You lookin' at me punk?! Reilly's game face...
Tuesday, September 06, 2005
Silencing the Zydeco
How do you adequately discuss the absolute destruction of an entire city, much less one with the panache of New Orleans? The whole country must still be in shock, certainly those citizens who have spent even the smallest amount of time in the Crescent City, because the scale of the destruction is so vast that it seems as if it cannot be true. Maybe that's why the federal reaction was the way it was - the utter shock that this was even a remote possibility, much less an actuality. But this is no excuse. Nor is the "we didn't know it could happen" argument.
For Bush to say that they didn't know the levees could be compromised is akin to a child saying he didn't know the dog would run away when the gate was left open - you've been warned about it, even scorned about it, so when it happens this flies like a lead balloon. The powers that be at both FEMA and DHS have said they didn't know about certain conditions until hours if not a full day past when they were first reported on national news. How is this possible? How can it be that we are getting the most accurate reporting from Harry Connick Jr., a guy who plays the piano for a living (and a New Orleans legend), and even at that point, when the lines between MSNBC and Entertainment Tonight have been merged, the government claims to have had no idea how bad things were? This whole thing has been bungled beyond belief and at the expense of those citizens who were trapped in a toxic lagoon. Some should have evacuated and they didn't, that is those with the means but not the desire. But the others, the one's without the means, were utterly abandoned. Why did the relief not come sooner? Not in the immediate day or two following the catastrophe (which it should have in the worst possible scenario), but as a proactive measure?
For years people have foretold about the very real possibility of a total breakdown of New Orleans levee system in the event of a cat 4 or 5 hurricane, but nothing was done to remedy this potential calamity. That being said, it was well known, and well documented, that a storm of this size would demolish a significant part of the city and it was also known that a large portion of the city's inhabitants lay well beneath the poverty line. So where was the planning? If we knew of this possibility, why weren't there buses lined up on Saturday to take people from these neighborhoods out of town? How much would it have cost? It certainly would not have been cheap, but what is the cost of potentially thousands of lives? Bush is now trying to push through another $40 billion for recovery, the transportation effort would have been a fraction of a percent of this number, and we would be talking about material goods, not lost souls.
Furthermore, why weren't there 10,000 national guard troops staged in Memphis, ready to roll south as the rain from the storm passed them by? Even if New Orleans was spared the flooding, these troops would've been put to work quickly in one facet or another on this. And it keeps getting worse - the Keystone Cops, Presidential Edition. One image that will always stand out to me is the picture of Bush "surveying" the destruction from Air Force One: not only was he two days late and had to cut his vacation short, but he didn't return to actually set foot on ground in any of the disaster areas until 4 days after the storm. Imagine waiting for the cavalry to come save you for 2 days, seeing the president - the most powerful man in the nation - fly over, then waiting 2 MORE days until anyone showed up to help. How would you feel? Abandoned. Right in the middle of the United States of America.
Today the streets of the French Quarter are silent. And they will be tomorrow and the day following that, probably for the next 60-90 days. After that, who knows? It has been widely said that the spirit of the people of New Orleans will rise like the proverbial Phoenix and rebuild this great city, and we all hope this is true. New Orleans is an American institution - not unlike (but not at all like) San Francisco and New York City. These cities distinguish themselves immediately, not only in the US but as world cities. The Zydeco music blaring from every crevice. The debauchery of all things Bourbon Street. The coffee and beignets at Cafe DuMond. "The Quarter" is another world that is not of this world. Bill Simmons says that the French Quarter is one of the only places in the world where as soon as you step into it you feel like you are in a movie, and I couldn't agree more. Eight weeks ago I was down there with a lot of uncles and cousins of mine and can tell you that you haven't lived until you have seen the sun rising above the bayou and filling the French Quarter with morning's first light. You may feel like you want to die, but it is quite a site - bittersweet almost in that "curtain being pulled back from Oz" kind of way, but it also means you have survived.
On the flip side, I proposed to my wife in Jackson Square. She said yes, so this story is a good one. The romantic aspect of the Quarter is often overlooked in the face of Mardi Gras and a million different crude Bourbon Street t-shirts, but it is still there. The old streets and horse drawn carriages. The boutique shops. The vine laced balconies. The smooth southern drawl and sweet tea. The music hanging in the air. The gumbo. The laid back life style. It's all there to be found, on foot no less, in the Quarter - with Jackson Square and St. Louis Cathedral right there on the banks of the mighty Mississippi.
This was the best part of 'Nawlins - that it was all right there. And it will be back. It has to come back. There is too much music yet to be played.
For Bush to say that they didn't know the levees could be compromised is akin to a child saying he didn't know the dog would run away when the gate was left open - you've been warned about it, even scorned about it, so when it happens this flies like a lead balloon. The powers that be at both FEMA and DHS have said they didn't know about certain conditions until hours if not a full day past when they were first reported on national news. How is this possible? How can it be that we are getting the most accurate reporting from Harry Connick Jr., a guy who plays the piano for a living (and a New Orleans legend), and even at that point, when the lines between MSNBC and Entertainment Tonight have been merged, the government claims to have had no idea how bad things were? This whole thing has been bungled beyond belief and at the expense of those citizens who were trapped in a toxic lagoon. Some should have evacuated and they didn't, that is those with the means but not the desire. But the others, the one's without the means, were utterly abandoned. Why did the relief not come sooner? Not in the immediate day or two following the catastrophe (which it should have in the worst possible scenario), but as a proactive measure?
For years people have foretold about the very real possibility of a total breakdown of New Orleans levee system in the event of a cat 4 or 5 hurricane, but nothing was done to remedy this potential calamity. That being said, it was well known, and well documented, that a storm of this size would demolish a significant part of the city and it was also known that a large portion of the city's inhabitants lay well beneath the poverty line. So where was the planning? If we knew of this possibility, why weren't there buses lined up on Saturday to take people from these neighborhoods out of town? How much would it have cost? It certainly would not have been cheap, but what is the cost of potentially thousands of lives? Bush is now trying to push through another $40 billion for recovery, the transportation effort would have been a fraction of a percent of this number, and we would be talking about material goods, not lost souls.
Furthermore, why weren't there 10,000 national guard troops staged in Memphis, ready to roll south as the rain from the storm passed them by? Even if New Orleans was spared the flooding, these troops would've been put to work quickly in one facet or another on this. And it keeps getting worse - the Keystone Cops, Presidential Edition. One image that will always stand out to me is the picture of Bush "surveying" the destruction from Air Force One: not only was he two days late and had to cut his vacation short, but he didn't return to actually set foot on ground in any of the disaster areas until 4 days after the storm. Imagine waiting for the cavalry to come save you for 2 days, seeing the president - the most powerful man in the nation - fly over, then waiting 2 MORE days until anyone showed up to help. How would you feel? Abandoned. Right in the middle of the United States of America.
Today the streets of the French Quarter are silent. And they will be tomorrow and the day following that, probably for the next 60-90 days. After that, who knows? It has been widely said that the spirit of the people of New Orleans will rise like the proverbial Phoenix and rebuild this great city, and we all hope this is true. New Orleans is an American institution - not unlike (but not at all like) San Francisco and New York City. These cities distinguish themselves immediately, not only in the US but as world cities. The Zydeco music blaring from every crevice. The debauchery of all things Bourbon Street. The coffee and beignets at Cafe DuMond. "The Quarter" is another world that is not of this world. Bill Simmons says that the French Quarter is one of the only places in the world where as soon as you step into it you feel like you are in a movie, and I couldn't agree more. Eight weeks ago I was down there with a lot of uncles and cousins of mine and can tell you that you haven't lived until you have seen the sun rising above the bayou and filling the French Quarter with morning's first light. You may feel like you want to die, but it is quite a site - bittersweet almost in that "curtain being pulled back from Oz" kind of way, but it also means you have survived.
On the flip side, I proposed to my wife in Jackson Square. She said yes, so this story is a good one. The romantic aspect of the Quarter is often overlooked in the face of Mardi Gras and a million different crude Bourbon Street t-shirts, but it is still there. The old streets and horse drawn carriages. The boutique shops. The vine laced balconies. The smooth southern drawl and sweet tea. The music hanging in the air. The gumbo. The laid back life style. It's all there to be found, on foot no less, in the Quarter - with Jackson Square and St. Louis Cathedral right there on the banks of the mighty Mississippi.
This was the best part of 'Nawlins - that it was all right there. And it will be back. It has to come back. There is too much music yet to be played.
Monday, August 08, 2005
Peter Jennings
What do you say about the consummate professional? I grew up with Peter Jennings, as many of us did, and his voice brought clarity through the cacaphony of the world's events. His style was timeless and he brought an absolute sense of humanity to the news desk. His experiences became our experiences because he wanted to share them - to let us step into a world that we had not actually travel but he HAD, and he knew there were lessons to be learned at every step for those willing to listen. This is what set him apart - the constant drive to learn, and more importantly for us, to share what he learned.
A couple of years ago I was returning from studying in El Salvador for the summer when I met him on the curb at SFO. For 10 minutes he talked to me about my recent trip and what I learned, about where I was in school (a journalism major, with great interest in his career), and how did I liked San Francisco? This man, on a trip to visit his son who was going to school in California, appeared to be interested only in what I had to say about my life. The only thing that broke up this conversation was the arrival of my sister, and she thought I was talking to a professor of mine - he was so easy going and engaging.
I will never forget Mr. Jennings, from my kitchen every night before dinner during my youth, or from the curbside where we met at SFO during my senior year of college. When an athlete or movie star dies, even if they were your favorite, you realize that to you they were the best at whatever it was that they did - but they also simply played a role in the trivial side of life. Many people, including myself at times, will argue that the major news networks are little more than that themselves, but the fact remains for those of us who watch the nightly national news that these people become trusted members of something just beyond family. They bring us the positive news, but they also know how to cushion the blow of the negative. They are the cognoscenti of all things beyond our local radar at best, our in house international gossip columnist at worst. Peter was the best at it. The void left is enormous and it will remain for quite some time...
A couple of years ago I was returning from studying in El Salvador for the summer when I met him on the curb at SFO. For 10 minutes he talked to me about my recent trip and what I learned, about where I was in school (a journalism major, with great interest in his career), and how did I liked San Francisco? This man, on a trip to visit his son who was going to school in California, appeared to be interested only in what I had to say about my life. The only thing that broke up this conversation was the arrival of my sister, and she thought I was talking to a professor of mine - he was so easy going and engaging.
I will never forget Mr. Jennings, from my kitchen every night before dinner during my youth, or from the curbside where we met at SFO during my senior year of college. When an athlete or movie star dies, even if they were your favorite, you realize that to you they were the best at whatever it was that they did - but they also simply played a role in the trivial side of life. Many people, including myself at times, will argue that the major news networks are little more than that themselves, but the fact remains for those of us who watch the nightly national news that these people become trusted members of something just beyond family. They bring us the positive news, but they also know how to cushion the blow of the negative. They are the cognoscenti of all things beyond our local radar at best, our in house international gossip columnist at worst. Peter was the best at it. The void left is enormous and it will remain for quite some time...
Friday, August 05, 2005
If One is Okay ... Two ... Two Is Just As Easy, Right?
In the life cycle of a tropical storm, there are very definate highs and lows - the ebb and flow of intensity. For instance, when Hurricane Emily recently went crashing through the Gulf of Mexico, it powered up to Cat 4, hit the Yucatan Peninsula, was a Cat 1, and then kicked back up to a Cat 3 before heading into the mainland of norhtern Mexico. I guess the point in explaining this is simply that the hurricane is still a wicked storm when it is over the Yucatan. A hurricane is a hurricane after all. As for the cycle of the last 2 years of my life, I see some striking similarities.
When we were waiting for Reilly to come along, we were at Cat 4 - no idea how crazy things were going to get when she hit us. But life settles down a bit. Everything is still crazy, but not as insane as the landfall of the first few months. I feel older. I just feel old some times. I suddenly don't care as much about foul odors, and I can only assume this ambivalence increases (hence the smell of EVERY grandparents house). But I am content, and actually quite happy with my place in the world. As it turns out this does not always mean "fair skies" as much as it means "the calm before the storm", or the eye of the hurricane.
A couple of months ago we found out that Reilly is to have a sibling. We figured at some point she would, but the first week of January, 2006 wasn't exactly on our radar. We do not know the sex of the baby yet, and most of my friends do not know we are expecting again, as I am sure most of them aren't over the shock that I am a daddy now. The realization that the Deuce was on its way carried with it a much greater calm than did the word of Reilly's arrival. Maybe its 'cause we had already gone through it, or maybe it is something else.
I think I might be deceiving myself, but this whole thing doesn't seem so bad. I like to think that it is because Annie nad I have our shit so together that the thought of doubling the workload "ain't no thang." I mean, we already have tons of baby stuff. We know (more or less) what we are doing. We have the room at the house. Maybe most importantly, we have become parents. Our lifestyle has already taken the biggest hit and we have made the right changes. Now is this all true, or is it like the veteran resident who thinks "this storm is weak compared to the others" and decides not to take any precautions only to be wiped out when the wrath focuses on him?
This is my fear, that we have not become better, wiser, stronger but that we are simply broken. I have been in but a few fights, but the first punch is always the worst. Kind of like jumping into a cold pool - that first instant the shock is at its greatest level, then you just become numb. Are we numb now? Do we know what is going on, or are we just trying to focus on the essential functions of getting through the day? I prefer to think that it is the previous, but you never know, I could "wake up" in 5 years and realize I have two kids in school, am coming up on my 35th birhtday, still haven't gone heli-skiing in Alaska, and generally feel like Tom Hanks in the beginning of Joe Versus the Volcano. This is what scares me.
Annie and I were recently talking about this, and as you can tell have yet to come up with a real answer; at least not one that we truly believe in. This is really what growing up is all about I guess. It's not the manual labor job you did for minimum wage. Or the dedication you spent towards getting through college and the first few years of your career. But none of this really gets the job done. What does it it is sitting there staring at your first child (and then presumably your second, third, et al) and realizing that this it is - your role in the world has changed and there is no going back. You cannot switch children the way you can switch schools or jobs. The job of a parent is far more difficult than the manual labor and pays nothing. This is not to say parenthood is bad at all, but it is sobering, both figuratively and literally for some.
Maybe the hardest part is convincing yourself that your life has changed. You still want to be an idiot, but now you can't be, at least not in the same way. So maybe the feeling that I am looking for is simply shock, and I still haven't come out of it. Or maybe I have, I just haven't realized it. Like a hangover, or sitting in the eye of the hurricane just before it heads back towards open water and starts picking up speed again. My feeling now is that if I am going through a storm, just bring it on. I have battened down the hatches as much as I can and am ready fro the brunt of it - I'll recover once it blows through. Then I'll look to the Canary Islands and see that a tropical storm named "Teenagers" is starting to stir...
Thursday, June 09, 2005
Wednesday, June 08, 2005
Wednesday, February 23, 2005
Two and a Half Months Isn't Long in the Grand Scheme of Things...
Okay, so it has been two and a half months, but, if I recall, I mentioned something about my lack of focus and follow through on such endeavors, thus this is to be expected.
Reilly is now 8 months old. She is on the verge of crawling, which means my wife and I are on the verge of crawling. Doors, cabinets, and likely the cat will need to be Reilly-proofed. This shouldn't take along at first glance but, as I assume all babies are apt to do, she is able to find the one sharp/rock hard/potentially lethal item in an otherwise perfectly secure room and begin to chew on it. I know this is a never ending project, but it helps to believe that I might actually find a way to secure the house to some degree. Way it goes. She should learn after a while, right? Maybe not.
As yet another sign of AARP membership dues being seemingly right around the corner ... I believe the whole world wasn't as protected when we were kids. You always hear members of the so called Greatest Generation and the Babyboomers saying things like this, but I think Gen. X is there as well. I personally know three people who actually stuck forks, paperclips, et al in light sockets and actually LIVED to tell about it. Now, if you believe the books, magazines, etc., all of these sockets must be covered and everything plugged into these sockets must have some sort of shock guard on the plug. Is this really that big of a problem? How many people are actually killed versus a bit shocked? Does this not teach us the lesson that electricity is not to be trifled with? Hell, I knew those three guys and it still took an ill-gotten plan in a high school physics class for me to learn the simple lessons of electric currents. Everything has to be bigger and better now, which I assume means potentially more deadly.
How are we better as a society for hiding these little "lessons"? You might have to try harder to hurt yourself, and thus learn, but the danger seems to be greater because we have taken away the small things. Is this not like leaving a loaded shotgun, with the safety on, on the floor while you are locking up the Red Rider BB gun because it's dangerous? We all know teens have an acute sense for danger and finding ways around the safeguards we instill, so this would seem to be counter productive, unless of course we are taking these actions to insure the future success of the so-called Darwin Awards. I prefer a world were I can take a BB in the chest (after I missed the GI Joe in my fireplace and the BB richocheted back at me) and say, "Won't do that again! Well, maybe once more ... to prove scientifically that this is a stupid idea ..." But we lived, welts and all, to tell our friends of the misadventures, and sometimes how to perform these experiments themselves. This taught me not only lessons in pain, but also geometry. But I digress ...
The real of point of today's entry is to say that Reilly is getting bigger and more mobile, and I need to start baby-proofing the place, but I still found the desire and call to action to put a driving range in my house. I have been playing golf for years and, on a recent February outing to the course, I noticed that my short game goes to hell during the generally cold Colorado winters. When I lived in Arizona we sometimes had the opposite problem - but we faced the heat by opening the freezer and working our chip shots into the ice-box ("Two points if you stick it in the ice tray, 1 point if it just stays in the freezer.") This cured two problems, both the heat and the loss of "touch." Anyway, for the last couple of winters since my return to Colorado my hallways have become putting greens and my living rooms chipping areas. This works for about half-an-hour on the particularly cold days, but then you are left with nothing but a dented wall and some tournament from the '80s playing on the Golf Channel. And then it hit me ... I now live in a place where I can do something more!
We moved into a house in December that is far bigger than anything we really need at this point in our lives, but the opportunity presented itself and we jumped on it. We have about 60% of the house in use and we had three bedrooms set up as guest bedrooms. Like a bolt of lightning, and blinding avoidance of common sense, it hit me that one of the guestrooms had vaulted ceilings ... now all I had to worry about was convincing Annie that this was indeed a "good" idea ... and making sure a swing wouldn't make those ball-size dents in my previous aprtment's walls look like child's play.
I talked to Annie, ever cautious about using just the right words to make this sound like I was truly gaining something athletic out of this ("I can practice indoors on the coldest days and thus will be working out! No excuses!" I finished my argument, laid all the cards on the table, and waited for the disection of this hairball plan. And then it came, "Sounds like a good idea!" What?! Really?! DONE! I rushed downstairs and got online to figure out what this would cost me and how fast I could get it, because this opinion surely wouldn't last long. The next day I was off to our local golf merchant and by evening I had set up a 10 foot tall driving range in what had been a guestroom with a view a scant 30 minutes before. Our neighbors must wonder, but that's okay - boring neighbors are no fun. Anyway, I now have yet another toy I wished I had as a kid, and have created yet another room that needs to be baby proofed, lest an errant golf shot come flying out the door. More on this later, but my short game could start looking up ...
Reilly is now 8 months old. She is on the verge of crawling, which means my wife and I are on the verge of crawling. Doors, cabinets, and likely the cat will need to be Reilly-proofed. This shouldn't take along at first glance but, as I assume all babies are apt to do, she is able to find the one sharp/rock hard/potentially lethal item in an otherwise perfectly secure room and begin to chew on it. I know this is a never ending project, but it helps to believe that I might actually find a way to secure the house to some degree. Way it goes. She should learn after a while, right? Maybe not.
As yet another sign of AARP membership dues being seemingly right around the corner ... I believe the whole world wasn't as protected when we were kids. You always hear members of the so called Greatest Generation and the Babyboomers saying things like this, but I think Gen. X is there as well. I personally know three people who actually stuck forks, paperclips, et al in light sockets and actually LIVED to tell about it. Now, if you believe the books, magazines, etc., all of these sockets must be covered and everything plugged into these sockets must have some sort of shock guard on the plug. Is this really that big of a problem? How many people are actually killed versus a bit shocked? Does this not teach us the lesson that electricity is not to be trifled with? Hell, I knew those three guys and it still took an ill-gotten plan in a high school physics class for me to learn the simple lessons of electric currents. Everything has to be bigger and better now, which I assume means potentially more deadly.
How are we better as a society for hiding these little "lessons"? You might have to try harder to hurt yourself, and thus learn, but the danger seems to be greater because we have taken away the small things. Is this not like leaving a loaded shotgun, with the safety on, on the floor while you are locking up the Red Rider BB gun because it's dangerous? We all know teens have an acute sense for danger and finding ways around the safeguards we instill, so this would seem to be counter productive, unless of course we are taking these actions to insure the future success of the so-called Darwin Awards. I prefer a world were I can take a BB in the chest (after I missed the GI Joe in my fireplace and the BB richocheted back at me) and say, "Won't do that again! Well, maybe once more ... to prove scientifically that this is a stupid idea ..." But we lived, welts and all, to tell our friends of the misadventures, and sometimes how to perform these experiments themselves. This taught me not only lessons in pain, but also geometry. But I digress ...
The real of point of today's entry is to say that Reilly is getting bigger and more mobile, and I need to start baby-proofing the place, but I still found the desire and call to action to put a driving range in my house. I have been playing golf for years and, on a recent February outing to the course, I noticed that my short game goes to hell during the generally cold Colorado winters. When I lived in Arizona we sometimes had the opposite problem - but we faced the heat by opening the freezer and working our chip shots into the ice-box ("Two points if you stick it in the ice tray, 1 point if it just stays in the freezer.") This cured two problems, both the heat and the loss of "touch." Anyway, for the last couple of winters since my return to Colorado my hallways have become putting greens and my living rooms chipping areas. This works for about half-an-hour on the particularly cold days, but then you are left with nothing but a dented wall and some tournament from the '80s playing on the Golf Channel. And then it hit me ... I now live in a place where I can do something more!
We moved into a house in December that is far bigger than anything we really need at this point in our lives, but the opportunity presented itself and we jumped on it. We have about 60% of the house in use and we had three bedrooms set up as guest bedrooms. Like a bolt of lightning, and blinding avoidance of common sense, it hit me that one of the guestrooms had vaulted ceilings ... now all I had to worry about was convincing Annie that this was indeed a "good" idea ... and making sure a swing wouldn't make those ball-size dents in my previous aprtment's walls look like child's play.
I talked to Annie, ever cautious about using just the right words to make this sound like I was truly gaining something athletic out of this ("I can practice indoors on the coldest days and thus will be working out! No excuses!" I finished my argument, laid all the cards on the table, and waited for the disection of this hairball plan. And then it came, "Sounds like a good idea!" What?! Really?! DONE! I rushed downstairs and got online to figure out what this would cost me and how fast I could get it, because this opinion surely wouldn't last long. The next day I was off to our local golf merchant and by evening I had set up a 10 foot tall driving range in what had been a guestroom with a view a scant 30 minutes before. Our neighbors must wonder, but that's okay - boring neighbors are no fun. Anyway, I now have yet another toy I wished I had as a kid, and have created yet another room that needs to be baby proofed, lest an errant golf shot come flying out the door. More on this later, but my short game could start looking up ...
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