Right to Left: Karen Blakeney, Sandy Adams, Grace Booth, and Sandy Lemoine; Southern Christian Writers Conference

This past weekend, I traveled to Tuscaloosa, Alabama, for the 20th Annual Southern Christian Writers Conference.  I attended several nice workshops and met some wonderful folks.  It was truly a blessing.

I decided to enter my Parents magazine article, “Nathan’s Wonder Slide,” in the conference writing contest.  On Saturday, I learned my entry won first place in the magazine category.  Coincidentally, I made friends with a few of the other winners and happened to be sitting with them when the awards were announced.

Tuscaloosa is still recovering from the deadly tornado that struck on April 27th.  Coming from South Mississippi, it’s easy to sympathize; we have experienced Hurricane Camille and Katrina.  It was heartwarming to see volunteer organizations in town, including the two large Samaritan’s Purse trucks teeming with workers at our host church, First Baptist of Tuscaloosa.   It would have been understandable if First Baptist had bowed out as host of the writers conference this year given all the work they are doing to help in their city’s restoration, but they took on both projects.

It was a great conference; I hope to return next year.

I was amazed at the number of insulting, derogatory comments posted by people who think:

1. Prayer is a waste of time.
2. The participants are stupid/idiotic/not voting for the right party.
3. Instead of praying, the time should be spent volunteering to clean up the oil spill.

It’s too bad the critics don’t know the true hearts and deeds of South Mississippians. Would they have insulted us like this 5 years ago when we were struggling to repair and rebuild our homes, churches, businesses and communities after Hurricane Katrina?  Maybe, it’s just frustration over the oil spill talking.

Click here to view the embedded video.

On Sunday, June 6, 2010, there will be a 26 Mile Prayer Chain on the Mississippi Gulf Coast.  Hundreds are signing up to participate on facebook.  If you live nearby, consider joining this group from 4:00 p.m. to 5:00 p.m. at the following locations:

Gulfport, Mississippi:
Courthouse Pier
HWY 90 Marriot Courtyard under the oaks
Between Courthouse and Teagarden Rd across from White Cap

Long Beach:
Mason Ave
Jeff Davis

Ocean Springs:
Under the bridge next to the yacht club

Pascagoula:
Beach Park

Bay St Louis:
Bay Bridge

Biloxi:
White Ave

Here is an opportunity to remember the eleven men who lost their lives and to pray for the success of efforts to stop the leak and clean our sea and shoreline.

This amusement park and miniature golf course was at the end of Cowan Lorraine Road on the beach in Gulfport, Mississippi.

Everything in Gulfport had a great fall EXCEPT for Humpty Dumpty. -Funtime USA; Gulfport, Mississippi; post Hurricane Katrina.

Two weeks after Hurricane Katrina, we took my mother to see what was left of her Eighth Street House in West Gulfport: the steps and a concrete porch. Left to right: Daughters Natalie and Michelle, me, and my mother, Joyce Parker.

Grand Casino barge rests on Highway 90 in Gulfport, after Hurricane Katrina.

[Click here for Part I, Part II, and Part III.]

We began to hear rumors that everything near the beach was completely destroyed – restaurants, casinos, historic buildings, even the beautiful beachfront mansions. With no television and limited radio, it was hard to know whether or not there was any truth to these claims.  Soon, we would find out for ourselves.

Lacking running water and electricity, we decided to get out of town. The heat and humidity in South Mississippi is punishing enough, but without the benefit of air-conditioning, we were miserable to the point of sleeping on the bathroom tile floors.  We were especially concerned that Nathan, given his heart condition, did not need the added stress.

BEFORE - My mother's Eighth Street house in Gulfport, Mississippi, before Hurricane Katrina.

Before we left, though, we needed to check on my brother, Tom, and his family. Despite living in a mandatory evacuation zone, they stayed, a mere six to eight blocks from the beach.  We drove in as far as we could, parking when the debris became too thick to traverse.  When we reached them, they were hot and miserable, like us, but otherwise fine.  Their house was damaged, but everyone in town had damage.  It had become a question of livability.  Tom’s house was still inhabitable.

From there, we crossed the railroad tracks heading south to the beach. Sure, we were curious, but there was a practical reason for our journey, too.  My mother owned a house on Eighth Street, a block from the beach, right behind the International House of Pancakes.  We needed to see how much damage it had incurred, get an idea of what sort of Home Depot purchases would be necessary to put it back in order.

AFTER - Bryan and Adam stand on the former porch of my mother's house after Hurricane Katrina.

Before we reached the beach, we were confronted with a substantial mountain of debris that ran parallel with the coastline. A large oak had conveniently uprooted across the obstacle, creating a bridge to the other side.  We climbed it, stood at the top, and gazed at what had become of our home town.

It was hard to speak. We stared for while.  We were truly shocked.

Bryan broke the silence by informing me that my mother’s house was gone. I was so stunned by the vastness of the destruction that I had forgotten one of the main reasons we were here.  In that moment, our city seemed hopelessly ruined.  The places we had loved all our lives were gone.  It felt like we had just learned of the death of a dear friend.

And speaking of death, 238 Mississippians lost their lives in Katrina. For those of us who lost homes or incurred property damage, there was a real sense of gratitude that we were alive.  A quiet compassion permeated those early days and weeks and months as we moved about our community trying to restore our lives.  We made eye contact with total strangers feeling a somber, inexplicable tenderness.  And we were moved to tears by the volunteers and gifts that poured in from all over the country.

Our cities lost so much to Katrina.  But we gained, too.  We experienced God’s grace and goodness through the warmth and kindness of compassionate people.

[For the next few days, I will be posting a few photos I took of destruction in my home town, Gulfport.]

Karen Blakeney

We rode out Hurricane Katrina in this house in the Quail Ridge subdivison. This is after some "tidying up." The chimney and most of the shingles are gone, and the eastern eave was blown out (giving us a view of the sky in the guest bath).

[Click here for Part I and Part II.]

Finally, the wind slowed enough for us to try to make our way back home. Cut off from all communication (even our cell phones no longer functioned), we wondered what we would see as we emerged from the boarded up house in Quail Ridge.  The Ford Expedition, shiny and flawless when we arrived the day before, was now pock-marked and dented.

A cursory look at the house revealed heavy damage. The chimney lay in pieces on the patio, the roofing was stripped, and the corner eave resided on the front lawn, explaining the new view of the sky from the guest bathroom.  Trees, usually lush with summertime foliage, were winter bare, even the evergreens.  Of course, many were so hobbled and broken, their survival was questionable.  And fallen, uprooted trees were plentiful, too.

Our house in Gulfport, Mississippi, a day after Hurricane Katrina (roads freshly cleared). We were two houses short of flooding.

In fact, we were barely out of the neighborhood when we came upon a fallen tree straddling John Clark Road from ditch to ditch. Apparently, our efforts to get home were over in less than a quarter mile’s drive.  As we contemplated turning around, two men with chain saws popped out of the pick-up in front of us (I love Mississippi men) and buzzed through the obstruction, tossing wood chunks to the side until a passable expanse emerged.  We dodged debris and scooted under sagging power lines the rest of the way, all the while dumbfounded at the amount of destruction this understudy to Hurricane Camille had caused.

Shipwreck at Floral Hills Cemetery in Gulfport after Hurricane Katrina. Notice the empty headstone vases...the silk flowers were all over the Bayou Oaks neighborhood in Gulfport, decorating the piles of debris.

The closer we got to home, the more we realized that something profound had happened. Passing over the bridge, we saw the dozens of boats that had been protectively moored inland; these were now battered or sunken or tossed ashore.  The streets of our neighborhood were impassable, so we parked and walked in, dazed by the gut-wrenching sight.  Our beautiful, manicured community had become a foul, rubbage-filled hell hole.  Our own house had luckily escaped flooding, but many of our neighbors’ homes would have to be gutted.  Furniture and clothes and personal belongings of every sort had washed into the streets; the eclectic piles lay smeared in the muddy silt of Bayou Bernard, colorless except for the surreal splashes of silk flowers that had blown over from Floral Hills Cemetery.

Many houses in Gulfport experienced flooding during Hurricane Katrina, even though they were not in flood zones. This is a house on our street in Bayou Oaks.

If someone had told us before this storm that one day our house would incur $46,000 in damages and we would feel damned lucky about it, I never would have believed them. But I assure you, as the reality of Hurricane Katrina became clearer, that’s exactly how we felt.

Tomorrow:  Hurricane Katrina – Four Year Anniversary – Part IV.

Karen Blakeney

The Quail Ridge House - shingles and garage door missing. Hurricane Katrina, Gulfport, Mississippi.

[Click here for Part I.]

August 28-29, 2005

The wind blew briskly as we climbed out of our SUV at Granny’s house in Quail Ridge. Our girls, Natalie and Michelle, were fine with evacuating, but Steven, like his father, wasn’t keen on the idea.  If he could have had his way, we would be riding out Katrina at our own house in Bayou Oaks.  Notice, I said Bayou Oaks.  Hurricanes and bodies of water are not a good combination ever.  I don’t care that we were not in a flood zone.

Personally, I didn’t think ten miles up the road was far away enough. I hate hurricanes; I prefer as much distance from them as possible.  The fellas in my family, on the other hand, seemed ready to don Superman capes to fight the apocalyptic wind in hand-to-hand combat.  Testosterone, I am convinced, carries a side effect of uncontrollable attraction to insane adventure.

My childhood experience with Hurricane Camille was enough adventure to last my lifetime. In fact, I would have preferred to be as far away from Gulfport, Mississippi, as possible back then.  Little Bryan’s smart mom and dad had whisked him off to Laurel during Camille, so he didn’t seem to have a grasp of reality about how awful sitting in the middle of a major storm can be.

Nathan, four-years-old at the time, took it all in stride. This was just a trip to “Janny’s” house.  He ate spaghetti and watched cartoons until the power went out.  Then he went to bed.  Nathan still slept a lot back in those days before his heart surgery.  As the winds increased to the point of howling, I was glad he could sleep through it.  I would have hated for him to spend that night like I did through Camille…wild-eyed and frightened.

The night got hairy quickly. After the power went out, a steady dripping sound began to blend with the constant roar of the wind.  Soon, every light fixture in the house began to drip and then pour rainwater, a sure sign that we had lost ridge vents and shingles.  While my mother tried to rest in the east bedroom, the winds escalated from loud to ferocious, and then she heard a powerful ripping sound from above.  She ran to the other side of the house to tell me she felt certain a tornado had ripped out a portion of the roof.

As I watched Nathan sleeping, a little Hurricane-Camille-deja-vu took over, causing me to worry that the house might deteriorate to the point of caving in on us. How would I protect Nathan?  Then a horrendous clamor of metal exploded above the roar of the winds.  “The garage door is coming apart,” Bryan called from the washroom where a windowed door allowed him to see the calamity.  “Watch Nathan for me,” I told my mom as I rounded the doorway to see for myself.

The entire ceiling over the garage was swollen with rainwater and bursting at the seams; and the garage door was a mangled piece of metal, buckling and banging in the wind. We should have left the state.  I felt like screaming, I told you so! Before I could launch into a tirade, Bryan and Steven slipped out the door and began trying to tie down the wildly flailing garage door with a long nylon cord.  My mom was a nervous wreck.  “Karen,” she said, “you’ve got to get them back inside!  It’s too dangerous!”

Mad as I was, I still didn’t want any harm to come to my guys. “It’s not important!” I yelled through the roaring wind.  “Come back!”  Bryan muttered something about trying to save our SUV from getting pummeled by the door.  The words were barely out of his mouth when a powerful gust busted down two storage room doors, blowing the one closest to Bryan off its hinges.  The explosion of wind lifted Bryan and Steven.  I could hardly believe my eyes.  They hung on to the flying door and tried to secure it back to the doorjamb!  Remember what I said about testosterone?

“Bryan, forget about it!” I yelled.  “Come inside!” They continued to struggle in the maelstrom of wind and water, determined to reattach that blasted door.  Who do you suppose won that battle?  Bryan or Katrina?  That wretched woman jerked him against the wall like he was Raggedy Andy.  In the process, his finger was slammed between the door and the doorjamb.  He winced, he finally let go, and he pulled himself together.  As he walked inside, he stiffened his face, I suppose to maintain dignity–would have made a perfect “I’m good” commercial.

As the evening progressed, the chimney came crashing onto the patio; now water and ash were pouring down the flue.  Dawn was breaking as we sloshed across the carpet and competed for a view through a small gap in the the window’s plywood covering.  The wind was still full force all these hours later; an assortment of debris…shingles, siding, branches, fencing…flew through the air.  Trees danced wildly, sometimes uprooting or snapping.  I wondered, shouldn’t this storm be slowing down by now?

While we gawked at the unrelenting tempest, Natalie’s cell phone rang. “Mom and Dad,” she said as she hung up, “Taylor’s house is flooding; they’ve moved up to the second floor.”  Flooded?  That seemed impossible.  Bayou View doesn’t flood; at least, it didn’t flood during Camille which was the worst hurricane in the history of the universe.

Or so we thought.

Tomorrow:  Hurricane Katrina – Four Year Anniversary – Part III

Karen Blakeney