One of the saddest things I've had to deal with (outside of my own personal drama) over the past year or so was being in southeast Texas immediately after Hurricane Ike devastated the area. To call what happened "devastation" would be to seriously understate the degree and scope of the damage I observed for close to two months. I was in southeast Texas four days after Ike made landfall on the night of September 12th, and I was there until November 5th. During that time, I saw more of the aftermath that most of the locals. Most of the folks directly effected by Ike were so wrapped up in their only situation (and understandably so) that they had little idea what might have happened 20, 50, or 70 miles away. Not only did I travel through the eight-county Houston metropolitan area, but I also spend a good deal of time in some of the much less affluent areas of deep east Texas near the Louisiana border. If I live to be 105 and never again see anything like what I saw in the aftermath of Ike, I'll die a very happy man.
Hurricane Ike was more than just a professional challenge for me, though it was certainly that and then some. This one was personal, as the the eye of the hurricane went straight up the western shore of Galveston Bay and over the top of Seabrook, where I lived for ten years. When I left Texas in late September, 2007, I never imagined that I'd be back a mere year later in a professional capacity dealing with the aftermath of a major hurricane. Outside the personal drama involved in returning to Texas, going back to Seabrook was one of the most difficult things I've had to do. I've lived and worked in three different war zones, and I've never seen or experienced anything like the in some cases complete devastattion I saw in Seabrook and surrounding areas.
I have no words to describe the sorrow I felt in returning to my former hometown. I've dealt with natural disasters (and war zones) before, and maintaining a degree of professional detachment is as much self-preservation as a means of doing my job. Being in Seabrook, though, and in traveling throughout southeast Texas, made maintaining anything resembling professional detachment close to impossible. Driving through Seabrook, I saw people dumping their belongings on the curb, because they were soaked with sea water and riven with mold and mildew. These were people I ran into at the post office, at Kroger, and at Blockbuster. Few of these people were anything you could describe as "wealthy", and many had lost everything. There is simply no way I can adequately describe the sorrow that weighed (and still weighs) on my heart. Seeing whole neighborhoods of my former hometown reduced to uninhabitable, moldy piles of wood, brick veneer, and sheet rock...and realizing that but for the gift of time it could have been me in that situation....was almost more than I could handle
Driving through Galveston and along the Bolivar Peninsula reduced me to tears more times than I care to remember. I'm no fan of Texas, but I've always loved Galveston, and what I returned to was a town that smelled like garbage. The Bolivar Peninsula looked- and still looks today- like Ground Zero from a nuclear blast. The state of Texas is just now beginning to get a handle on the damage done to Galveston Bay. There are whole areas- like the Bolivar Peninsula- that may not be habitable for years. At the very least, it will be a long, long time- perhaps years- before less affluent areas like Galveston and Chambers County fully recover.
The biggest problem is that while southeast Texas continues to struggle towards recovery, the nation, and our government, has moved on. Yes, we've got an economy circling the drain and we're in the throes of perhaps the worst recession any of us have ever known. Dealing with that has to be a priority, but how can we continue to pump billions into wars in Iraq and Afghanistan when AMERICANS along the Texas Gulf Coast are still suffering? (And what about New Orleans? Hellos Hurricane Katrina? @005??) There's still a tremendous amount of clean-up work to be done six months after Ike visited southeast Texas, and it appears that it simply isn't a priority for the federal government.
Perhaps if Hurricane Ike had devastated the Hamptons, things would be different....
Six months later, and Hurricane Ike continues to have a profound emotional effect on me. It's difficult to explain, because I really don't have a vocabulary sufficient to give voice to the sadness and anguish I continue to feel for the friends and colleagues I left behind in the Houston area. Houston itself will be just fine; the city has the money and the resources and the connections in Washington to ensure that it will bounce back quickly. For less affluent areas like Galveston and Chambers counties, though, it is, and will continue to be, a much different story.
Meanwhile, though the cleanup continues, healing the scars on my soul is a process that's going to take a long, long time. I can only hope that I never see the like of Ike again.
