Last night I cried for New Orleans

We recently, as a family, had the privilege of viewing the new feature-length documentary Katrina's Children from the relative comfort of our mostly-renovated living room.
The film focuses on nineteen children from various New Orleans area neighborhoods. The narrative is presented entirely through the words and artwork of the children. Through the magic of animation, their paintings are brought to life as they tell their stories -- stories of survival... of death... of loss... of destruction and fear... and of faith and hope.

I admit that I approached the film apprehensively. On the one hand, I expected the skewed editing and political bias that we've gotten from Katrina documentaries to date. On the other, I assumed that even if this film managed to achieve some sense of honesty that it couldn't possibly tell us anything we didn't already know given our personal Katrina experience. I was genuinely surprised on both counts.

The issues are all there - poverty, crime, racial inequality, the Corps of Engineers, the failed response, the effects of class disparity, the hellishly slow rebuilding effort, the depression and apathy of the (still ongoing) aftermath.... Oh, our children are so much wiser than we give them credit for! One little boy's artistic vision will stay with me for a long time: Hurricane Katrina spinning toward the symbol of Yin-Yang... Will the hurricane destroy it? We don't know. He explained "The black has a little bit of white in it.. and the white has a little bit of black in it...." In his vision the storm was ultimately defeated by not one - but two powerful dragons using their diametrically opposed powers of fire and frost together to stop it. (Some of my old philosophy professors would love to see this kid in their classes someday.... ) And another little boy's words will remain forever burned into my heart and mind: "I don't hate white people. I want to be a white person."

Do you remember the horror stories that came out of Katrina? The dead bodies? The dying babies? The shootings and stabbings? The suicides? Do you remember when all of those stories were slowly and systematically reduced to myth and urban legend? Well there are quite a few of these children who were apparently never told that the horrors they witnessed never actually happened.... And no one ever will.

After the film it was our son, George, who remarked first: "I'm just so shocked at what these kids went through - the stuff they had to see." This, coming from the boy who was only 8 years old himself when he survived Katrina... So confused as to what was actually going on that it wasn't until the water had started to recede and we adults were crying with joy that he finally shouted: "I don't want to die!" He remembers the terrible heat, the foul-smelling house, the lack of food, the threat of disease, the wild dogs growling through the neighborhood at night, and sobbing hysterically when we explained that we all had to use a plastic coffee can as a toilet. Yet he said in true sincerity: "Nothing really happened to us.... those poor kids."

Dave and I were simultaneously struck dumb by the state of New Orleans. Here we are - three years out from that terrible day - and nearly done (yes... really) with our Katrina repairs. Nothing is the same, mind you... Our neighborhood is a little older... a little more depressed... a little shabbier than it was pre-Katrina... But it's a neighborhood again. We couldn't understand how things could stand still: Neighborhoods that look like war zones (complete with guard patrols). Gutted houses. Ungutted houses. FEMA trailers. It's like Dorothy stepping out of the Kansas house into the wrong side of that rainbow. Late last night I cried for New Orleans.... and early this morning I slept fitfully while I dreamed of broken houses and mud-caked mementos.

But when I woke up not long ago I was drawn to look out our front door... And I realized something very, very important. Out through our front door.. over our thick, green lawn and past the poorly patched street.... Behind the brick house across the street and the few broken oaks that have recovered enough to block the view.... There is a neighborhood like that. Other than a few empty slabs scattered throughout and a handful of algae-covered FEMA trailers - street after street yields abandoned homes - left as they were the day after the storm. The broken windows and poison ivy growing over the rooftops can barely hide the piles of rotting possessions inside. Lives. Row after row of lives still interrupted (if not halted altogether) - and merely 600 feet away from my front door. Yet, we forget that it's there. The mice and rats had run out of food there several months ago and invaded this neighborhood.... Without much thought we understood that our new mouse problem was a result of it. But how how how do we forget? How do we ignore it day after day?

It was in this way that Katrina's Children was truly eye-opening for us. Right here - in the aftermath... In the middle of the destruction.... We have been surviving and recovering. We have built ourselves a bubble and we have chosen to live in it for our own sanity. We barely leave the emotional safety net of our own home as we work desperately to remove any reminders of the horrors of Katrina that remain within. We walk through the realm of anti-Oz every day and consciously choose not to see what is around us for fear that it will finally break us.

And if we can manage such selective vision - is it any wonder that the rest of the world, so far removed, has been able to forget and move on?

A couple of the children in the film mentioned that their parents didn't understand. Their parents told them it was over. It's over. Forget about it. I suppose those parents have constructed a bubble of their own. Thank God for the children to remind us that it's not over...

Our future is in these kids' hands. For a while there - that thought concerned me. What would become of a region whose children had suffered so much loss and tragedy -- all at once? The answer lies with these nineteen kids.... and with all of the kids like them along the Katrina-ravaged coast. From Bayou la Batre, Alabama through every city on the Mississippi Gulf Coast to the mosquito coast of Louisiana and northward into tragic New Orleans - we are promised a future generation of people made courageous through loss and wise through tragedy. It's up to us now to teach the final lesson - to ensure that theirs is not a generation of bitterness and disillusionment.

We are very grateful for the opportunity to view this beautiful film. We hope that many more people will have the chance to look into the eyes of these children and listen to their words of innocent wisdom. This is what we need - not just those of us here in Katrina Oz -- but all of us.