Hope Trumps Disaster

“You know what gets attacked first in the midst of a crisis or disaster such as Katrina?” The bishop proclaimed in the microphone in Our Lady of Prompt Succor church today.

“Hope. A group of people’s hope gets attacked first.” He said, answering his own question with intensity.

He went onto say later that, “I am thankful today to be standing here before you people and be able to say that during that time of crisis four years ago, your hope was attacked by hurricane Katrina, but I can see you have all given yourself over to God, and hope has prevailed”.

As the 3 of us workers sat in our pew in that church in St.Bernard parish, one of the hardest hit areas by Katrina from the industrial canal breech, I felt like I was part of something very important. The Eucharist was brought up by the men and women of the police and fire department of the parish and I got chills. The church was packed; black, white, young, old.

Today marked the 4^thanniversary of hurricane Katrina making landfall on the gulf, and the bishop was absolutely correct, hope was prevailing.

Church bells rang this morning throughout New Orleans, there was a second line parade starting at the street corner in the lower ninth where the industrial canal broke and water came crashing through. Me and Rebekah went to the New Orleans Museum of Art this morning since they were screening Spike Lee’s documentary “When the levees broke”. We watched half of it and then went to the other side of the museum to view a special collection of “Katrina” photos that were on display for one day only. The names of the people who lost their lives’ were honored outside the museum as well. There was a 24 hour rebuild-a-thon happening all day and night in the lower 9^th ward in which many university students and government/military personnel turned out to help serve a still crippled area.

I guess my point is….hope. So much was done today to fill the city with hope on a day which, similar to September 11^th, is usually veiled with grief and dark energy.

As I reflected on my time here as a SJW tonight at church, I felt very connected to something bigger.

I sat there, and examined the scraps on my forearms that occurred from lifting lumber into a house I am helping to rebuild. This week was my second full week of work, and I am not gunna lie to you, I lost sight of the bigger picture a bit here and there. My body has been aching from the new forms of physical labor I am participating in. I arrive home drenched in sweat, sawdust, and grease from the nail gun. I have been working on many sporadic pieces of different houses, thus I have not been able to see too much of my progress yet; I learn one thing and then it is on to the next thing.

But in light of all the uncertainty (and dirty clothes) my service with lowernine.org provides me, it has also helped me to glimpse this interesting hope that seems to float throughout New Orleans.

As I was telling my friend Sue on the phone the other night:

“You can feel something down here, I mean don’t get me wrong, many of the houses are still boarded up and completely ruined, but there is a really positive energy floating around. It is almost as thick as the air itself."

Each day as me and Rian cruise through the lower 9 to work or when I am actually out on the job there are sounds of hope: hammers nailing the houses back together, table saws cutting 2x4s to frame up new windows on a home, kids in uniforms are yelling to each other as they all walk to school together.

The other piece that has thrown me for a loop as far as hope goes is how grateful many locals are in relation to people coming in to help.

Usually when I meet new people here they ask the classic question of,

“So, why are you here?”

My response is an abridged version which sounds like “I moved here from New York, I am a volunteer working in the lower ninth ward rebuilding homes, I will be here for 10 months”.

After I say this I am always met with a hug and “thank you” whispered into my ears or handshakes and that very intense kind of eye contact, where the other person is really trying to convey their emotions through their gaze. I expected to have some grateful responses here and there, maybe down the line from homeowners who I helped directly, but definitely not from complete strangers who praise my bravery for even taking the step to say “yes” to a certain call to serve other Americans.

So as today marks the 4^th year that this crazy yet loveable city was really knocked down by nature and fate, I feel blessed to have found my way down here at a time when hope is being reborn. My fellow SJWs and I get to be a part of reviving a part of our country! Even just by being people who exude a positive spirit we can contribute to that hope that the bishop was talking about.

Cheers New Orleans!

Love, Traci

Help with Posting a Comment

Dear Readers

We have gotten some questions about readers not being able to post a comment to each respective entry on this blog. If anyone could write back (in a comment form) on how to successfully post to our blog this piece of information would be greatly appreciated!

Here is a quick 411. If you want to make a comment on one of the entries, scroll to the bottom of the entry, there will be a hyperlink which says "comment/post comment". Once clicked you will have a window in which to type your feedback. Now here is the tricky part. It asks you for an "account" (i.e. google, OpenID, AIM, etc). If you have a valid gmail address click that one. I believe you can also opt to "comment anonymously". Meaning, if you do not have any of the account/email types blogger accepts, commenting in an anonymous format would suit your needs. Just make sure to sign your entry so we know who it is from! Thanks so much for the lovely comments already!!

~SJW Fab 4, out.

3 Day Week Rewind

Hello all, Traci here!

It is Sunday, the day of rest, but I feel as if I have been in fast forward all week and it is hard to slow down! Aside from our jobs, which I will brief ya’ll on momentarily, the 4 of us girls have been doing a lot. We have been frequenting many different grocery stores and farmer’s markets in order to try and stretch our food stipend as best possible and walk the talk of sustainability. We have been experimenting with different modes of travel in and around the city, such as the Algiers ferry, driving across the bridge, and under calculating drastically how much walking any gal can do in high heels and 98% humidity just to check out the French Quarter. Maybe I will ask the girls about the idea of swimming across the Mississippi to cool off after our adventures on foot….

Anywho, work.

We all started our jobs this past Wednesday and everyone made it successfully each day; although we all resembled zombies a bit each morning around 7am. I know Rebekah described her first few days, so I would like to do the same. Rian and I are carpool buddies, since our service sites are barely 5 minutes away from each other. The morning traffic made me miss my hours as a late night bartender, but thankfully Rian did the driving the first few days, so I took shotty and slowly acclimated to a daytime shift of work.

I work at www.lowernine.org which is a small non-profit, located in the lower ninth ward, which specializes in direct rebuild services via short and long term volunteer participation. Although I was only there 2 days out of the 3 (we will cover where I was…on day 2) I really love the energy at lowernine. It run out of a house right in the 9^th ward, so the connection to the community I am serving is very present. I instantly enjoyed all my “co-workers” since most of them are aged 18-30 and therefore we all have tons of enthusiasm and happen to be on the same page with things.

Wednesday I got a feel for how our homebase/office ran, had a few meetings with some key staffers as to get a gist of the organization, and helped prepare dinner for the volunteers. Why did I cook them dinner? Oh yeah, I forgot to mention that, most of the volunteers who stay a short amount of time stay directly at the lowernine.org house. The house holds about 15-18 volunteers at a time, and they all take meals together and alternate roles of housecleaning and such. Even though I do not live there, helping to prepare the meal was a meaningful piece of solidarity, I thought.

Thursday, my supervisor at lowernine lined up a different gig for me with Rebuilding Together-a national rebuild program. RT was under a deadline crunch for submitting a grant proposal worth millions of dollars, so I was enlisted for the day as an “intern” to help gather research to put into the grant. My task all day Thursday was to Google my brains out until I found some useful statistics surrounding rebuilding New Orleans post Katrina. This included things such as contractor fraud, the current amount and condition of the FEMA trailers still scattered about the city, and key economic demographics to support the grant.

Sounds fancy right?? Haha, yeah that is what I thought!

Although I felt like a wet noodle after sitting at that computer reading all day, I was proud that I found many tidbits of informative data that RT worked into the grant proposal. Thus, I was part of something big to help move the city forward! Not to mention, so many things started coming together for me as far as understanding my job, and how things get done in the non-profit sector.

Finally, Friday.

Boy was I happy it was a short week. I am sure your familiar with the “new job” curve aren’t ya? First it is a sense of fight or flight your first day: “What the heck did I get myself into here? How did I end up in New Orleans working for free again?” Then, if you don’t run, it turns all warm and fuzzy for the next few moments. “I LOVE my job, and everything is WONDERFUL”. Then comes informational overload and inevitably the crash. (After this the curve flat-lines for the most part…but in general the first few weeks in any job is tough and filled with ups/downs)

Friday was a half day at lowernine since our supervisor held a small “appreciation” pool party at her friends house in the late afternoon heat. Overall Friday was good. That tension of being “the new girl” broke like a fever, giving way to this interesting sense of starting to belong and be part of “the crew”. A few playful shoves around the kitchen as I helped a few of the other volunteers shell shrimp to make gumbo served as a positive affirmation. I dunno about you, but being someone with a lot of dry Irish wit, getting pushed around a kitchen and punched in the arm (lightly), is a good sign.

This week coming up, I will officially get out on the rebuild sights and start physically working. Friday I went out to a few sights to round everyone up and got a good look at where our progress was at the various homes we are rebuilding for people. I am really looking forward to wearing the new FREE clothes I got at the nearby thrift store to paint and hang sheetrock in the coming weeks. I love working in an environment where you see the tangible progress and can have a wardrobe full of paint-ridden clothes to show for it.

So aside from the nightly “crashing” that occurred for me, the new job is off to a good start! Thanks for reading!

-Traci

Rebekah's Two Weeks

So it has been roughly fourteen days since I have completely upturned my entire life to move in with four complete strangers, and I have never felt as sure in a decision until now. We have been sent out to our charities, and for the last few days I have been orienting to the Daughters of Charity Services of New Orleans (DCSNO). http://www.dcsno.org/
This is a completely different kind of nursing to me, as I have been a nurse in the hospital for the last 2 years. It is really interesting to see the type of holistic care and the dedication the staff has placed into providing this care. I find it very encouraging.

I have only been at DCSNO since Wednesday, so it is hard to say how exactly I feel so far. I almost feel full of information. In the last couple of days, I have learned an seen so much. I am trying to keep it all straight, but like any first time at a job, it will take some getting used to.

Speaking of adjustments, having roommates is another thing I haven't had in a while. And having more than one is something I haven't had since college! Not only are we all coming from different geographic locations, but we also have very different diets. This is going to create somewhat of a challenge since we have to shop for food together. But it is easily something we can work out. We just have to figure out how to shop to live simply, which will take some work finding out what everyone likes or doesn't like and what corners we feel can be cut to save some extra cash.

One of my favorite experiences so far was going to the Jazz Mass at St. Augustine's. There are hardly words to describe the soul moving music combined with the liturgy. It was pretty amazing to see what a positive effect music can bring into all our lives. If anyone came to New Orleans around the time of one of these masses, I would tell them to go no matter what their religion. The entire church was packed, and although there was no air conditioning on the hot Louisiana Sunday, everyone stayed until the Jazz band marched out the front door. They held the Jazz Mass for the Satchmo Festival. New Orleans holds this festival in remembrance of Louis Armstrong.

I can't help but think that this is definitely the path God has chosen for me. The other three girls here are pretty cool. I was a bit afraid that they would be very different from me, and in many ways they are. We all get along pretty well, and I think that is a really good thing. I think we all ended up here because of different reasons, and though we all have our own experiences and backgrounds, we are all supposed to be here. I am really looking forward to this year and the adventures and experiences to come!

Introducing....

Hey ya'll!! Welcome to the SJW blog page. We are writing to ya from the hot, interesting, and incredibly diverse city of New Orleans...affectionately referred to as N'awlins by many locals who harbor an awesome southern twang. As it states in the header of this page, this is the St. Joseph Worker Program's first year ever in New Orleans, thus this blog is meant to inform the congregation of Sister's, our friends and family, as well as any interested readers of how the year is developing. My name is Traci, and I am writing this first post. But, for future posts, don't be suprised as voices change and we all contribute our own renditions of what it means to take on a year of volunteerism through this program.

Okay so, since we only moved into our home one week ago, our jobs have not yet begun. We just completed a week of orientation with our Director, Jackie Schmitz (CSJ) and other extremely wonderful people of the area. Each day of orientation we focused on a different pillar of the program.

In light of the fact that we do not have any work experience to reflect upon yet, I thought it would be nice to introduce the team of workers and where we will be working!

Rebekah Clark graduated from West Virginia University in Morgantown, WV in May, 2006 with a Bachelor of Science in Nursing. While gaining experience as a telemetry nurse in a hospital setting, she is also passionate about education and care for those who cannot afford healthcare. She has volunteered as an Emergency Relief Worker with the Red Cross. Born in Minneapolis, she has also lived in Chicago and Hampton, Virginia. She loves spending time with family and friends, and is a supporter of animals and the environment. Rebekah will be working as a nurse care manager at the Carrollton Medical Center as well as visiting other healthcare locations for training, orientation and professional experiences.

Becky Kleive graduated from St. Olaf College in Northfield, MN in May, 2009 with a double major in Women’s Studies and Environmental Studies. While in college, Becky also engaged in an off-campus study experience called “The Oregon Extension,” which is a program teaching intentional community-building in a remote, mountainous environment. Her creative leadership at St. Olaf’s included co-directing the Vagina Monologues, hosting a radio talk show and educating audiences around the environment. Becky is passionate about education, community organizing and direct service work. This summer, she spent some time visiting her father (who is in the Peace Corps) in Samoa. Becky will be working with the St. Vincent De Paul Adult Learning Center for Empowerment. Rian Kistner graduated from the University of Dayton in Dayton, OH in May, 2009 with a Bachelor’s degree in Chemical Engineering and a minor in Music. Rian is passionate about using her gifts and leadership skills to assist in community growth. In recent years, she has used these gifts in many ways, from serving as a Team Leader for the Teens Encounter Christ program and Music Ministry Leader in Dayton’s Campus Ministry Department to serving as President of Dayton’s chapter of the Society of Women Engineer’s and as an International Living and Learning Community Member. As a St. Joseph Worker, Rian will work with the Community Center of St. Bernard as a Community Service Advocate as a direct contact with community members seeking assistance to rebuild their lives in the aftermath of Hurricanes Katrina and Rita. Traci Salisbury graduated from Marist College in Poughkeepsie, NY in May, 2008 with a major in International Business and a minor in Global Studies. Traci’s optimistic nature and zest for life support her passion for “servant leadership” and community involvement. Traci has served as a hospitality assistant at a women’s shelter with the Mercy Volunteer Corps, a facilitator with Just Faith Ministries for teens, a Soup Kitchen Volunteer, and a volunteer for Habitat for Humanity. Traci will be working with Lowernine, an agency dedicated to teaching home rebuilding to volunteers and community residents; facilitating access to social services; working with youth; and experimenting with models of sustainable economic development in the Lower Ninth Ward of New Orleans, LA. *** So, yeah, that is the four of us in a nut shell! We will be posting as our adventure continues to unfold! Lastly we would like to take the time to send out a huge thank you to all the people who put their heart and soul into our program, especially Judy Minear (CSJ) and Karen Salsbery (CSJ). Without their passion for this new frontier, none of us would be blessed with this opportunity to grow. Thank you so much!