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Watching Katrina Of Wind and WaterBy Rick Horowitz
He watches -- how can he not watch? He watches as the water breaks through the walls. He watches the water fill the streets, and creep up the sides of buildings, brown with mud, slick with oil, filthy and fetid as the hours drag on. As the days drag on. There are bodies in the water. He hears about them, though he hasn't seen them yet. Perhaps the cameras, or those who point the cameras, have decided to spare him the sight of bodies floating in the water. He's grateful for the restraint, fleeting as it surely is; he knows he'll see the bodies soon enough. There are people in the water, and on the rooftops, waving, waiting, desperate for deliverance. He cheers as the baskets are lowered, holds his breath until the desperate are safely inside the helicopters. There are others, equally desperate, who never made it to the rooftops. "How could they have stayed?" he wonders, and then remembers all the warnings he himself ignored not that long ago. A hurricane was coming, the television had shouted -- leave while you still can. He was in the path. He heard all the warnings. Heard them and shrugged his shoulders. It would be a bother to pack up, he told himself. And besides, think of the traffic. And besides, it would spoil his vacation. And besides... And that was a house that meant nothing to him. No history, no memories. What possessions he had with him had arrived with him, just days earlier, and had easily fit inside a suitcase and a few duffel bags. These things of his could have been gathered up again just as easily, had he chosen the sensible course, had he chosen to make his escape ahead of the approaching storm. And yet hadn't he stayed? Hadn't he enjoyed the thrill of anticipation as the sky darkened and the wind gained strength? And afterward, after the storm had brushed past and left everything just where it was supposed to be -- hadn't he been pleased with himself for sticking it out? Pleased, and filled with new stories to tell? So who was he to pass judgment on these people? To leave would have been to leave everything. To lose everything. So they stayed -- scared or serene or sick or sentimental. And lost everything. More than everything. He watches -- how can he not watch? There are looters in the water. He watches them breaking the glass and scouring the aisles, making off with whatever they can carry. "How can they do that?" he wonders, and then remembers his Bible-study classes so very long ago. To save a life, his teachers told him, one can break a law. One can run a red light. One can even break into a drug store, his teachers told him, to get life-sustaining medicine. Bread, milk, water, diapers -- he's willing to apply the same principle. But flat-panel TVs? There was nothing in his lessons that covered flat-panel TVs. He's angry, and embarrassed. (He also finds himself hoping to see just one white looter -- one white looter anywhere -- if only to delay the inevitable posturing for a minute or two.) He watches the speeches and the news conferences. Watches the trucks arrive and the buses depart. Watches the tear-filled eyes and the hollow, vacant stares. And he wonders, did he really wish for this? Not for this, no -- certainly not. But there was a moment... There was a moment when he first heard that the hurricane had veered, that this enormous hurricane, with all its growing fury, and with this beautiful, bizarre, pained and thoroughly irreplaceable city dead in its sights, had, ever-so-slightly and at the last possible minute, turned away. It would be no big deal after all, he thought to himself. There would be no big stories. Was he -- just for a moment, no more than a moment -- disappointed? He watches -- how can he not watch? And he's ashamed. Posted 9/1/05. Get
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Rick Horowitz
