A Painful First

I'm still exhausted but now I'm depressed, too. Cindy and I did something today we never wanted to do. We put the kids in Day Care.

We went seven years and purposely worked opposite shifts so that we did not have to let somebody else watch our kids in any environment outside of our house. But we don't have any choice with our current schedule. It is only for a couple of hours, but I don't like it. Not one bit.

I won't let this last long!

Crippled

Everything hurts. Every bone aches. Every joint numb. Every muscle cramped and screaming with each step or twist. Definitely over did it yesterday. I couldn't even get comfortable enough to sleep. I feel like I got in a fight with a bag of bricks. Like some gang of knobby robots broke into my room last night and gang probed me.

We still have hours of work in our future.

And I am damn near crippled.

Moving day

Moving is only slightly less painful than getting sodomized with a dry monkey wrench.

All day and late into the night. Mom, Dad, Cindy, Gigi, Robbie, and me. We muscled through it. Ate cheap pizza. Drank too many sodas. But just after night threatened to make any more work impossible, we finished. Said our goodbyes. And wandered off with odd limps and dangling arms, like drunk zombies in need of fresssh brainsss.

I'm never moving again!

We'll call it: home

We bought the house on 37th Street. Two blocks from the kid's school. A mile from Gigi's house. Only two blocks from the property we were supposed to buy last year, on September 9th. It would have been Jason's birthday that day. Instead, the would-be home drank 5ft of water and we were all digging out from under Katrina's long mushroom cloud.

Other properties in the area are going for 20% - 30% more than they would have priced before the storm. I refused to act out of desperation and buy into an overprice house where the value would quickly drop to pre-Katrina prices in the near future and possibly even lower once newer sub-divisions are put on the market by the glut of developers invading the market. So we watched the owners of this property drop the price week by week, until it came into our range. And I bought it.

Built in 1964. Three bedrooms. Two bathes (one green and yellow, the other pink and blue.) It isn't the house we want. It is the best house we could get for the best price. But the yard is huge and there is plenty of potential to upgrade the place. Close to prime shopping, close a mall, close to all our parents and one of the best elementary schools on The Gulf Coast.

And it beats the hell out of a FEMA trailor.

Now it is: Home.

Shadow of an eclipse

I was running on the treadmill when a flashback crossed the room. I think it was Kelly. The girl I dated before Cindy.

It has been nearly fifteen years since I saw her. The height was right. The build was right (if you factor in more than a decade of accretion.) Straight, jet black hair. Alabaster skin. Our eyes caught for a half second as she strolled to the locker room. I looked down. To avoid further contact. And noticed the shoes. Slick like a drop of oil. A hint of a strap edging toward her calf. If I sometimes have a thing for odd footwear, I owe it to Kelly. She had hundreds of shoes.

Either she didn't recognize me, or didn't want to acknowledge me. She and her shoes kept walking. Would have been too odd to strike up a conversation with such an old ghost. A flimsy shell of a relationship. Never would have held if brought it into the light of day. She was too married. Still clinging to the mental trappings of an alcoholic ex-stripper. Too much of a pathological liar. And didn't posses the wits to form even remotely believable lies.

Our tango ended when I left for college.

She suggested we try a long distance dance.

I suggested I had no trust for a woman whose every second with me constituted a violation of her vows to her husband.

And a week later, I met Cindy.

But nobody sees a ghost without skipping a heartbeat. A sudden flush of blood to the neck and ears. Like a first kiss. A first sip of champagne. Yet the moment you try to grasp that distant souvenir, it is gone. Slips into the folds of your past. Dropping you back into the cold clutch of reality where your brain reminds your loins that you can't, and shouldn't, go back.

I watch the slow shadow of a mental eclipse creep across my sun and disappear into the locker room.

My vision returns.

I look up again. And silently finish my run.

Let loose the bird!

The Turkish Health Ministry reported that country's first battle with the H5 mutation of Bird Flu. President Ahmet Necdet Sezer authorized a tactical strike by the Türk Silahlı Kuvvetleri (Turkish Armed Forces) on H5. Which resulted in the country's worst defeat in a decade.

Studies on the genetic sequence of the viruses from tissue samples taken from H5 indicated they were "very similar" to H5N1 viruses found in birds in China, the organization said.

H5, high off of its stellar victory, fled into the country side, leaving the Türk Silahlı Kuvvetleri to licks it wounds and plan for another day.

Godzilla and King Ghidorah were unavailable for comment.

Behold: Scamitics

Scam - noun - a fraudulent or deceptive act or operation.

Politics - noun - a: the art or science of government b: the art or science concerned with guiding or influencing governmental policy c: the art or science concerned with winning and holding control over a government

Scam + politics = Scamitics: noun - a: the art of deceptively guiding and influencing government

Need a good example? Look no further than fabricated "distance" between the Bush Administration and today's self-confessed taker of bribes, tax evader, fraudster, and general maker of corruption: Jack Abramoff.

This guy was the Patron Saint Of Fund Raising for the GOP. He bought a restaurant (Signatures in D.C.) where he could freely wine and dine public officials. He had not one, but FOUR skyboxes for sporting events (at a cost of $1M per year) where he could spend a few intimate hours watching games of skill with public officials. He raised somewhere in the neighborhood of a quater million dollars for the Bush-Cheney re-election campaign, “And I haven’t even started making phone calls,” he told the Times. Not to mention the golf trips to SCOTLAND and $90,000 "vacations" to RUSSIA. All of it involving the GOP.

And today he confessed his guilt to charges including: conspiracy, honest services fraud, mail fraud, conspiracy and tax evasion stemming from influence-peddling scandals in Washington. Abramoff is also cooperating in a bribery investigation involving lawmakers, their aides and members of the Bush administration.

This, of course, is only the START. By some count, his fall from grace could drag down at least twenty members of Congress. And with little stretch of the imagination, this could reach all the way up to the top. Yes, the top. Duyba, Cheney, and Dark Sith Lord Rove.

And somehow, SOMEHOW, Tony Snow gets up on podium today and tries to convince us that Abramoff was some kind of lone gun. He was off doing his own thing, without directly meddling in the affairs of the current administration. "Sure, he was doing all kinds of illegal things, but not with us," Tony tries to say.

Scamitics at its finest. The art of deceptively guiding and influencing government. You know how I can tell they are lying these days? Their lips are moving. Behold: Scamitics.

Monday, grrr!

• As if Katrina wasn't enough, we have this little Tropical Storm ZETA to deal with. It's JANUARY and it is still alive, swirling in the Atlantic. It started in 2005 and has lived to see 2006. Only the second tropical storm to ever do that. Yet, global warming is a "theory," they tell us. Not concrete evidence that humans are impacting the environment.
• Northern CA is taking a beating, too. Another winter storm slamming down on them, causing mudslides and flashfloods and havok, oh my.
• In West Virginia, there are thirteen coal miners trapped underground after some kind of accidental explosion. This one isn't going to be pretty, trust me.
• In the OTHER Virgina, police are reporting that they discovered four bodies (father, mother, two children) in their basement with their throats cut. The discovery was made AFTER firefighters got there to put out the fire which was burning their home. Oddest of all, it was the drummer for the band Cracker that discovered the fire!
• We got a rampaging internet bomb exploding via compromised web pages and unpatched Instant Messaging clients. It didn't strike any of our systems at work, but we've been on high alert and fielding questions all day.

Other than that, I got nothin'. Too much running around. Too many meetings. Too many plans being made with too few people to carry them out. Par for the course, on Monday.

Doe's Long Strange Trip

Albert Dorine Kranz, "Doe" to most of us, was born on Sunday, January 1st, 1920. Being so young, he did not remember the hour. But he told me it was two days before Babe Ruth was traded to the New York Yankees. And two weeks before the United States applied the Eighteenth Amendment, ratifying the Prohibition Of Alcohol. And by the time he turned ten, the world as he knew it would be in the throws of The Great Depression.

Several wars, several hurricanes, several grandchildren, and two great grandchildren later, here he is. Celebrating his 86h birthday. We talk about how the time flies by for him, and how he doesn't understand what happened to the world. Too much technology he tells me. We don't do anything with our own hands any more. We don't talk face to face any more. He didn't like the telephone. Imagine how he'd feel about instant messaging or texting on the cell?

Tom Brokaw came up with the title, "The Greatest Generation" for those folks from 1911 - 1924. And in the wake of The Big Deuce, he helped sire "The Baby Boomers." From Prohibition & World War, to Love & Peace, to the Internet & Marylin Manson, it has been a long strange trip.

MOVIE: Syriana

A: Truly enjoyed it. Well written. Well directed. Great acting. Not very predictable. And it made me fire up a couple of extra braincells in order to keep all the threads together while it was unravelling. Good stuff, this movie. Just what I like to pay my hard earned money to see. And I'm very glad that I saw it on the big screen.

B: It's a liberal wet dream. You know, typical far left dogma: rich people are evil, poor people are oppressed, oil is the blood of Lucifer, we suckle off Middle Eastern teat by turning a blind eye to the human rights violations of our oil-bearing allies, money can't buy happiness, let's all hug a seal and sing peace songs in bed with our neighbor. Could have been a little LESS liberal, but it still worked for me. I've a thick skin. I'll let you present your opinion in your movie.

C: C is for Cindy. She fell asleep. Maybe half way through? She had her fill of Diet Coke and popcorn then drifted off and numbed my arm for at least an hour. Even Clooney couldn't keep her eyes open. But her heat kept me warm and I could feel her heartbeat through her cheek.

It was good to get out of the house. It was good to see something that didn't revolve around computer generated effects or melodramatic chickery. Not sure how much it will gross at the box office, but it will be getting a buttload of nominations for the Blah Blah Blah awards.

And it might even win a few.

Tis The Season

Mom's birthday. 42, again. A good son won't reveal his mother's age. So I'll feign a good streak and keep it to myself.

As per our family tradition, we celebrate by putting up the Christmas tree and decorations. When I was growing up, Jason usually did the detailed work. I'd help Dad get all the boxes down. Mother would place all the ceramic figures and say a few encouraging words. My brother would spend an hour or two making endless circles with strings of lights and beads and eleventy billion holiday bulbs. I never had the patience for it. Never felt the Christmas spirit. I'd rather watch Mom and Jason enjoy themselves. It was one of those rare occasions when we'd come together as a family with one goal and one set outcome that never failed to live up to our expectations. I even carried the tradition to Atlanta, GA, and we'd wait until Mom's birthday to get set the scene.

This year, the magic has fled. Since the repairs were completed on my Dad's house, Cindy and the kids and I have been living in the computer room. Our lives reduced to the smallest bedroom in the house. Cindy and the children sleep on the "day bed" and I sleep on the living room floor. Because of our schedules, we've all managed to stay out of each other's hair. And thankfully the furnace of summer and hurricane season is behind us. But Christmas in the wake of Katrina isn't the same. We try not to talk about it. But it weighs down our bones. Makes our eyes heavy. Our conversations slower and quieter. And Jason isn't with us. He is in Las Vegas, doing whatever he's going to do. God help him.

But we celebrate our proud tradition. Happy Birthday, Mom. We're raising a tree in your honor. Let the holiday season officially begin for the McDougal Family.

The least we can do

A linewoman is in charge of the dozen linemen who skitter up and down our street like angry bald ants. Her name is Cindy. Built like a fireplug with ruddy, unkempt hair he voice caries like thunder off the hot asphalt. She brought a crew down from Duluth, Minnesota. They drove six trucks fourteen hundred miles to our blacked-out and balmy shores. Linewoman Cindy says they left two days before Katrina took us in her arms. Then sat in Memphis, waiting for orders, until Thursday. And they have been in this fresh hell ever since.

Linewoman Cindy spent the last three nights vomiting into a bucket. This crew has repaired the fallout from eight or nine "bad ones," but all the other cleanups paled next to the dance of Lady Katrina. After a 16 hour shift, they sleep (or try to sleep) on hard wooden cots, inside a rotting mildewed tent. There are no separate areas for women. No showers. No phones or lights. What little breeze they get is laden with the scents from row upon row of port-o-lets that flank their make-shift campsite.

Linewoman Cindy says they don't know if they'll get fed today. On Friday, a runner brought a few bags of damp, rotting sandwiches. Saturday there was no runner. And they only ate after they had done their full shift.

I won't let that happen, today.

An hour later I have sixty dollars worth of Domino's pizza and three iced-down cases of bottled water lined up on the bumper of one of the Minnesota Power trucks. I wave down Linewoman Cindy and let her know I've brought lunch.

One by one, the linemen amble over, collect a few pieces, and give nod. Some put fists full of ice down the back of their shirts. Others rub water on their scalps and neck. They usually give me a wet handshake and thank me.

Once everyone else has left, Linewoman Cindy gives me a hug. Her fingers holding onto my back. Both of us perspiring in the late noon sun.

I tell her we don't have any extra beds, but there is plenty of floor space at my parent's house. And we have hot water. They're welcomed to join us tonight. I give her directions to our house. They can take a shower for the first time since they've been in town.

Linewoman Cindy's eyes fill with tears. She says that is the sweetest thing anyone has said to her since they left their homes. Nine days ago. We're rescuing each other, she says.

It's the least we can do, I say.

A Tormet Darkly

As the night finds us, we're taunted by our first glimpse of neighboring street lights. The horizon to the north east is alive with cheers and laughter as dozens of people are lofted back into the embrace of light and air conditioning. The few remaining trees glow in a mask of sodium vapor lamps.

The distribution center at the high school must be lit. One or two blocks around it have been brought back to the grid. The linesmen have started to spiral out in an ever widening gyre.

Won't be long. It is a game of inches, now. Creeping toward power. House by house. But the darkness of our block torments us.

Better days

I couldn't take the idleness at Aunt Judy's. I hadn't sat still that long since the storm. I wasn't used to the quiet. Or the luxuries. Things like clean water and air conditioning. I felt like I was getting soft. Taking advantage of Judy while my parents and grandparents pull together the broken pieces of their lives. And I have this nagging voice whispering inches from my ear: Get ice. Get water. Get food.

So I kiss the kids, hugs my beloved bride, and hit the road, early. Have to do something. Have to obey the compulsion. Have to act. Ice. Water. Food.

On the drive through the fetid remains of Gulfport, I abruptly notice something. An alien in the sun. An angel. I'm actually under a red light. A real, live, working red light! There's power to the intersection. There is electricity coming from somewhere. People are obeying traffic laws. We are inching out the stone age, one utility at a time. RED LIGHTS! Who would have thought I'd be happy to see one? I love this first red light. I watch it shrink in the rear view. Fascinated by its simplicity. Its single-minded devotion. The herald of more to come. I'd kiss it. If I could. With tongue.

On the way to my father's house, I stop by the nearest supply site. Armed troops, still. Fatigues and guns and sun-baked recruits barely out of the teens shuttled here to save what is left of our lives. They help me appease the voice. Ice. Water. And food. Fill the trunk, thank the soldiers, and roll home to divvy up the spoils between parents and my grand parents.

Everyone is sweating. Everyone is tired. This is the new life. But we are together in our misery.

And better days are coming. We see them down the street. In the form of foreign power company trucks. Fat with linemen and fresh power-poles. Any day now, we will have electricity. Then air conditioning. Then clean water. And real food. And the kids will return to school. And the stores will re-open. And the restaurants. And the malls. And all the roads will be repaired. We see it down the street. Better days.

Back from the bottom

The trip to Hattiesburg was notable only because of the unmistakable presence of the military. Armored trucks. Jeeps. Hummers. Personell carriers. With almost as much hardware flying overhead, heading to Kessler and Gulfport International. An invasion of relief creeping south. And armed soldiers taking the place of every traffic light. By armed I mean: machine guns slung across their backs. Full on martial law as far as the eye can see.

Fortunately they all let me pass and I found my way to Aunt Judy's house, where I slept the sleep of the dead for nearly twelve hours.

In the morning, Cindy and Judy and Terry and Logan filled the van with tools and supplies, then headed to Gulfport, to help Glenda. They left me with the kids. We spent hours hugging and playing. I soaked up the air conditioner. And caught up on the news. The rest of the day was utterly uneventful. Completely boring. Stress-less. Just what I needed to decompress.

I've collected some thoughts today. Just ideas and events that I want to write down before I lose them:

• I watched TV today and if there is anything I could tell the world, it is this: I am not a victim of Katrina. I am not an evacuee. I do not want a "hand out." I am a single survivor among hundreds of thousands, if not millions. I only want aide enough to get some normalcy in my life, for me and my family. Once we're able to fend for ourselves, we will all be fine. In the meanwhile I'm thankful for anything and everything that helps us recover any piece of our life.
  
  
• I saw New Orleans on the news. I saw the "victims" as they sat there and waited to be rescued. Thousands upon thousands of able-bodied people screaming for hours that they wanted food. They wanted water. They wanted somebody to come take them away. They blamed the city for not being ready. They blamed the government for not being prepared. They blamed the military for taking too long. Rather than doing anything for themselves, they spent hours doing nothing but placing blame and demanding help.
  
  
• If there is one other thing I can tell the world: New Orleans is an embarrassment to me. I do not know anyone like the people there that you are constantly seeing on the television. I know and have met hundreds and thousands of people since the storm who are doing everything they can for themselves. The people I know have not stopped to ask for help. They do not blame anyone for what happened to them. They do not expect anyone to prop them up. And I wish you could see the real face of the other survivors. We are all embarrassed by what you see and we are sorry that the media has focused their constant attention on on such a mis-characterization of the people affected by Katrina. Please don't put us in the same light with them. We aren't cut from the same cloth as those folks.
  
  
• I forgot to mention my Wound Of The Day, yesterday. I crushed most of my fingers. We were taking supplies to my grandparents and I was manually closing the garage door (which tells our neighbors that we are not home) and I didn't realize the gaps between the individual pieces of the door were going to snap closed as I lowered the door. I heard the sound of my fingers crunching like wet pieces of celery. And then the pain buckled my knees. Profanity not fit for writing came spewed from my mouth. And I cried out for my father to save me. Pleaded for him to push the door up. To free me from the teeth that were biting into my fingers. But it was my mother who rescued me. Dad never even turned around to see what was happening. Likely the deaf old man didn't hear my anguish. But Mom did. Even though I didn't call her. And she didn't let me forgot who rescued me and who ignored me, for hours. In the car, I told her I thought all my fingernails were going to come off (from the look of the blood bruises I could see forming. ) She thought I was babbling about having to cut off all my fingers And she won't let me live that down, either.
  
  
• I try not to mention how angry I really am. If it seeps through into my writings, I apologize. But, I'm constantly beating myself. Constantly angry. And not just because of the lack of sleep and lack of excitement. A week ago, I left behind a four bed room house with a full basement and a six figure income. Not quite the move I thought it would be. Not by a long shot. I put off relocating for more than two years. Why didn't I wait one more week? I expected to give up a few of the amenities of living in Atlanta, but I didn't expect to be reduced to living in the middle ages. Let me summarize this way: DAMN! DAMN! DAMN!
  
  
• The President took a tour of the Coast, the day after we saw the helicopters. Nice of him to take time out from his victories in Iraq to come see the remains of our battles with Katrina. He spends a billion dollars a week to bring democracy to the Middle East. I'm very interested to see what he can do to bring relief to the Gulf Coast. I hope he seizes the opportunity and devotes as much time and effort to us as he has the citizens of Iraq.
  
  
• Jason and Mel are going to Alabama, to visit relatives there for a while. Aside from the time he helped keep me alive on Dad's roof and some help he gave on Doe's roof, we haven't seen them much. I think they're with Mel's mother.
  
  
• I really have no idea what is going on with Cindy. What she is thinking. What she wants to do. She's asked me for answers a couple of times. I have none. Nothing other than constantly moving toward a normal life for us and the kids. I don't know what it will take to get us there, but that's what I want to do. I don't have to mention who is responsible for our move down here, who hounded me for two years to leave Atlanta.
  

I'm going to fix dinner for the kids, wait for Cindy to come home, and see where we are going from here. Then I'm going to sleep, again, and try to mentally prepare for the adventures to come.

I hope it can only go up from here. If I haven't seen the bottom, yet, I don't want to.

Before the curfew

I make it to Glenda's in fear of the damn curfew. Didn't sit down to eat any of the food Mom had ready for us. Barely had time to pack.

The sun starting to sink behind the horizon, but I have to check on Glenda and let her know the plan.

I was supposed to be there earlier today. I know she's disappointed. She doesn't have anybody with her. Lost everything. All alone in the ruins of her life. She is shriven by the heat and exhaustion. I can see the bones of her face. Her hair matted down. The faint uncertainty in her steps. The weakness of her hug.

I try to explain about the trip to Louisiana and how I've been tending to my grandparents. I don't know how much it takes the edge off. She doesn't really look at me when I tell her I'm heading back to see Cindy and the kids, just for a few days.

She asks me to try to pull up some carpet with her. The last room in the house. The one Dad and I didn't touch. I told her it was because the cats were in there. I'm allergic to them.

But we were just too tired. We could barely lift our arms that day in her. But then the explosion of filth from the refrigerator sapped what little reserve we had been holding onto.

Back in that room, I'm not much stronger than she is, now. I don't know how much I even try. I've been running all week. Barely slept. The endless heat. The lack of real food. And no end in sight.

I almost think I'm asleep right now.

And I can't do it.

Can't even make a single cut in the rug.

Glenda pulls. And I try some more. There's nothing left. I can't draw the crescent knife through the soggy carpet. Either the blade is too dull, or I'm just not strong enough. She sighs, curses softly, and brings me another knife. One her David had used on his carpet, she says, Which means if it doesn't work, it is my fault. Not the knife.

And I can't do it.

The carpet refuses to be cut.

She sighs at my failure. But says nothing.

I don't know if she thinks I'm faking it. Trying to get out of here without helping. I don't have the strength to even defend myself, so I do not even try.

We don't look at each other as I walk to the front of the house. Mumbling something about plans for Monday. She is behind me as I make for the door. Both of us dragging and short of breath.

It's all bullshit. I know she needs me to help her. She won't ask. She never does. But I feel the night coming on the horizon. The panic rising behind my eyes. Feel five days of constant battle bend my bones. Feel her disappointment. The paleness of my own situation compared to hers. The weight of her crumbling house leaning against us. Just the two of us. And I'm the one leaving her to it. By herself. It shouldn't be this way. All bullshit. And I'm the one doing it. She won't say any of it. Just suffers through it. Cursing me with her silence.

I'm almost out the door, when I pull out the money. A thousand dollars.

She sees it as I turn to her. Stops and looks at me. A new anger in her eyes.

"Oh, no! No!" she says. Shaking her face.

I start counting out twenties.

"No, Jon!"

But Cindy told me, earlier. Glenda didn't have much left. We're all in the same situation: conditioned to having only $20 in our pockets, thanks to ATMs and debit cards. So I borrowed some from my father.

"Jon."

I fold half and put it in my pocket. Then I look at her.

Her jaw is clenched. Lips pinched tight. Eyes wide and staring at me.

I step in closer. Reach down and pull up her hand.

She takes in a breath. Finding words to stop this.

I put the money in her hand and close her fingers around it.

Step in closer while she holds it. Still silent. Still thinking what she wants to say.

"Take it, Glenda. Please. I don't want to beg." I whisper.

I feel the tears on my neck and pull her closer to me.

"Jon," she says.

I hold her with what little strength I have left. Trying to blink my eyes dry.

"We will all be fine," I say.

"Jon."

"No."

"I..."

"I promise, Glenda. We'll take care of you. Please, let me do this."

She finally breathes. And puts her arms around my neck. The fight rushing out of her in deep, pained sighs.

I don't know how long it lasts. I don't how many of the tears are mine.

Finally, she says. "You have to go. Before the curfew."

I'll be back.

Good neighbors

As we drive down Dad's street, slowly cruising past the remains of our neighbors, honking and waving, a muffled hallelujah follows in our wake. It is like The Second Coming on top of Mardis Gras on top of Christmas. People run up to us as we get out of the cars. Everyone smiling, their eyes lit up, holding their breath like their birthday cake is being lit. We throw open the trunks and they come unglued. Everyone is shouting and clapping and thanking us and shaking my father's hand and telling us how much they appreciate what we've done. How they were running on fumes. How they'll bring us dinner tonight. How they'll go with us on the next run. How they can't believe all the gas we were able to get.

And my father, who paid for every drop, doesn't accept a single cent from anyone. He pushes their money back to them and politely declines. He says not to worry about it. He doesn't need to be paid. This is what neighbors do, he says. Shakes his head every time somebody pulls out money. No, thank you. He won't have it. Not when people need money for other things like rebuilding or paying for food once the donations dry up and the jobs are all gone.

I know The Old Man. Their smiles are all he wants. To know that he made a difference in their lives. For them and their children. Every time he steps out of his house, they'll be thanking him for weeks. And he knows if he ever needs anything, they will be there to help. Money can't buy that.

When everything is handed out and everyone has gone back to their homes to share the good news, Dad puts his arm around me. Squeezes my shoulder with one old, tanned hand and looks at me. "You done good, kiddo," he says. "You done real good."

And we go find Mom. She'll have something cooked for us. The tubs will be filled. There will be tall, cold glasses of sweat tea. And she probably has the floor cleared so I can collapse.

But I have promises to keep. And miles to go before I sleep.

Minor setback

Just as we're pulling off the Interstate, only five miles from home and still giddy from the thrill of the hunt for fuel, I notice I have cell coverage again.

A week ago, I was wrapping up my paperwork for the new job, meeting new faces, and saying, "See you when this Katrina thang blows through."

It has been seven eternities since then. I didn't even think about work, until I saw those bars on my phone.

I know from the neighbors that the Copa and the Grand in Gulfport were destroyed. I'm sure my casino didn't fair much better, if not worse.

But I try the 800 number my mother gave me for their Hurricane Hotline. And nearly plow off the road when a friendly voice answers after the second ring.

Like so many other events since the storm, the conversation blurs until only the core ideas remains in my head:

The casino is nearly destroyed. Won't be operational for months. If not years. I'm not in their database. (Monday, August 29th, the day Katrina wiped the Coast from the face of the earth, was supposed to be my first day.) I didn't go to orientation, so I was never flagged as employee. They have no record of me. Would not have even checked on me, if I hadn't called them. For all intents and purposes, I'm not really an employee.

But the executives are starting to gather in Biloxi, and the Hurricane Hotline folks will pass along my information.

Somebody will contact me.

Sometime.

In the future.

Somehow.

This isn't good, I think. Something of a minor setup. And that's all the thought I give it. For now.

My family is alive, I tell myself. My parents have a house. My grandparents have a house. My brother has a house. We have food. We have ice. And now we have gasoline. That is all I need to bring the grin back to my face.

The Quest

After three days of generator power, we are nearly out of gasoline. We do not have enough to make it through the rest of the night. We've even "borrowed" some from my Grandfather last night. He won't have enough to make it through another day, either. If I haven't mentioned it before, the "average" wait in line for gasoline is reportedly 14 hours. To get fuel locally, people park their cars over night, and generally receive their $20 worth by noon the next day. And (needless to say) gas prices these days are somewhere close to $3.50/galon.

Neither my father, nor I have any intentions of sitting in any line for 14 hours. And $20 ain't gonna cut it. We're going to get enough gas for ourselves, my grandparents, and all the neighbors. So we've been planning us a little road trip. Into the heart of Louisiana.

Generally speaking, gas is cheap in Louisiana. Raw materials are usually gathered in The Gulf, shipped only a few miles to the shore, and processed at local refineries by cheap local labor. Aside from New Orleans and Slidell, Louisiana was relatively spared by Katrina. So our theory is this: if we drive a couple of hours into its belly, we'll eventually find the motherload.

My father and I load up both of his cars with ten empty five-gallon containers in each trunk, say our goodbyes, and set out for I-10, heading West, toward the remains of New Orleans. We have a pair of walkie talkies and keep in touch, sweating in the early afternoon sun, keeping our air conditioners quiet to conserve fuel, but our stereos are cranked and we're privately celebrating the eventual outcome of our safari.

After 30 minutes, we pass Slidell, LA. It's blackened by the destruction and the one or two gas stations we see from the interstate are swarmed by lines which stretch as far as we can see before we shoot past them.

After 45 minutes, we pass the exits which are supposed to lead into New Orleans. They're all barricaded. Nobody is going in. But there is an exodus of people evacuating. A tired, desperate storm of vehicles nearly buckled from the weight strapped to every available flat surface. An armada of families who salvaged what they could and hit the road, bound for greener pastures.

After an hour, we're in the thick of evacuee traffic going to Baton Rogue, or Texas, for further. Our progress grinds to just about 20MPH and we find ourselves passing hordes of military vehicles and utility trucks. As we creep past the open exits, we continue to see endless flocks of locals clustering around their neighborhood gas stations. Cars by the hundreds, lining the roads. No restaurants are open. No other stores are open. Everything is dark, unpowered. Nothing for us here. So we continue our quest, heading ever west.

An hour and a half after we started, we finally begin to see signs of power. There are open stores. The lines have begun to shrink. The madness slows. There is almost an air of normalcy as we see traffic vanish and fewer people waiting vulture-like for supplies.

Barely ten miles from Baton Rogue, we exit the interstate and shoot to the nearest station. We're tenth & eleventh in line.

We get out. Stretch our legs. And hug. Smiling like drunken fools and patting each other on the back. We did it. We found our treasure. Our golden goose. Not even two hours from the house. We'll be home in time for dinner!

Maybe twenty minutes later, we're fueling up. The station is sorry to tell us that they have imposed a 25 gallon limit. We grin likevillage idiots. 25 gallons each may as well be the motherload. It's 500% more than we'd get at home.

Almost enraptured, each of us fills half (5 out of 10) of our five-gallon cans, grab forty dollars worth of junk food, and find out there's another station less than a mile up the road. But, we're told with a frown, we'd be limited to 25 gallons there, too. Our grins grow even wider.

At the next station, we're fifth and sixth in line. We only wait 10 minutes before topping off all our cans and our cars and hitting the road.

The cars drive completely differently with 50 extra gallons weighing down their ass end. But we don't care. We roll up the windows and bask in the well-deserved chill of sweet sweet AC. Feeling like conquering warriors. Destined to return with the holy grail in our hands. Fuel. Fuel. Fuel. Enough gas to last everyone for another 5 days.

If we have to, we'll do it again next week. And the week after. As long as it takes. God willing, nothing can stop us from reclaiming our lives, now.

Surprise. Surprise.

On the ride home, the unexpected: my cell phone rings. It is Cindy. My wife and children are safe. I haven't heard their voices since Tuesday. Only four days ago. Feels like four weeks. My world is upside down. I can't believe I'm talking to her on my cell. Never thought to even check it for signal. She's doing most of the talking. I'm silent.And numb.

Hattiesburg has power again. She's spent the past couple of days standing in lines. Getting supplies. Getting gas for all the cars. Uncle Terry has already started off on another run (he drives big rigs all cross countries.) Aunt Judy is back to being a realtor, riding the wake of the sudden real estate explosion.

Cindy asks what to do. Should come down to the Coast? She can't keep them up there for weeks. Doesn't want to impose on the family. But doesn't know what to do. They're running out of cash, too. Debit cards are useless. Nobody will take a check. The banks are all closed. What should she do? Where will we go?

I'm still numb. I've been juggling the pieces of my parents chaos and trying to fend for my grandparents since the moment I left Hattiesburg. But now my own life comes falling back to earth. Liam had only been in school for one week, before the storm. Cindy hadn't even started looking for a nursing job. Where would Meg go to pre-k, now? New house? My new job? Would any of those dreams survive?

I can't think about any of it. Can't talk about it. I tell Cindy I'm okay, everyone is okay, and I'll see her tonight. I'll get some money and drive back to Hattiesburg to see her and the children. And we'll figure out what to do. We'll make something work.