noelleprice (![[info]](http://p-stat.livejournal.com/img/userinfo.gif){kind=small} noelleprice) wrote,@ 2006-09-18 20:44:00 |
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Opelika, Biloxi, and home
The weather was beautiful in Tennessee... hot enough to make me happy in the daytime, clear as a bell, and cool in the mornings and evenings. As I make my way southward, I seem to be gaining about 2 degrees and 5 percentage points of humidity for every 100 miles. But it feels like home.
In Opelika, Alabama I stayed with Crystal, another Coke Scholar, and her husband David, both of whom I knew from the January Slidell trip. They showed me around Auburn University, which was really neat. I also got to meet some of the other folks who are going to come with them when they bring a group of volunteers out to help with construction in October. Yay! Volunteers. We need 'em. Bring 'em on. We played a few rounds of liar's poker, which was good fun because we were analyzing the nature of the game at the same time as we were playing it. Then I got to sleep on a real bed for the first time since I last slept in my bed in Santa Barbara on June 24th (not that I'm counting). Actually, I did get to sleep on a very nice futon in Philly. I think a bed is the only thing from my comfier life that I do miss sometimes.
Travel note - cheapest gas of the trip: $2.39 a gallon in Waugh, Alabama. Exactly $1 a gallon less than the last price I paid in California.
On my way back I really wanted to check in on Biloxi and see how re-building is going there. The answer is that they've done a lot, and there's a whole lot still undone. Here's a pic to give you a quick visual... this is taken along the road I took from Biloxi to Gulfport 9 months after the storm.
by grey_mare
There are some great aerial photos of the Gulf Coast at http://www.pbase.com/smms/katrina_after
Biloxi Bound
I came in June 2002 in search of Keesler Air Force Base
like most of my dad's stories it was a name without a face
took a picture of the guard gate, ate fried chicken on the sand
and dreamed me fuzzy photos of my dad as a young man
what a difference a few years make - summer two thousand and six
they've done a bang-up job with clean-up, but there's so much here to fix
watch construction and destruction sites play leapfrog down the shore
and conjure fuzzy photos of things to be and things no more
on the cutoff for Biloxi, take a thoughtful look around
no one's coming here by accident, assume some common ground
you can look a stranger in the eye while driving into town
because wherever you may come from, you are both Biloxi bound
some are drawn to devastation, some are called here to rebuild
some are here just for the money, some to prove it can't be killed
some have come here snapping pictures, some are paying their respects
some returning one last time to pack whatever they've got left
some have chosen here to holiday, for a kinder kind of sin
gambling freely in casinos where _somebody_ always wins
some greet the future full of pride, some stay in spite of fear
just can't imagine coming home to anywhere but here
on the cutoff for Biloxi, take a thoughtful look around
no one's coming here by accident, assume some common ground
you can look a stranger in the eye while driving into town
because wherever you may come from, you are both Biloxi bound
The weather was beautiful in Tennessee... hot enough to make me happy in the daytime, clear as a bell, and cool in the mornings and evenings. As I make my way southward, I seem to be gaining about 2 degrees and 5 percentage points of humidity for every 100 miles. But it feels like home.
In Opelika, Alabama I stayed with Crystal, another Coke Scholar, and her husband David, both of whom I knew from the January Slidell trip. They showed me around Auburn University, which was really neat. I also got to meet some of the other folks who are going to come with them when they bring a group of volunteers out to help with construction in October. Yay! Volunteers. We need 'em. Bring 'em on. We played a few rounds of liar's poker, which was good fun because we were analyzing the nature of the game at the same time as we were playing it. Then I got to sleep on a real bed for the first time since I last slept in my bed in Santa Barbara on June 24th (not that I'm counting). Actually, I did get to sleep on a very nice futon in Philly. I think a bed is the only thing from my comfier life that I do miss sometimes.
Travel note - cheapest gas of the trip: $2.39 a gallon in Waugh, Alabama. Exactly $1 a gallon less than the last price I paid in California.
On my way back I really wanted to check in on Biloxi and see how re-building is going there. The answer is that they've done a lot, and there's a whole lot still undone. Here's a pic to give you a quick visual... this is taken along the road I took from Biloxi to Gulfport 9 months after the storm.
by grey_mare
There are some great aerial photos of the Gulf Coast at http://www.pbase.com/smms/katrina_after
Biloxi Bound
I came in June 2002 in search of Keesler Air Force Base
like most of my dad's stories it was a name without a face
took a picture of the guard gate, ate fried chicken on the sand
and dreamed me fuzzy photos of my dad as a young man
what a difference a few years make - summer two thousand and six
they've done a bang-up job with clean-up, but there's so much here to fix
watch construction and destruction sites play leapfrog down the shore
and conjure fuzzy photos of things to be and things no more
on the cutoff for Biloxi, take a thoughtful look around
no one's coming here by accident, assume some common ground
you can look a stranger in the eye while driving into town
because wherever you may come from, you are both Biloxi bound
some are drawn to devastation, some are called here to rebuild
some are here just for the money, some to prove it can't be killed
some have come here snapping pictures, some are paying their respects
some returning one last time to pack whatever they've got left
some have chosen here to holiday, for a kinder kind of sin
gambling freely in casinos where _somebody_ always wins
some greet the future full of pride, some stay in spite of fear
just can't imagine coming home to anywhere but here
on the cutoff for Biloxi, take a thoughtful look around
no one's coming here by accident, assume some common ground
you can look a stranger in the eye while driving into town
because wherever you may come from, you are both Biloxi bound
