I called P and C last night after seeing their son trick or treating. Their home was washed out (what we call it when the structure sorta remains but water has taken out the interior). They both sound depressed. She went to Bay St. Louis to clean out her Dad's home. His house was filled with 14 feet of water during Katrina. He's moved to another state and says he won't come back to the Coast to live.
P and C moved to an apartment after the hurricane with their two high school students. This weekend, they move to their own apartment. I offered to give them household things and etc. to help them feel at home. From the garage/estate sale hoard, I can fluff up either a FEMA trailer or temporary apartment with accessories and stuff.
Not that people want stuff anymore. The current mood is "I don't want anything that can be lost" which is a good indicator of depressed mood. Everything and anything can be lost. We know this. What we aren't certain of, at this point in the aftermath, is how we tolerate more loss.
A cell phone gets damaged. It is the link to outside because Bell South hasn't finished phone repairs. Losing use of the cell phone upsets into hysterics. The proportion of loss is impaired down here.
"I don't want anything that can be lost." Having an aged parent move to another state is a loss. Having nowhere familiar to lay one's head is a loss. Sharing office space because your office blew away feels like loss. It's loss.
The changes of everyday life overwhelm the grieving spirit. I see this every day. I see people grieve over small frustrations, huge disappointments (the Insurance Industry), unfamiliar physical landscape, unavailable goods (grocery stores aren't stocked as they were before the hurricane) and not knowing where friends/acquaintances are living.
This is such a weird time to be living. I suppose all times are this way but the abrupt Before Katrina and A K overwhelms my people. And, me, too.
6 comments:
Praying for you, your family, your church and especially P and C this morning.
Here in Oklahoma City, the memorial for the bombing really expresses well the sense of "before" and "after." The bombing happened at 9:02--one gate to the memorial reads "9:01", the other "9:03."
My prayers are with you and yours this morning.
St. C.,
The up and downs we have all been expeirencing after Katrina take their toll. My house was undamaged and yet I feel a sense of guilt because so many have lost so much. The place I work at was destroyed and yet I feel elation because we were able to peel some shrimp last week at an undamaged plant and we had a small payroll.
Some morinings I feel good and then I see something that hits me hard and go back to the bleak feeling.
And I yet that nagging feeling of guilt hangs in there, especially after I see people I know and they tell me of the damage to their homes and their lives.
Praying for you and yours.
aw, (o)
puts a whole new perspective on 'I've lost my keys, phone or diary'
Lord surround them with your light
restore colour
and yeah the JOY of knowing you.
It seems impossible right now Lord. I ask you don't just plaster over the scrapes and cracks, but pour your oil of healing, your oil of gladness into the deep wounds and fill each and everyone of these dear people with Your presence.
Father thanksgiving is approaching. Turn it around for these folk, that it would be a time of remembering Your goodness in a very bleak situation.
Hear our prayers
Amen
I cannot even begin to understand. How overwhelming
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