By Nate Douglas
To the people who think the Federal Emergency Managment Agency (FEMA) is not doing their job: they are wrong. It is their responsibility to manage releif to disasters. What is a disaster? It is an uncontainable, unmanagable, and most ugly situation which seems to never rests from being out of control and messed up on every level, including government. It is an event that has no winners and one must learn to walk away defeated.
Something happened among men and women living along the Gulf Coast: their possession stripped, their families severed, dreams have died, and lives changed within hours of great catostrophe. One can call it an “angry” God, or blame it on the evil we humans are sometimes so helpless to create. This devastating event of Hurricane Katrina and Rina have taken the lives of so many and inflicted a massive disaster on every American. "Why?" is truly an empty question and for many people it will remain forever unanswered.
Instead of defining the event, a better route to reason is exploring words such as "survivor." Mostly because looking at nature's reasons sometime leads people to make statements such as, "...Because we are in the hands of an angry God...” Or, "...The Bush Administration is behind this..." Please note: these are not answers. They are simply pathetic forms of blame and accusation. It does not answer the question at all. We can make all the accusations, or blame whoever we choose pointing the finger all around. The truth of this whole event is that it is over: the worst is over. People are still in a state of crisis and the aftermath is fresh. The casualties continue, but the worst is over.
I say this because during my terminal semester at the University of North Dakota in Grand Forks in 1997, I was preparing to graduate and anxious to go out use my degree. During the spring of that year, it was an early April morning after I came home from the seventh night in a row making sandbags with the rest of the town. We lost the battle and as the sun rose this day, the second largest city in North Dakota was swallowed by a gigantic flood. It was national attention, and when I tell people from far away as Russia, they even heard the story of the 1997 Flood of Grand Forks. For people who have never been in a natural disaster, it can be very hard to explain. For example, things do not make sense such as being in an ocean of parked cars at a gas station. Looking around the stalled traffic, all I could see was last-minute items and frightened children. Inside the store, police are yelling at the top of their voices, “Take whatever you need! Please...get out of town!” Where is there to go except for an airbase serving as a shelter?
Everything is an unanswered question. The worst knowing people I knew: friends, colleagues, and everyday folk, had forever changed because when the flood hit, the 50,000 residents were not prepared. When I talk to other survivors of the flood, it seems the sudden evacuation was the biggest regret. Not many people were able to make calls and exchange phone numbers to let others where they will be. Although there was never a death in this mass devastation, people vanished and life became very hard. Professors who have dedicated their lives to research walked away from their life’s work, or never returned because they knew the damage was waiting for them. family memories were taken, and everything that has to do with our need for possession was in question.
When I came back to my basement apartment off Washington Avenue in Grand Forks two weeks later, the whole town looked like some of the images on television coming from the Gulf. I lost everything. All my memoirs from living abroad, all my friends and their contact info; everything was gone from me. Someone told me, “Well, do you still have your sanity?” I wasn’t sure at the time. I was not sure for a long time. Life was hard for three years, and the floods almost took me. I was very angry for a long time and I blamed everything for the disaster and blamed the disaster for everything. These were the darkest hours of my life. I had to teach myself, “The worst is over.” Although the flood left me broke, homeless, jobless, angry, and confused; my self-control, freedom, or whatever a person calls that ability to make decisions unlike any other species was in question. I decided not to live my life another day carrying the weight of heavy anger and not loose to an event I didn’t have control over. There was no need for this as I was exhausted. I wasted too much energy.
You see, what the flood taught me was an event occurred in my live of which I had no control. I did what I could. I also realized that I never owned anything in my life: my possession owned me. More importantly, nothing last forever. Great things come and go in life. A decent credit score, fast cars, comfortable chairs are all nice. However, my sanity is non-negotiable. It is my health. It can not be replaced and that is where I stand today.
Natural disasters teach people about transitions and having to make (accept) change under some kind of hardship. They also teach lessons about survival and taking things like water and electricity for granted. Yes, we have to mourn but we also need good times. Sometimes, it is always easier to remember the trauma but the good times are there and they will comfort if you let them. Hemmingway was right: courage is grace under pressure. And if you take that a step further, put it into a mathematical/logical equation; it works too.
Courage = Pressure/Grace
To everyone affected by Katrina's destrustion: you’re not alone. Be courageous and don’t let this event get to you. Do not let it take your mind no matter, how many bad days in a row you may pass. The rubbish in the streets may never seem like it won’t go away. It will be gone in time! The buildings and small scenes that used to remind you might be replaced. It is okay, the worst is over. If sickness strikes, it’s just another day of more courage. If the worst is yet to come, be prepared and fight it. No matter what the outcome is for you getting through this, great things will come along your journey. However, you can’t see these things if your sanity is absent.
Like all the things loved, even crisis has an ending.
About the Author: Nate Douglas is Editor in Chief of Minnesota River Valley Reader (http://www.rvrmn.com).
Source: www.isnare.com
