was developed. Mardi Gras with celebrated with parades as early as 1838, and a new form of music, jazz, was in its infancy.

My grandfather moved to New Orleans, and my father was born, raised, and lives there - or lived there - until last week. My cousins, their children and grandchildren lived there - until last week. They are all now in Baton Rouge, where at least they have family, and are in familiar surroundings, but let’s be clear - they like so many others, are evacuees. And, though I have lived in New York for the past 30 years, I was raised in New Orleans - and of that I can only quote the adage, “You can take a person out of the South, but you can’t take the South out of a person.” The roots are deep.

New Orleans was a unique city. It was in many ways the ultimate expression of the American ideal - a melting pot of peoples from all over the world who lived together, and who together built more than a city. Generation upon generation of families have been born, raised, lived and died in this city creating a culture that is unique, special, and American. The adjacent Gulf Coast in Mississippi was an extension of this culture. This was a vital part of the United States, in ways that go far beyond its role as a tourist destination for Mardi Gras, for Creole and Cajun cooking, for Jazz Fest or Preservation Hall, for River Road plantations, for a beach on the Gulf, Casino gambling, or merely for a Hurricane from Pat O’Briens.

Now, a hurricane of a different sort has laid the city to waste, and one has to ask the question, “What will be done, and what can I do to help?” It is a question each of us, as Americans need to be asking of ourselves, and of our elected officials.

The rebuilding of New Orleans and the Gulf Coast is a matter that deserves our highest priority as a nation. This is a city that has been evacuated, and to which the inhabitants cannot return. For many, there will be nothing left to return to - their homes are gone. For others, the future is unclear, the latest estimates being 80 days needed to dewater the city. And that’s when people can come in to begin the process of cleaning and rebuilding. But think about it - who will do the work? Where does that enormous number of people as a work force come from? How do the materials get delivered, and where are they stored? Where do people live, eat, and sleep, while the city is rebuilt? And, after all the businesses have relocated, and all the families settled in new communities across this country, who will come back?

This deserves around-the-clock media coverage, on all networks, similar to that broadcast after 9/11. It deserves the full focus of the Congress and the Executive Branches of the Federal Government, but it also deserves the same level of focus from ALL elected representatives - at all levels of State and Municipal government. This is the UNITED States, and this is a time of great National emergency, when ALL of us must come to aid those affected, because, in truth, we are all affected. It may in fact require nothing short of a draft, a Peace Corp initiative, or a WPA type program - in other words, a federally funded program focused on the rebuilding of a region of the country.

For those who don’t yet grasp the enormity of impact this will have, or feel that this is only a problem for those unfortunate, or foolish enough, to live in the path of Katrina - be forewarned, you will feel the effects soon enough. Gas prices will continue to rise, seafood will be scarce, the flow of importations will slow, and our economy nationwide and on personal levels will be sorely impacted. And the long-term influence will be far greater - wider and deeper - than merely economic. At risk is a cultural heritage, a part of the fabric of this country that has been ripped asunder. We must respond accordingly, and begin the process of repairs now, with a view to nothing less than complete restoration and renewal.

Unfortunately, we have a vacuum of leadership at the highest levels of the Federal government - a group of officials who neither grasp the scope nor content of this catastrophe. So we, the people, must make enough noise, like the inhabitants of the clover in “Horton Hears a Who.” We must begin by asking the difficult questions, and not stop until the answers are backed up by action.

One message I heard during the past week is worth repeating, that infrastructure is a gift of one generation to those that follow. We have reaped the benefit of the work that was built, and paid for, by our predecessors. Those people included my grandparents, and their parents, and their parents before them. It is a debt I am now called upon to repay, but more than that, I owe the same benefits I have enjoyed to my children, and their children to follow. What goes around comes around. It is now up to all of us to preserve not just a past, but also a future.

I ask you to do your part in this. I am one voice, but I send this note to many. I ask you in turn to forward this to your friends, your family, your business colleagues, and your elected officials, and I ask you to ask them to also do their share. Do not accept “no” for an answer. Do not accept a non-answer for an answer. We must all work together, and we must do it now because, in truth, we have no other choice.

The destruction of New Orleans is an event that is without historical precedent - unless one accepts the biblical account of Sodom and Gomorah, or the Flood. 9/11 pales in comparison. Nonetheless, the failure of the news media and the federal government to treat this accordingly gives one pause. When the World Trade Towers fell, the coverage was continuous on all TV and radio channels, and the efforts of rescuers was round the clock with aid brought in from all points without hesitation. Other than CNN and MSNBC, whose efforts I applaud, except that their efforts appear to focus on single rescues more than the big picture, I have trouble finding coverage - and this usually sandwiched between regularly scheduled programming.

One has to wonder. Where are our leaders at a time of need? The President has yet to address the nation on the gravity of this event. Like Nero fiddling while Rome burned, he continues his vacation in Crawford. Will the swift boats now being ordered in rescue Democrats as well as Republicans - or perhaps they will attempt to rewrite the history as it happens, Photoshopping the aerial views of flooded neighborhoods to show that it was due to Democrats. The governor of Louisiana asks for the thoughts and prayers of the nation but unless this is backed up by physical efforts - labor and materiel - the rescues will not even begin to happen. And, when the Governor of Mississippi rightly compares the destruction to that of an atomic bomb, people castigate him - but this is not rhetoric - it is an analogy rightly based on the facts.

The loss of an entire city is more than mere buildings. And this is more than a city - it is a region as well. It is the cumulative efforts of generations, the history and culture of a people bound up in the bricks and mortar, and in the lives that they house - the museums, the restaurants, the libraries, the universities, the houses of worship, the public parks, etc. It is up to the rest of us to see that this history is not lost.

It is time that something be done. The effort should be lead by our politicians - our elected leadership - and by the media, who have the power and the means to get the message out. I implore you to redouble your efforts.