signs of spring

[OT from cottage renovations]

yes, it's that time of year again ... the feeder is out and the annual race is on.  the outcome -- win or lose -- will be posted in this space. 

incidental botanicals

[OT from cottage renovations]

the expedition was about rebuilding but during breaks there were opportunities to appreciate the setting. 

(click through these thumbnails for higher resolution images)

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Gautier, MS

at the job site, 25 March

Azalea

26 March:

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New Orleans

Jackson Square, 29 March 2008

   

end of the line

[OT from cottage renovations]

(click through these thumbnails for higher resolution images)

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New Orleans, LA

having gone through Gulfport, Pass Christian and Bay St. Louis we then went onward into New Orleans.  we entered from the SE through the 9^th Ward. 

as elsewhere along the coast the greater accretion of debris had been cleared away.  rather than bare concrete pads or twisted stilts on empty lots, what one sees is structures that are for the most part standing, still showing search team triage marks.  a few have been razed, here and there one has been gutted in preparation for rebuilding to come, but most are just sitting there waiting for something to be done. 

it's like this for blocks and blocks: homes and small businesses that haven't come back to life. 

I ended up putting down the camera, except for this one image: it will have to convey the sense of solitary despair for the rest. 
I just couldn't go poking a lens into the misfortune of others. 

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the one image with which to leave the end of of the line is this one from a few days earlier in Gautier.  these tattered trails of random fabric, blown off into the wind and snared by tree limbs during the storm, are for me the most haunting of sights. 

the people whose clothes they had been may have made it out, or maybe not.  and if they didn't, their remains may have been found, or maybe not.  there isn't a way to know. 

sometimes people put wispy black or white rags out on tree branches at Halloween to spook the place up for the benefit of children.  there's no harm in that, it's just a bit of fun.  but from now on whenever I see them, this is what will come to the mind's eye, a reminder of what and who was lost in the storm. 

if spirits they are, let them rest in peace.